[PAUL K]

IMO.... Oil and Zinc is just a distraction from crap lifter materials, soft cam cores or poor machining. If I'm correct you can use the highest quality NASA spec oil along with the slickest additive known to man with a break in procedure that would make Hell jealous and you will not prevent a failure.

[Half-Inch Stud]

Originally Posted by Steve C.

OK, is it just marketing hype ???

"Lucas Zinc Additive protects camshaft lifters and valve train during break-in period of motors. It is excellent for flat tappet camshafts during break-in or as an additive to any motor oil to prevent premature wear. .......

Yes indeed that is hype. Zinc during Break in??. How about claims for the long strokes from 300 miles to 30,000 miles? 30,000 to 110,000, 110,000 to 190,000. Zinc is not is the running.

Here is what matters: Lobe lift rate, spring pressure, and every design aspect that supports lifter rotation.

[64speed]

Let’s start an oil fight…just kidding, I will run Lucas or Valvoline VR-1 and if that’s not good enough then I am lost.

[Gach]

I asked my cat and he said he googled it and Google says. Valvoline VR-1 or Lucas. But he’s allergic to zinc. Plus didn’t like the taste, it gave him diarrhea.

[Gach]

Keep your eyes open on Amazon some times they have great sales on Valvoline VR-1 I have enough for 2 more oil changes.

[Elarson]

Originally Posted by Stan Weiss

While to much spring pressure can be a problem. You need to know how much pressure only the outer spring has because to little spring pressure can also be a problem.

This a quote of a post by Mike Jones.



Stan

Interesting quoted post. A couple of comments:

The factories just put a flat tappet engine together and run it in, without changing springs. Aren't all of the factory springs in the mid-to-high 200 lb range?

For the flat tappet lifter to live a long life, it has to spin. Which means the friction on the cam face has to be higher that the rotating drag in the lifter bore. I can easily understand that a too-light spring wouldn't have enough face friction. It also stands to reason that there needs to be a precise fit of the lifter in the bore and there has to be a good oil film in there. Hence the need to get oil flowing immediately on a new engine.

Just my thoughts....

Eric

[Half-Inch Stud]

Polishing the lifter Bores of 50 year old Blocks ought to be a thing, a standard process.

[Jay S]

There are tons of performance applications with other brands that run single springs with 300 lbs over the nose. There is no inner spring to take out. If the builder checked the taper on the lifters and cam on everything I see no reason that you should need to pull the inners on a 60919 with a 1.52 rocker. We pull inner springs these days because the machining is generally crap, and it gives the lobe and lifter more of a chance to break in and not take to much taper off during the break in. If that machining was checked there should not be much reason to pull the inners on a mild cam like a 60919 with .469” lift. Unless, for some odd reason it has a ton of extra spring pressure.

FWIW..We don’t generally go 500 miles on break in oil on a fresh build. We only go 30 to 50 to get rid of the contaminate’s in the oil. The filter doesn’t get them all. After that the oil change interval depends on what the application is. After 50 often we go back to a normal interval. If it survives the cam break in, usually the next test is the engine bearings, then rings. Usually there are contaminate’s in the oil from break in after the first 20 minutes of the cam’s break in, or things that were either left inside the engine from improper clean up. I prefer to change the oil sooner and keep those from cycling thru the engine.


I am a bit surprised people have faith yet in letting a company pick their flat tappet and or spring package out when those vendors claim they have had a 20% (Crower) (??) failure rate? Compared that to Jones (2%). I have noticed Butler’s seem to have a more is better philosophy with spring pressure and they like to sell Compcams XE grinds in flat tappets. Whatever the case, they are doing something wrong or selling the wrong parts. QC at Crower is pretty poor on flat tappet stuff, some to the lifters machining lately is not impressive. 2% to 20% is a heck of a difference in results.

