[tom s]

I was told Summit had them also but since I don’t need them yet I have not checked.Tom

[78w72]

Originally Posted by Formulajones

Couple things. They suggested decades ago the thinner oil for hydraulic roller lifters, not the flat tappets. What people seem to miss, we had better quality then with tight internal tolerances. Not so much today.

The problem with lifter manufactures still suggesting this thin oil today, is they are in denial that there is even a lifter problem, so for anyone to still take their suggestions on oil viscosity seems a little sketchy to say the least. How can we listen to a cam manufacture tell us we still need 10-30 oil in our hydraulic rollers when they won't admit they have a manufacture defect?? See what I mean?

I'm not saying one is right or wrong, but there is definitely some questionable stuff here worth looking at.

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wasnt sure what you meant by "decades" ago, roller lifters for pontiacs werent really that popular/common 2 decades ago so i thought maybe you meant FT lifters. going back about 10-15 years is when comp had the original versions that were notorious for noise, many got replaced under warranty so im sure comp & other companies were aware of the issues but may not have publicly admitted it?

but they did change the manufacturer about 7 years ago with the "s" type that i have now, they replaced the originals a year or 2 out of warranty with no hassle, indicating again they knew of the issues. based on my experience & others ive read about, the newer "s" ones have better tolerances &/or relocated oil bands, so todays lifters are better than the older ones it seems yet they still recommend 10/30. havent heard of anyone using 20/50 & fixing their ticking lifters...

i dont really see them recommending 10/30 oil as sketchy for lifters or in engines built for street/light strip use, suggesting overly thick oil is whats kinda sketchy. id much rather have good flow with good psi than overly thick oil. keep in mind its not just lifter companies suggesting 10/30, its many reputable builders, SD said to use 10/30 for best results in these current HR lifters, my experienced builder suggested 10/30 for my engine, so thats what i use.

im not saying one is right or wrong either, just reiterating what has been recommended by comp & many builders. i guess if someone has tickers & wants to experiment its pretty easy to put in some 20/50 & see if the noise changes.

[Formulajones]

Originally Posted by 78w72

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wasnt sure what you meant by "decades" ago, roller lifters for pontiacs werent really that popular/common 2 decades ago so i thought maybe you meant FT lifters. going back about 10-15 years is when comp had the original versions that were notorious for noise, many got replaced under warranty so im sure comp & other companies were aware of the issues but may not have publicly admitted it?

but they did change the manufacturer about 7 years ago with the "s" type that i have now, they replaced the originals a year or 2 out of warranty with no hassle, indicating again they knew of the issues. based on my experience & others ive read about, the newer "s" ones have better tolerances &/or relocated oil bands, so todays lifters are better than the older ones it seems yet they still recommend 10/30. havent heard of anyone using 20/50 & fixing their ticking lifters...

i dont really see them recommending 10/30 oil as sketchy for lifters or in engines built for street/light strip use, suggesting overly thick oil is whats kinda sketchy. id much rather have good flow with good psi than overly thick oil. keep in mind its not just lifter companies suggesting 10/30, its many reputable builders, SD said to use 10/30 for best results in these current HR lifters, my experienced builder suggested 10/30 for my engine, so thats what i use.

im not saying one is right or wrong either, just reiterating what has been recommended by comp & many builders. i guess if someone has tickers & wants to experiment its pretty easy to put in some 20/50 & see if the noise changes.

That's really not what I was trying to convey. I never said it would fix it, just pointing out there are things to look at here that should raise an eye brow. When I said sketchy, I wasn't talking about the thin oil being sketchy, I was talking about the recommendation itself coming from people that can't admit there is a problem to begin with and hopefully open up the thought process a bit and realize these suggestions were coming from people in denial. This industry isn't a dictatorship or run by a communist party, (least not yet anyway) we can think for ourselves, at least I hope so. I'm just tossing out things to consider, or reasons why maybe we shouldn't take some of this stuff as "set in stone"

These bleed down problems weren't just a Pontiac issue either. But to be upfront about it, I've never had any of these issue myself, with the old lifters and short oil bands from Johnson (Sold by Comp at that time) or the new "S" lifters. They've all run quiet for me for many years in several Pontiacs So I'm not complaining about any of it, I just find the discussion interesting and pointing out things that others may not look at and hopefully at least shed a different perspective on it instead of the same old regurgitated stuff we always hear.

