There is a similar lifter question in another thread here and come to find out that TA doesn't even sell the lifters with no hole in it so the only way to have the proper lifters is to take the no hole disc out of your old lifters and install them in new ones. If in you don't have the original lifters then don't worry about changing the discs because in the other thread someone called TA and they said the lifters with the hole in them would work fine. The only concern is that with the hole in the disc that it may bleed off a little bit of oil pressure. As for the cam degreeing, its not the "lobe" that needs to be on TDC(top dead center) it is the number 1 piston that needs to be there. With an aftermarket cam, those are made in short batch runs so the setup isn't as repeatable as it should be so if the cam isn't checked when it is installed it could be a few degrees off possibly making the engine sluggish or have decent low end torque but runs out of steam before 4,000 RPM. That's why an aftermarket cam is degreed, to make sure it performs the way it should. Now if you were to buy a "stock" replacement cam like the Federal Mogul one the single keyway timing gear and chain would work just fine because those are made in WAY bigger batches and dialed in where they are supposed to be(supposedly anyway). GL
You don't really really need the timing chain set to be able to advance or retard. You just have no adjustment if there is a reason to advance or retard. You need to contact crower and see what lifters work for the pushrods/rockers that year engine has. That way if anything is wrong/goes wrong their cam warranty is covered.
To be honest warranty won't be worth much as I'm in the UK and the cost of shipping makes it not viable. I've known of people with parts going wrong and works out cheaper to buy new ones than shipping something over and back again as manufacturer won't cover the cost of sending it back to the US. I will contact Crower now, drop them an email and see what they say. it's just I get a bit of mixed information. I'm already guessing Crower will say for level 2 cam go with the level 2 lifters, which probably have the oiling hole... and then I'll be back to the mixed advice of being ok with solid pushrods.... but then now according to what Derek says above, TA lifters have the hole as well...and I don't have all the lifters to convert the internals, as one of them already had a hole and a pushrod with holes (photo somewhere a couple of pages back) I'll see what Crower says. Hoping to put the order in this week.
The difference in the lifters is the hole in the push rod cup, so that oil can flow through the hollow push rod. The other difference is the ball radius on the end of the solid push rods is slightly smaller 5/32, vs. 3/16 on the hollow push rods. Normally, I would think that it was no big deal to cover the lifter cup hole with a solid push rod as it would block off the oil hole, but I am not sure about using the smaller ball end of the solid push rod in the lifter cup designed for the 3 /16 ball end. If you can find a solid push rod with the bigger ball end, that would solve that problem. You need to be able to degree the cam in as it may not be ground exactly. You want it in right first time.
ah yes! I see what you mean and i can follow. if they were both the same sizes then a solid pushrod would just block the oiling hole. Although looking at this photo - when I found one of my lifters and associated pushrod was incorrect, looks like the solid ones are bigger than the hollow pushrod I found in there. but of course this is the rocker arm side. maybe its different on the other end. I'll check wednesday evening.
Sorry, I got that reversed, the solid push rods have the larger ball end, the hollow push rods have the smaller end. From the TA catalog,
right.. so that wont work. Wont be able to use pushrod oiling lifters with solid pushrods. - If that's the case then my option is t go with TA lifters and TA solid pushrods. But then according to what was said above about TA lifters, that they also have the oiling hole...it's not good. maybe they have the oiling hole but the cup is for a 3/16 ball end. but then.. using TA lifters won't go with what was said about lifters having to match the cam manufacturer.. hahaha, this is a mess! I'll wait to see what Crower says... might give TA a call too, god knows how much will cost calling the US though. I'm down the workshop on wednesday evening, so I'll pull out one lifter of each time and associated pushrod, see the differences. Although all the lifters seem to be pretty stuck, except the one that has hole for hollow pushrod. what a mess EDIT: Just got a reply from Crower.. very helpful... "Yes.. 50257 with 66050 should work…. you tell us push rod length … 70399-16 5/16 ball and ball (5/16 ball) no oil hole…. " and that's it lol
Doesn't T/A still make the hybrid pushrods? Plug the heads, use regular lifters and his 1.59 ratio rockers.