[NeighborsComplaint]

A true to form RA IV cam has a comparatively slow opening and closing ramp compared to modern grinds. This results in lower spring pressures being required to maintain valve control, Spring pressures in the range of 110# seat and 320# fully open are really all that is required. These lower spring pressures combined with factory spec lifter preload provide correspondingly lower pressures at the lifter to cam interface and promote easier rotation of the lifter. Above all ,cam lobes and lifters should display OEM correct tapers.

As someone else mentioned, it is also good practice to blip the throttle during break-in while keeping RPM between 2,000 and 3,000 RPM to promote oil splash to the cam.

[Jay S]

What Crower sells as the 60919 is not a true to form Ram air 4 style cam. It has accelerations more like a modern cam. With 110 lbs seat pressure it can make the top end HP start to nose over. Years ago it may have been more like a RA4.

[Jay S]

Originally Posted by 64speed

They stated while failures did occur it was more like 20% and the returns they received were from obvious poor break in most of the time.

That Crower quote still cracks me up. 1 in 5 and it’s supposedly the consumers fault? That is scary.


What valve spring are being used in this? Crower currently has hydraulic roller spring specs listed on there cam cards for the 60919. I hope that is not what they picked out, that would land you in the 20%.

[Dragncar]

I looked on Jones Cams web site for Pontiac hyd flat tappet lifters and all they had were Chevy. You can use them but did not see a Pontiac or Olds lifter.
Clay Smith does offer a high end Pontiac anti pump up lifter but they are 298 $
Actually a small price to pay if they do their job.

[geeteeohguy]

Another important thing: Use ONLY non detergent or break in oil (Driven) for the cam break in and first 300-500 miles. The detergent in diesel spec and boutique oils WILL remove the break-n paste off the cam and lifters and hold it in suspension instead of leaving it on the cam lobes where it needs to be. This used to never be an issue, as 'back in the day' we always used cheap non detergent oil for cam and engine break-in. That kind of went away. So DO NOT break in your cam with conventional or detergent oil and a ZDDP additive thinking it will be OK. The detergent in the oil will keep the additives OFF the cam and lifters during break in.
There's a great youtube video on 'musclecar solutions' that covers this. Do it once and do it right. Also, as I stated elsewhere, you need to measure the cam lobes for taper and check all of the lifters for crown on a piece of glass. They should all rock. Also, check every lifter for leakdown by soaking in oil and depressing the plunger. IF you get oil back in your face past the plunger, the lifter is no good. One youtuber recently went through 3 sets of lifters to come up with 16 good ones he could use. VERIFY the cam lobe taper and lifter condition BEFORE you install them in the engine.

[Jay S]

Jones sells and uses Hylift Johnson lifters on their cams. I think Clay Smith sells and uses Hylift also. I think it is possible to buy Hylift Johnson from Crower also, they cost 2x as much as their current off the shelf hyd lifter.

[64speed]

I am using Comp Cams 986 springs and will dev be using break in oil. My machinist is confident I will have no problems

[Jay S]

Originally Posted by 64speed

I am using Comp Cams 986 springs and will dev be using break in oil. My machinist is confident I will have no problems

That is good, should work good. With the 1.52 rockers will probably have about 120 seat and 270 lbs max lift with 1.52s. If you pulled the inners on those it would take it down to about 90 seat and 200 lbs max lift. With what the builder did checking the lifter taper is should be fine leaving the inner in.

[mgarblik]

This whole camshaft/lifter break-in mess seems to boil down to a "pick your poison" scenario. For near stock builds, I still don't see a real advantage to going to a roller cam. I say this because there is certainly no guarantee of success. I see thread after thread about defective roller wheels, defective needle bearings and stuck/noisy hydraulic roller lifters. Add to that the minimum $1000.00 EXTRA cost to run one and it's hard to justify, IMO. But, I have done everything right to the best of my ability and had a flat tappet hydraulic camshaft fail in 30 minutes on the dyno. The most recent was last spring on a Ford 260 V-8 stock rebuild for a Falcon Sprint. We are talking about a 170 HP 2-bbl. engine. Little single springs. It started up and ran fine for about 20-25 minutes, then developed a little valve noise and a slight misfire. Shut it down, opened it up and 3 valves were barely opening. Metal paste everywhere. What went wrong? It's a chicken and the egg situation. Who knows. After taking the engine back to the bare block and cleaning everything again, he went with a tiny roller cam. It was about a $1500.00 ordeal with new cam, lifters, gaskets. About 20 hours of disassembly and cleaning.

