tappets noise with 976 on a BB

[Nacho-RT74]

Once on my 400 instaled HLJ 976 lifters ( correct ones for BB )... cranked up the engine and never got charged.... had to get 2011s which are for SB and they worked. Just that get discharged overnight

Camshaft is Crower 282HDP, which is a mild cam with around 478/502 lift. Nothing radical.

opinions. I don't think lifter's oil groove leaves the bore on this to get discharged.... or yes ?

[BSB67]

Discharged = leak down?

Plunger leak down after it sits for some time is internal to the lifter.

[Nacho-RT74]

Being new? All 16 of them?

My car is dissasembled since 4 years ago, but they got discharged overnight since the first start up

[cdr]

Being new? All 16 of them?

My car is dissasembled since 4 years ago, but they got discharged overnight since the first start up

dont forget a GOOD oil filter with an anti drain back valve, no fram, wix is good

[Nacho-RT74]

laugh... it is/was wix

[Nacho-RT74]

ok... let's see... My thought.

Is there a chance the lifter bores are worn... and conical? I mean due the 976s never got really charged and 2011 did ( although overnight discharged ) due the oil groove location. 2011s get charged in 3 or 4 seconds after the start up.

Forgot... springs are Hughes Engines 1106 I got USED at Carlisle 2008. Seat height pressure got me on 110-120 lbs rate, not 150 of the original specs

[c00nhunterjoe]

As russ said, if they bleed down sitting, its the lifter itself, 1 or 16, yes. Lifters. The others not pumping up could be another bad batch. But if the lifter bores were so bad that no lifters will pump up at all, you wouldnt need to measure them, it would be pretty obvious wear. Never the less, you need to check them. Dont forget to prime and inspect. Can be easily done with the valley pan off to check oiling.

[Nacho-RT74]

mmm... well. I find hard to believe HLJ lifters could be bad on 16 lifters together... or would you think that ?

Not saying you are not right, but would you doubt from HLJ lifters in THAT way ?

is there a way to check for bad lifter on the bench ?

[Nacho-RT74]

then also remember... 976s never got charged, but 2011s got. Only real diff between them is the oil grove height... right ?

[c00nhunterjoe]

Thus why i suggested taking a look at the lifter bores. If they were all worn to the point that 0 lifters will pump up, the wear should be obvious. If you are positive the lifters are good, and the bores are good. Then you have an oil pressure problem. The other lifters bleeding down is still the lifters.

[BSB67]

HLJ are junk too.  If you have clacking upon start up, and it goes away in a minute, its the lifter, and you'll need to decide if you want to chase it or not.  Oil filter drain back would make this condition worse.

If other "correct" lifters always clatters all the time, I suspect that you not looking in the right place.  If you have decent oil pressure at an idle, and your lifters are clattering, you have a problem and its not the lifter bore.

Unless the factory put in ovesized bores/lifters, or your machine shop screwed with them, they are not your problem. 

[Nacho-RT74]

HLJ are junk too.   

never thought could read that from somebody, after all the advices and good critics of them ( reason why I bought them in fact )

If you have clacking upon start up, and it goes away in a minute, its the lifter

just 2 to 4 seconds

If other "correct" lifters always clatters all the time, I suspect that you not looking in the right place.  If you have decent oil pressure at an idle, and your lifters are clattering, you have a problem and its not the lifter bore.

gauge between half of the way and 2/3. Never below half not even hot. 20W50

ALTHOUGHT I know I'm having somehow of oiling issue due how half of the PRW steel rocker brass bushings got worn

Unless the factory put in ovesized bores/lifters, or your machine shop screwed with them, they are not your problem. 

Nobody has touched the bores ever. Actually I can't feel or see anykind of play or gap between bores and lifters

[Nacho-RT74]

AAAAND, Oil pump is/was a new one Melling HP ( real NOS ). On the first engine start up was getting top of the gauge reading at 1.8-2K RPMs for the breakout ( with regular replacement 2011 Elgin lifters... no tappeting sound... some months later came out with that, and began the lifter challenge, hence got the HLJ ones )

[PRH]

I've never checked or measured any of this myself, I just "assumed" this is how it was......