Crower should tell you what lifters to use with your pushrods and rockers. That will answer your questions. Tell them you have the 68-69 with solid pushrods.
I told them, all the information on a really nice well put together email, they replied this: Just got a reply from Crower.. very helpful... "Yes.. 50257 with 66050 should work…. you tell us push rod length … 70399-16 5/16 ball and ball (5/16 ball) no oil hole…. " So basically dont think it works. If the lifters that go with the level 2 cam accept a 5/16 ball end, that will be different from the rocker side, with, being 68/69 will accept a 3/8 ball end. Unless there's something like a pushrod with 5/16 on the lifter side and 3/8 on the rocker side. I doubt though. EDIT - Yes there is, Crower makes them... 200 dollars for a set. don't think so... Will have to ask TA if their lifters accept the 3/8 ball end, which I guess they should as they are advertised for a 68/69 I'm trying to avoid going that way, plugging heads and spending more money on rockers... The other way would be to just get the lifters from TA, if they accept the 3/8 ball ends, and then I would have 3/8 ball ends at both ends of the pushrod, but by doing this I'm going against the advice from Steve Caruso that the lifters should be same brand/go with the cam that has been chosen. not sure how crucial this is....??
The way the rocker oiling system works on the '68 and '69 Buick 350 is that it gets its oil from the block through an oiling journal from the front cam bearing, which leads up through the head and into the rocker bar itself. This supplies oil pressure and volume to the rockers themselves, which have a little oiling provision (hole) that leads down onto the pushrod ball end (rocker side) for lubrication. If the pushrod is solid (as was from the factory), oil pressure is maintained and only a little bit seeps out from around the sides, drizzling back down and finding its way to the oil pan eventually. If the pushrod is hollow (as is the case with later oiling system), it would want to force its way down into the pushrod and toward the lifters---but wait, there's some resistance going on here, since the lifters with holes in them and the hollow pushrods are trying to oil the rocker arms in the opposite direction, so what you'd end up with is a stalemate on oil bleed off, meaning it maintains the oil pressure and will only seep through where it would have done so otherwise with the original setup. Soo...I don't really see an issue here with using either solid or hollow pushrods (or lifters with/without the oiling hole), as long as your pushrod lengths are correct and the ball end sizes are correct. Your rockers are going to be oiled and lubricated regardless. Don't take my advice as gospel, as I may be missing something here, but hopefully others will chime in with affirmation or correct me if I'm wrong.
Steve Caruso has said on more than one occasion that he's found the Crower cams to be pretty accurate, within 1* or so from advertised specs. This means that while degree'ing the cam would still be a good idea, a cam from Crower will likely be close enough if you simply 'lined up the dots' on a single keyway timing gear. With machining variances and tolerances within specs, it's virtually impossible to get everything 'spot on' perfect anyway, and as long as the cam is within a degree or two of its advertised specs, you'd never tell a difference in the way it performs really. To me, it's silly to get a 3 keyway gear since you're stuck with 4* in either direction of straight up, which means that if it's off in default setting, 4* swing in another direction would only help if the cam was off by that much. If you got any multi-keyway gear, you're better off with one that goes in either direction by 2* increments, so you get more precision. Degree'ing a cam is pointless unless you have the proper gear for it. Get Steve's advice on this.
