[Franked]

Well, I got my heads a few weeks ago, they are KAUFFMAN D-ports, not Edelbrock D-ports, not sure why I thought that, must have been confused during the conversation, when ordering. I have them at my machine shop, so my machinist guy can bash on them, he is super picky, and builds a lot of high RPM racing stuff that wins a LOT, so I can listen to his bitching. He keeps telling me I don't want over 9.25 to 1, the stroker kit/head combo is designed for 10-1 or 10.3 to 1, Kauffman didn't have larger than 85cc chambered heads, so we may be putting thick gaskets, and or leaving the deck height as high as we can.
My Machinist guy says with CA's piss gas (max 91 octane) I really don't want over 9.25-1, or I will have to mix in race gas, and/or have no timing advance.
Any thoughts on this? the gas here does suck for high compression.
Frank

[Franked]

Thank you for the response Paul. I like the Idea of a factory roller lifter, especially if it's lighter. I am wondering what happened to all these guys who had something they made, did anything ever get produced, so Joe public(as in , ME) could buy them? I may try milling the flats lower on some lifters, I bought a 4 pack of the sealed power HT2148s on ebay, they haven't arrived yet, and I took my block and stroker assembly to the machine shop so my guy can tell me how I screwed up, and charge me to make it better, so I can't test right away.
I will post what I decide to try, I am also looking forward to seeing what length custom pushrods I need, I don't have the heads yet, so that is a wait item too.
All this is going into a 1964 Lemans, like my first car, but not the same car, with a T-56 Magnum Transmission, and a 9 inch housing made for these cars. Hopefully I won't be breaking parts!!
Frank

[Bill S]

I have just started my 0.040" over 455 recently with the HT2148 and spider setup. Going easy for awhile breaking in and playing with ignition timing.
My issue is I have HS roller rockers 1.65 ( really 1.69-1.70) ratio, and did not want to replace them. My current head / valve / retainer setup calculated to a safe .570" lift.

All the recommended roller cams would not work with my rockers. I had a cam speced as follows from Ed at Flow Tech.: (I believe Comp Cam intake # 3052 intake , 3053 exhaust), 230 / 240 deg at 0.050" lift, 0.320 cam lift for .544 valve lift. 114 deg LSA installed at 111 deg. Base circle measured 1.189". About 0.030" clearance between the lifter and spider.
Thankfully I still have a Mopar offset key kit # 4286500 to degree the cam properly.
Had to relieve grind the dog bones, with #7 requiring more grinding to get the dog bone perpendicular to the lifter. The other trick is the amount of bending of the spider so it applies sufficient pressure the the dog bones. That took a few rounds a "bend to fit". I applied oil to the setup and rotated a multiple time to ensure the bones were not bind on the lifter, rise up and remained flat. Of course bought a pushrod checker to order the correct length.

I will report back as I plan to have to tested on a DynaPack dyno to compare to my modded '04 GTO.

[Fishin2Deep4U]

I have not run this setup myself. I did help a buddy set his up.

What we ended up doing is simply throw the lifters on my surface grinder and take down the flat on both sides.

We looked at this a couple of different ways and I do not feel this is a best fix. My preference is to use stock components wherever possible so that roadside (shop) repairs are possible. That will not be the case on the road.

After reviewing where the issues are at, I would prefer to build new dog bones with relief for the lifter body. These would be a little thicker, but allow for any stock or equivalent replacement lifter. While not a factory part, I feel that it is probably not a real wear part. I can have these made easily enough so we would have some backups. I did not check the hardness of nor tried to cut the factory dog bones. But I am sure a Pontiac specific replacement part would be easy to get done.

Dave

[Franked]