[78w72]

Originally Posted by Formulajones

That's really not what I was trying to convey. I never said it would fix it, just pointing out there are things to look at here that should raise an eye brow. When I said sketchy, I wasn't talking about the thin oil being sketchy, I was talking about the recommendation itself coming from people that can't admit there is a problem to begin with and hopefully open up the thought process a bit and realize these suggestions were coming from people in denial. This industry isn't a dictatorship or run by a communist party, (least not yet anyway) we can think for ourselves, at least I hope so. I'm just tossing out things to consider, or reasons why maybe we shouldn't take some of this stuff as "set in stone"

These bleed down problems weren't just a Pontiac issue either. But to be upfront about it, I've never had any of these issue myself, with the old lifters and short oil bands from Johnson (Sold by Comp at that time) or the new "S" lifters. They've all run quiet for me for many years in several Pontiacs So I'm not complaining about any of it, I just find the discussion interesting and pointing out things that others may not look at and hopefully at least shed a different perspective on it instead of the same old regurgitated stuff we always hear.

sorry for any confusion, i knw you werent saying the 10/30 oil was sketchy, you meant the suggestion to use it for HR lifters was sketchy. my point is that comp & others know of the issues but still suggest that oil, if they found a thicker oil was better for the noise issue they would recommend that. i didnt get that SD was in denial or comp, they are well aware of the issues but still say 10/30 is best.

im not a blind follower of most things either, but when reputable people like SD say what they have found to be the best approach, i do follow that. just like i trust cliffs way of setting the preload yet most ofther companies dont suggest that procedure. people like that have tested these things & have experience with it to know it works.

why comp & other companies still say to use 10/30 is beyond me but it works good for my set up & with the engine tighter tolerances i havent had any reason to try a thicker oil. but for those with bad tickers it would be easy to try a thicker oil to see if it improves it, if it does great, thats a band-aid for the problem, if not, that indicates comp & others have found 10/30 works best for the noise issue & the problem is in the lifter bleed down rates related to tolerances & no oil will change that.

[Formulajones]

Now if they would have only admitted that back then all of us would have been ahead of the game a long time ago.


It's pretty apparent, at least from reading on this forum, that bleed down rates are still a problem with some of todays lifters. We are still getting threads like this that pop up about lifter tick.

[Tim Corcoran]

The correct way to adjust a hydraulic lifter is to set it at 1/2 the pre-load. Every lifter brand and type has a different pre-load so you can't just say set it at 1/2 or 3/4 turn. If you don't know what the pre-load travel is then you can set it zero lash then while turning the poly lock by hand count the number of turns it takes to bottom out, then back it off to 1/2 that amount. If you still have ticking you can try adding or subtracting the pre-load a little and this may correct it. If after all this and you still have a ticker you may have a bad lifter. If you still have a few tickers then you may have purchased poor quality lifters like Moral to save money. As far as hyd rollers, good lifters are very expensive these days but you get what you pay for. I highly recommend the Johnson 21120PR Hydraulic rollers, Butler and others cary them. If by chance your geometry is off this may also cause lifter noise and would require correct length pushrods to correct.

[lust4speed]

I was going to support the "decades ago" but looked up the last time I built the engines in the Cruiser and blue GTO. Turned out the Cruiser build was 9-22-04 so only 18 years ago and short of "decades" by two years. I purchased the newly introduced Crane HR lifters and they went in the Cruiser engine followed a month or so later with a set of also just introduced Comps HR lifters going in the blue GTO. Think I had to switch companies because of a fire at the plant producing the Cranes? Both sets were dead quiet and still going strong today. Last couple of years every set from every manufacturer that I have installed have periodic tickers in them. Guess they should have stayed with the ancient hydraulic roller design.