For reference, the Federal Mogul cs647 cam can in fact be obtained from Summit, it just goes by the "Sealed Power" brand name which is supplied by Federal Mogul. https://www.summitracing.com/parts/slp-cs-647 This cam will solve all the headache and extra expense. Just use Sealed Power lifters, stock pushrods, and boom you're done. lol The difference in power you'd feel vs the Crower level 2 cam would be about 10 whole ft. lbs. for a trade-off of 10 whole hp. Plus, the tidbit of info I alluded to earlier in this thread about earlier intake valve closing on the Crower cam being much earlier (58* vs 71*) for your 9.25:1 (or so) static compression, would be pushing the limits for premium petrol octane. More to consider! lol
TA does have an adjustable hybrid pushrod that is 5/16 on one end and 3/8 on other. They are hollow but I'm pretty sure you should not have a problem running these with your stock rockers. As that's what they are for. But it may be best to plug the oiling to head and use the lifter as oiling. Probably won't hurt for both to feed oil into rockers but would be best for one only to feed oil. http://www.taperformance.com/proddetail.asp?prod=TA_1427B Alittle pricey but solves the problem.
Isn't plugging heads as easy as pounding lead into pedestal oil hole? Sounds simple enough. I believe there have been guys that ran those 69 rockers with 5/16" oilhole pushrods, without incident. (no hybrid)
Gary, Sticking a stock cam in it is really something I don’t want to do. Before things went mildly wrong I was already thinking of putting a mild cam on it, and when I got the valve cover rattling and started tearing into this, it went from only putting new pushrods to tear it open completely just because I wanted a mild cam. If I ever thought of just putting a stock cam, then I wouldn’t have bothered going through all this work, I appreciate what you say but for me putting a stock cam, even if difference is not much, would be a waste of time all this tearing the engine apart and pulling it out. The doubt here is how crucial is to have the lifters to match the cam manufacturer? If I get crower cam 2, do I really really really need crower lev 2 lifters? If I don’t, then it’s sorted. 68/69 lifters from TA and stock pushrods from TA. (as they will have 3/8 balls both ends) - will be lifters with 3/8 cup, pushrods to match. The only downside with this is I have to put the whole order in, minus pushrods, and ship to the UK, put the engine together, measure the pushrod length (which I still haven't looked at how to do this) and then put another order from TA just for pushrods. This is the reason why I was trying to get lifters from summit, so they could come with the main bulk order (gaskets, cam, etc) and leave TA order for last, after I figured pushrod length, then I could order the pushrods together with all the oil pump parts. But seeing as lifters from summit all have a 5/16 cup, that’s not going to work. Even the lifters from Crower level 2 won’t work as they have 5/16 cup and the rocker arm has 3/8 cup. Not going to buy 200 dollars worth of adjustable pushrods either, whole combo truck/engine is not worth it. Well.. now writing this I come to realise I don’t have many options here other than using TA lifters with the crower lev 2 cam and TA pushrods. hahaha
Welcome to our world. Basically, TA or nothing. Years ago Kenne Bell used to make tons of Buick parts, as well as Poston. Poston is long gone and Kenne Bell just makes mustang superchargers. It's depressing really. And there's really no performance difference between the crower level 2 vs the stock CS647 camshaft. Even the level 3 is not that much more, "rowdy". I'd say it's no more than a 20hp difference, all things considered, between the two cams. I mean, the level 2 certainly is a better cam, but it's not like putting in a .500 lift cam with 300+ duration. It'd give it some pep, that's for sure.
I'm going down the workshop this evening to check my rocker arms, existing lifters and pushrods again. to make sure what I have in there... according to my engine numbers is a 69 GS350....but I'll be damn if that's wrong and I dont have a 69 and all this discussion has been pointless. well, not pointless because I have learnt loads. but in a way I almost wish it wasn't a 69 as it would make life easier on all this lifters/pushrod dillema....
I think JW said it might leak at the head gasket if you did that. See post #8 in the oil mod thread, http://www.v8buick.com/index.php?threads/400-430-455-block-id-prep-and-oiling-mods.214613/
To measure pushrod length you will need at least one adjustable pushrod to setup your preload and then measure how long it is. If you have any work done to the heads hopefully when you get them back the valves stems will still be close to the same length so you can order the same length pushrods. You will want to check the length at least the 4 corners of engine and average the measurements out. What you measure should be within no more than .020"(.508mm) of each other so you can get the correct preload range for all the valves.