The 976 style lifter has the thin oil band high on the lifter body.
I'm not sure it ever gets directly fed oil from the gallery.
In other words, when the lifter is on the base circle of the cam...... Is the oil band exposed to the gallery or not?
I just assumed it was not, and that the lifter was oiled by the pressure in the bore squeezing between the body and the bore.
If this indeed is the case, and the lifters were excessively loose in their bores, especially below the gallery, then they could be leaking enough out past the bottom of the bores to where there isn't enough pressure/flow above the gallery to effectively fill the lifters.
This would be a similar situation as to what was being talked about with potential issues with running hyd rollers in these blocks.

I think a scribe and some measuring would answer the question as to whether or not the oil band has direct access to the gallery.

The 2011 lifter have a wider/lower band and would definitely be directly fed by the gallery.
Even if they both have exposure to the gallery, the 2011's would be exposed to the gallery for more of the time(perhaps 100% of the time).

As for the overnight bleed down........ That's the lifters themselves.

And, if its determined the 976's have the oil band getting fed directly from the gallery, then I'd be looking at those as suspect as well.

I also agree that priming with the valley cover off would shed some light on it.

[BSB67]

HLJ are junk too.    

never thought could read that from somebody, after all the advices and good critics of them ( reason why I bought them in fact )

If you have clacking upon start up, and it goes away in a minute, its the lifter

just 2 to 4 seconds

If other "correct" lifters always clatters all the time, I suspect that you not looking in the right place.  If you have decent oil pressure at an idle, and your lifters are clattering, you have a problem and its not the lifter bore.

gauge between half of the way and 2/3. Never below half not even hot. 20W50

ALTHOUGHT I know I'm having somehow of oiling issue due how half of the PRW steel rocker brass bushings got worn

Unless the factory put in ovesized bores/lifters, or your machine shop screwed with them, they are not your problem.  

Nobody has touched the bores ever. Actually I can't feel or see anykind of play or gap between bores and lifters

I know there is a love fest with the HLJ, and they are probably better than the rest, but that does not make them good.  They may, or may not be good enough.  Here is the simple reality.  A good hyd. lifter requires extreme precision in its machining and metallurgy.  Our lifters are very very low production volume.  To make a truly high quality lifter for a old Mopar HFT would probably cost $500.  Mopar guys using a hyd cam will not spend that.  People that actually care are about making power are not using hyd cams, and everyone else will live with what they get and not know the difference.

2 to 4 seconds.  Lifter valving and/or plunger clearance.  The lifter bore does not keep oil in the lifter.  Your lifter is bleeding down, and it take a few seconds for the pump to pump them back up.  My 40 year old hyd lifters in my GTS sat for 12 years, I checked everyone before start up.  Hard as a rock and no start up clatter.

Sounds like your oil pressure is fine, but should be checked with a good manual gauge.  As for your rockers, have you measured them to know that there is excessive wear.  They will get shinny and kinda crappy looking pretty quick, but might not be excessive.  If it is excessive (and it could be) I would look to the quality of those products.  There is a reason that the Pro Magnums cost twice as much.

I've never seen a lifter bore wear give any of the issues you and other have recently reported.  They wear, but if you have decent oil pressure at idle, the bore wear is not a problem.

[Nacho-RT74]

something to check If I try to dissasemble the lifters ?

I don't have the 2011s with me ( engine is thousand miles from home ) but 976s are in hands

and, what about trying the Mopar Performance lifters I have with my 280/.474 camshaft still on box ?

About rockers... I got a new PRW set quite ago and Hughes engines with the "bannana cut" on oil provisions, but was thinking on rebuilt the worn set with teflon bushings made and inserted maybe someday. Actually, some rocker bushings on the first set are allmost gone on the area against the shaft.

[Nacho-RT74]

Another question...

Is the inner system the same between 976 and 2011s ?

[PRH]

My 40 year old hyd lifters in my GTS sat for 12 years, I checked everyone before start up.  Hard as a rock and no start up clatter.

Nowadays, of you pull the valve covers off a hyd cammed motor that has just been shut off, and bump it over...... You can watch the lifters bleed down as you put the valves at full lift.

The valve opens...... Then you watch it slowly start to close as the oil bleeds out of the lifter.

"Back in the good old days"........ That didn't happen.

[PRH]

I've never seen a lifter bore wear give any of the issues you and other have recently reported.  They wear, but if you have decent oil pressure at idle, the bore wear is not a problem.