So, the more I am thinking about this, the more i think I may try yo find some flat-bar steel the right thickness, and width(to be slightly narrower than the dog bones) and weld a strip & grind it down to make the bones, say .050 thicker on the bottom(not at the open end wrench part) so they are high enough to clear the round part of the lifter coming up.
I also think that my roller cam ramps may be too steep, they were hitting on a stock '05 GTO LS2 lifter, I wasn't sure about this, until I read through this whole post and saw that part a couple pages back, thinking I was not really seeing that on my engine. Aparrently I WAS seeing that. it's not a sealed power lifter, if the sealed power lifter hits like that, I may try clearancing the lifters with a flapper wheel on an angle grinder, just bevel the edge slightly so there is at least .010 when it rides up the steepest part of the cam.
My cam is a Butler Spec'd Comp cams grind. BP8022SP,
INT 281, EX 287, LIFT INT.510, EX .520

i was wondering if anyone has tried making the bones thicker on the bottom, and if anyone has clearanced the lifters by the roller part.
I think that would be much stronger than the ones with legs only supporting the axles, I have heard of those failing somewhere in the past where the legs spread out. is the roller significantly larger on the exposed roller lifters? a bigger wheel would be easier to roll up the steep ramps, I suppose.
Frank

[1969GPSJ]

So in my other recent post I noted that Crawdaddy Customs looked at oiling, but if I remember correctly, he also examined some other things with the lifters in his video, not just the oiling - perhaps with the spiders and "bones" too. Something to look at. He did 2 videos - this is the first one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50I58n4vD8U

[geeteeohguy]

OP hasn't updated since January of 2021...over two years ago. I wonder how this worked out for him?

[1969GPSJ]

Franked, you mention you are looking for a solution for issues with this adaptation of a stock style roller lifter for how your engine is configured, what are the exact problems you are trying to solve? Is it because you have more lift than the dogbones and spider can handle, or something else? I am curious since I have been looking at doing this conversion (with a look to avoiding the failures of the tie bars on aftermarket roller lifters). My application is a street application with E heads, and I am not pushing the lift numbers much past .520. I am still looking for the right cam and lifter combination. Jim Lehart came up with the original developments and use of this option: LSX hunter covered it briefly in a video on his channel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAKTh3uWBrE

[rohrt]

I was all on board to go the LS lifter route, but just couldn't pull the trigger. I feel bad for Randy going to all that work to make the plate system only to give up on the idea.

To me it seemed like there was too much block casting inconsistency for the plate system to work.
Too much cam inconsistency - But Randy had a few flavors of lifters to accommodate the different lifts/base circle.
Didn't like how the dog bones would lift up and needed modified with use with the spider.
Didn't like that there just were not very many people using it.

I think the lifter weight is more significant. Heavy lifters need more spring pressure. More spring pressure = more wear on the rollers and thus more prone to fail. Not sure where lifter float come into play but I would imagine that too.

In the end I went the johnson short travel rollers too. Glad I got them at the 700 price and not the 1100 price.

[1969GPSJ]

Sorry to hear that you put all that work into trying to figure out Jim's LS lifter conversion for our Poncho's. It was still really useful info for those contemplating the project! I appreciate your experiments and the videos you do documenting them. Quite a bit on your firebird is similar to my '69 GP.
I think after looking at Jim's original information that I am still heading down the path to using the F*rd spider and dogbones to use an LS style lifter in my 428. I'm probably going to talk to both Kauffman, Butler, and DCI (Don is building my friends aluminum RAV headed engine now https://www.facebook.com/DCIMotorspo...qiMWmPriBrhqwl) before I start buying parts though.

Originally Posted by rohrt

I was all on board to go the LS lifter route, but just couldn't pull the trigger. I feel bad for Randy going to all that work to make the plate system only to give up on the idea.

To me it seemed like there was too much block casting inconsistency for the plate system to work.
Too much cam inconsistency - But Randy had a few flavors of lifters to accommodate the different lifts/base circle.
Didn't like how the dog bones would lift up and needed modified with use with the spider.
Didn't like that there just were not very many people using it.

I think the lifter weight is more significant. Heavy lifters need more spring pressure. More spring pressure = more wear on the rollers and thus more prone to fail. Not sure where lifter float come into play but I would imagine that too.

In the end I went the johnson short travel rollers too. Glad I got them at the 700 price and not the 1100 price.

[Formulajones]

Originally Posted by rohrt

I was all on board to go the LS lifter route, but just couldn't pull the trigger. I feel bad for Randy going to all that work to make the plate system only to give up on the idea.

To me it seemed like there was too much block casting inconsistency for the plate system to work.
Too much cam inconsistency - But Randy had a few flavors of lifters to accommodate the different lifts/base circle.
Didn't like how the dog bones would lift up and needed modified with use with the spider.
Didn't like that there just were not very many people using it.