We don't build and dyno near as many engines as a commercial shop. About 15 a year. In the last 10 years we have had 3 engine failures on the dyno. 1 was a SBC that cracked a head and let water in the cylinder from over-porting. 2 was a 351 Ford that chewed up 2 distributor gears, each lasting about 1/2 hour. Fixed by changing the oil pump. 3 was the 260 Ford mentioned.

[tom s]

I just fired up a new 455 on my run stand.Clay Smith hyd roller cam and Comp Shaver lifters.No issues.Back to flat tappets.Tom

[Half-Inch Stud]

Forum Treads tend to group-overthink some things.

Under-think applies here: Dinosaur oil for ring-seating & Lobe-lifter wear-in. Key words are seating and wear. Indicates metal is removed from 1 or both surfaces.

I use ancient Isky Rev Lube for Flat HYD break-in. I often wonder what grit was used in the MoS2 paste to assure just the right amount of grinding occurred, and just the right finish.

After any length of time, the lifter face seems polished, with the slightest concentric pattern evident, while the successful lobes seem dull and sustain evidence of Parkerizing on 80% on the lobe. Vizard reco's the OPTIONAL case hardening on every Comp Cam he orders. Vizard doesn't seem to have a video on Flat cam failures.

[geeteeohguy]

Originally Posted by mgarblik

This whole camshaft/lifter break-in mess seems to boil down to a "pick your poison" scenario. For near stock builds, I still don't see a real advantage to going to a roller cam. I say this because there is certainly no guarantee of success. I see thread after thread about defective roller wheels, defective needle bearings and stuck/noisy hydraulic roller lifters. Add to that the minimum $1000.00 EXTRA cost to run one and it's hard to justify, IMO. But, I have done everything right to the best of my ability and had a flat tappet hydraulic camshaft fail in 30 minutes on the dyno. The most recent was last spring on a Ford 260 V-8 stock rebuild for a Falcon Sprint. We are talking about a 170 HP 2-bbl. engine. Little single springs. It started up and ran fine for about 20-25 minutes, then developed a little valve noise and a slight misfire. Shut it down, opened it up and 3 valves were barely opening. Metal paste everywhere. What went wrong? It's a chicken and the egg situation. Who knows. After taking the engine back to the bare block and cleaning everything again, he went with a tiny roller cam. It was about a $1500.00 ordeal with new cam, lifters, gaskets. About 20 hours of disassembly and cleaning.

We don't build and dyno near as many engines as a commercial shop. About 15 a year. In the last 10 years we have had 3 engine failures on the dyno. 1 was a SBC that cracked a head and let water in the cylinder from over-porting. 2 was a 351 Ford that chewed up 2 distributor gears, each lasting about 1/2 hour. Fixed by changing the oil pump. 3 was the 260 Ford mentioned.

I like roller cams in late model engines that were born with them. They seem to last. I would not have an aftermarket roller cam in any of my old Pontiacs under any circumstances. Have seen too many fail and spit hardened parts through the engine taking it out, as in this case. The OP's block never would have been destroyed had he used flat tappet cam and lifters. Many of us like to build a Pontiac and enjoy driving without worrying about catastrophic failure. The flat tappet cams I installed in my GTO's 42 and 35 years ago are still doing just fine, with no failures in all those years and miles. Imagine that. Again, break in or non detergent oil. Running regular 'dinosaur' oil won't do. It has detergent in it. You have to have a break-in specific oil these days.