[Formulajones]

Tomato TomOto, Are we really doing this? I think the point got across and that's really all that matters.

[HWYSTR455]

Originally Posted by grivera

Ok - so yesterday I checked things out and the noise is definitely from the passenger side. While I was in there I tried Cliff’s method - went through the firing order for intake and exhaust. Bottomed out each lifter and then backed out one full turn. It still ticks at 800 rpm idle. It doesn’t tick at highway idle so I assume they are pumping up with more RPM. Oil pressure at hot idle is 30, cruising RPM is 60 psi, high idle cold is ~70 psi. Oil is 10W30.

It also occurred to me - over a month ago I did a compression test (cold) on this engine and then a leak down test (hot). The compression on #6 cylinder was 175 psi and all others were 150- 155 psi. The engine has 9.3 compression.

Here are the leak-down test results done with engine at full temperature, all plugs out and each cylinder tested at TDC. Left hand gauge at 90 PSI

1 = 86 psi
8= 84 psi
4= 85 psi
3= 85 psi
6= 84 psi (this is the cylinder with high compression)
5= 85 psi
7= 84 psi
2 = 84 psi

Could the higher compression reading on #6 be the result of the lifter(s) bleeding down on low rpm and not opening the valves enough- and therefore not releasing cylinder pressure at the same rate as the others?

Some videos of idle RPM vs high idle during cold start-up. Ignore the loose PS pump belt…

Idle RPM: https://youtu.be/G47H3BL1s_U

Hi idle: https://youtu.be/nko8XB4-nqc

How high is your 'hi idle'? No tick there that I can tell by the vid.

Just run the idle slightly higher, maybe try going 50 RPM at a time, see where it stops ticking, and check oil psi. If it's under 1000 RPM you're fine. If you're intent is to run X RPM, then note the oil psi at the ROM it stops ticking, and step up oil thickness until you reach the psi it stops ticking at for your desired RPM.

My 535 will tick if I run under 925 RPM, so, I just run it at 925 RPM. Most 'performance' cams like a slightly higher RPM than stock anyway.

Once you move away from a 'stock' or 'factory' configuration, you can't expect to run a stock/factory idle RPM. With a 'performance' cam, and a higher than stock idle RPM, the transition is easier to tune as well.


.

[Formulajones]

Originally Posted by HWYSTR455

How high is your 'hi idle'? No tick there that I can tell by the vid.

Just run the idle slightly higher, maybe try going 50 RPM at a time, see where it stops ticking, and check oil psi. If it's under 1000 RPM you're fine. If you're intent is to run X RPM, then note the oil psi at the ROM it stops ticking, and step up oil thickness until you reach the psi it stops ticking at for your desired RPM.

My 535 will tick if I run under 925 RPM, so, I just run it at 925 RPM. Most 'performance' cams like a slightly higher RPM than stock anyway.

Once you move away from a 'stock' or 'factory' configuration, you can't expect to run a stock/factory idle RPM. With a 'performance' cam, and a higher than stock idle RPM, the transition is easier to tune as well.


.

Yes I agree, idle is another consideration, which gets back to what I mentioned earlier, idle oil pressure and viscosity. All of this combined with low idle rpm can be sort of a domino affect. Really low idle would compound the scenario.

Most cars I have here idle at least around 900 rpm. The automatics might see 800-850 in gear. The manuals 900 to 1000 is the norm. Seems to work for me.


Something else to keep in mind that is somewhat related and worth mentioning.

These camshafts rely on splash oil for lubrication. So unless you run a special lifter that actually squirts oil on the lobe (most probably don't) the only way the lifter and lobe gets oiled is from the oil being slung around inside the engine. This is another good reason to have the idle up a pinch. Idling the engine low at 500-600 rpm, while may work fine, limits the amount of splash oil the camshaft will see. Just food for thought since I know a lot of people worry about cam lobe failure these days.

[grivera]

My idle RPM is 800 and high idle in video is ~1300 rpm. These are good points though- thanks.