I think the lifter weight is more significant. Heavy lifters need more spring pressure. More spring pressure = more wear on the rollers and thus more prone to fail. Not sure where lifter float come into play but I would imagine that too.

In the end I went the johnson short travel rollers too. Glad I got them at the 700 price and not the 1100 price.

Enough spring pressure to properly control things shouldn't be so far out of whack on a hydraulic roller setup to even worry about roller wear or failure. I think this whole thought process is really going off the deep end, and probably is more of a result of improper setup to start with than anything else.

A typical hydraulic roller in our Pontiacs, considering the valvetrain weight, really shouldn't need more than 150-160 lbs. on the seat and maybe 420-450 lbs. open as an example. Pontiacs do have heavier valvetrain with their 2.11 intake valve and 1.77 exhaust valve sizes being bigger than a SBC for example. Speaking of which a SBC might only use 130lbs as an example. But those spring pressures can easily control a hydraulic roller well beyond what most would spin their Pontiac engine to and no worry of excessive wear. In fact I set dad's Pontiac engine up with a hydraulic roller and he's running a 2.20" intake valve, it's 160 on the seats and 450 open. It's gone several thousand miles, and I think 3 years now since the change, can't even tell you how many times he's put it on the 6200 chip for one reason or another. My BBC has a 2.25 intake valve, known for valve train control problems, and runs those same spring pressures. That engine has been together almost 25 years like that with a hydraulic roller, never had a valve cover off since and has no problem spinning 6500 rpm. Going racing this Saturday with it as well as dad's car I'd bet after 25 years those spring pressures are significantly less by now. All this stuff is typical link bar setup.

I think where people get into trouble, and I've had this issue myself, is when getting into solid rollers and the spring pressures they require. Had one of those in dad's engine too, that had a very typical 240 lbs. on the seat. Tony Bischoff set that deal up and used what is an acceptable street type spring pressure for a solid roller, tight lash deal, pin oiled Crowers etc..... They lasted about 7000 miles before it ate 2 lifters. Roller wheel failure. Lobe design plays a roll in this as well but when you are using race type parts on the street, along with lash, and spring pressures up in this range, you have to expect it's not going to last forever. Crower had no other explanation, I don't hold them accountable either. It's just the nature of the beast.

Moderate hydraulic rollers however with proper spring pressure, not even on my page of concerns.

[tempest1964]

Looks like you do fine work Stan!

[1968GTO421]

Originally Posted by tempest1964

Looks like you do fine work Stan!

X2 !

[grivera]

Impressive work, Stan! If you really need a challenge I'd like to introduce you to my 69 Lemans!

[mysticmissle]

Paul k has a set up for sale
Right now in the classifieds it’s just a ford Motorsport retro fit link with some
Sanded down dog bones

[Nobuddy]

Perhaps you could cut the Chevy bones and weld with correct spacing? Seems much easier and avoids a lot of unknowns.

Barry

[Stan65]

Thanks for all the interest. I’m looking into it all. Need to figure out ability of the machine shop to make them in quantities and price points. Nobody wants to pay “Friends and Family”, “Venmo” etc. That means in Illinois I have to report it as income and that eats about 40%. I believe this would even raise the break even price to a level no one would want to pay.

I would love to move forward with this, but it might be better for the community for me to just share the CAD drawings and see if anyone runs with it. Still kicking all the options around.

Thanks all,
Stan.

[Franked]

I got my set in the mail last night (12/2)
Thanks Stan!

[Stan65]

FrankieTA,

I will post a picture again of what I measured on my 73 455 block with my cam, and a copy of my cam card.

I do not believe a custom base circle is necessary unless your block has excessive chamfers cut on the top of the lifter bores.

Some have suggested using a Howard’s lifter to replace the Sealed Power HT-2148 I designed these for. If the Howard’s lifter has a narrower soil band that is lower and the oil feed hole is located so that it will get oil 100% of the time, it may change the limitations on lift.

Every block is a little different, as is every cam.

Hope this helps. If I can answer anything else or this wasn’t enough, let me know.

Thanks,
Stuart “Stan” Landreth

[Stan65]

Flingwing,

I actually sent you an email to your personal mail this afternoon.

The next batch will be ready to ship by the end of the week.

Thanks everyone!
Stuart “Stan” Landreth