Ok boys and girls. This is the second cam to go bad this year in this block. It looks to me to be a problem with the cam grinder. look at the pictures and tell me what you think. From what I can see the cam is cround with the lobes further back than they should be. The cam is all the way against the block just like it is supposed to be. Am I all screwed up or do I need to kick some vendor butt?:af:
Jason, looking at the pictures, it would appear that the base circle of that cam is so low that the lifter appears to have gotten into the area between the lobes, the rough cast area, this in turn would have scored the lifter which in turn would have taken out the lobe. Without having the cam in hand to look at, it would almost appear that maybe it was a regrind instead of a new core. Just some thoughts from viewing the pictures. Jim Burek
That looks ALOT like a Kenne Bell MK 2 cam I had in my block. The base circle of the lobes were ground rite down even with the rough cast area of the cam. I would also check the face of the block when you pull the cam out to see if the cam wore a groove in it. If there is a groove, I dont believe theres much you can do, it seems Buick didnt specify enough of a "thrust area" on the front of the cam where it rides on the face of the block. With higher than stock spring pressures, high volume/ high pressure oil pumps, and any taper ground into the cam lobes to keep the cam thrust to the rear of the block, it seems to aggrevate the problem. It would be cool if the 350 was popular enough, to have the cam grinders add more meat to the thrust area on the front of the cam, kinda like the V-6 has Mark
Thanks for the replies. It's not a kenne Bell cam. I will deffinitly look at every thing when I pull it all apart for wear.
As for the cam lobes being ground to far back, just about every motor I've seen the lifters don't exactly match up with the lobes. What break-in procedure did you do? did you replace the lifters? Maybe oiling issues?
Man, I feel for you. It is these kinds of repetitive problems that can sour a person on the whole hobby! I used a Crane cam -(in 1986!) and have never had a problem. Who the heck regrinds cams anymore?
One of the 310 cams I ordered from TA had the cam journals TOO LARGE! It wouldnt fit in the bearing bores, TA took care of it with no problem, but I've heard of this happening on the Big blocks also, AND to other engine makes, so it IS possible that something was ground or cut wrong. I read awhile back in the GSXtra (I think it was there)that some grinders were grinding on the high side (tite) of the specs. as far as bearing journals go. Mark
Myself I have tried to look at the TA site but end up leaving as its just confusing to me. A nice well laid out catalog would be neat. But of course I am sure TA doesn't have the budget to pump out flashy catalogs to everyone and their grandma like summit does. I bet summit spend more on them than TA makes in a year. No offense to TA just stating how expensive fancy adds cost.
I agree totally with this! There are alot of holes and deadends in their website. The search function is totally FUBAR'd, worthless. All I can use the site for is current pricing and looking for new items. But I guess thats good enough for me! I got no problems with the catalog, except it hasn't changed (much) in the last ten years. Definetely needs updating. Especially in the cams, pistons, conn. rods and cylinder head areas. It sure wouldn't hurt to expand on the cam description area as well. I'd be willing to bet it would greatly cut down on tech calls, which have got to be killing them time-wise.o No: I'm grateful that TA is the only one that has always listed duration #'s @.050". :TU: It sucks when advertised duration #'s are listed. uzzled:
Ya, I was thinking about this myself. You were supposed to call me a a couple of weeks ago when you had it close.o No: Hopefully all is well.
it looks like the cam's base is way too small... -allmost like a solid roller... what cam is it ? did you get new lifters for each cam? -maybe a hi-flow oilpump is needed..
Hey Rich Sorry to keep you hanging there. I've been out of town for 3 weeks and with christmas I haven't had a chance to check my e-mail or messages. To answer your questions. The cam company has taken care of me better than I could have hoped for. They sent me a new cam with the journals between the lobes ground down smooth so as not to be an issue or possibility of causing a problem. I have not had a chance to install the cam so I don't know if the lobe seperation is correct but they assured me it would be, and told me they had double checked every thing before they sent it out just to be sure. They also sent me a $100 to help pay for new bearings and they sent me a new set of lifters with the cam. I have to say that once I get the time to put the engine together I'm sure that I will be happy with how things turn out. By the way I just got the block back from the machine shop. They cooked the block, then shot peened it to get all the old paint off, hot tanked it and replaiced the freeze plugs. It's wraped in a plastic bag waiting to be degreesed and painted. If you want to come up and help we could probably have it together in a couple of hours. What do you say? I hope Christmas was good to you this year and if I don't hear from you till after this week have a good New Year.