I've never experienced that kind of wear problem myself either....... Just hypothesizing as to why one style of lifter would pump up, and the other wouldn't.

As for the internals...... 2011's have pushrod oiling, 976's do not...... So the guts aren't "exactly" the same.

[BSB67]

Nowadays, of you pull the valve covers off a hyd cammed motor that has just been shut off, and bump it over...... You can watch the lifters bleed down as you put the valves at full lift.

The valve opens...... Then you watch it slowly start to close as the oil bleeds out of the lifter.

I've seen that too.  Crazy.  But they were all PR oiling lifters.  I just assumed it was the additional leakage because of the PR oiling.  Do you see that on the non-push rod oiling lifters too? 

And at the hyd cam level of performance, I've never understood the need need for PR oiling.  And never was convinced there are need on SFT either.  Me and several friends ran a bunch of SFT cams before PR oiling with 150 - 160# seat pressure on Crower, Isky, Crane iron and aluminum rockers and never had a problem with PR/rockers.  I probably still have 5 different sets of ball/cup PR for all the different combos.  Of course, non of it was fast rate lobe stuff.

[bee1971]

Doing some research , seems to bee almost normal with the Comp XE HL Series Cams and 822-16 Lifters


I have only had the opportunity to break in my 432 Stroker back in December running the XE 275 HL and 822-16 Lifters , but the jury is still out on the Diesel Sound or as some describe Sewing Machine Sound associated with the fast rate ramps and Lifters

I started it up once since then and it sounded like a few lifters had bleed down also

25 psi at idle , 75 psi at RPM
Comp Cams 10w30w Break In Oil

Will drop oil this week when it warms up here in WI and decide what Oil and Zinc Additive I want to run and see what happens - Always have run WIX Filters like forever

Sucks I won't bee able to get this car on the road for months

[Nacho-RT74]

Sucks I won't bee able to get this car on the road for months

my car is completelly dissasembled, engine included. I hope already assembled in a couple of months.

but the non charging 976 lifters and overnight 2011s disscharge ( both new from HLJ ) has got me into a "nightmare" since is something suddenly happened.

Dunno if try the MP pieces with the 280/.474 cams I have ( still boxed ) or try any generic replacement lifters around ( elgin, once again ). I don't wanna try the MP ones since they are new and want to get rid off the cam package new.

Really want to dissasemble the 976s I have in hands never got charged to check if I find something weird. Just run into the engine for half an hour or so. Damn, this things weren't cheap!. Fortunatelly toplineauto crew sent me the 2011s at no cost ( so now I have 32 failed lifters LOL )

[Nacho-RT74]

As for the internals...... 2011's have pushrod oiling, 976's do not...... So the guts aren't "exactly" the same.

but aside that, it should interchange... right ?

[c00nhunterjoe]

Imo, if it is apart,  put a solid cam in it and dont look back.

[Nacho-RT74]

Can't go that route at this moment at least, due funds. That implies camshaft and lifters... dunno if pushrods too ( my adjustable rockers is to ball-ball, and pushrods are 8.5", sold by FBO... can't recall the brand, but HiPo )

and thats thinking the camhasft is one bolt to keep my timming gear setup.

it must be a solution keeping Hyd setup. Track the problem is the deal. Pointing to lifters itself, but... damn! all 16s ? ( 32s sin fact, somehow ) HLJs is something hard to think on. I think not even cheap Elgins could get that.

[c00nhunterjoe]

Then you need to reassemble it, prime it with the valley open and inspect for oil. If you have oil, then you need to keep buying lifters until you get a decent set. Problem is, you may never get them as has been stated already. Even a fair set bleeds down within minutes of shutdown anymore. Alrenative is to buy the race versions, but they cost more then a complete solid setup so that is out of the question based on your budget.

[Nacho-RT74]

HLJ crew told me they had the race versions, just that they use to be noisy, and after describe what will be my use, they advice and sent me the standard ones.

[c00nhunterjoe]

I doubt their race version is what i was refering to. They cost about 1200 for a set.

[BSB67]

Spent a few minutes on line looking in the Hylift catalog.  Seems like the 2345S would be the best choice if I understand the catalog


Also looks like the Johnson line of lifters is over $400, 3 x what the Hylift are.  Wonder why?

[Nacho-RT74]

wondering if this could be the fail on the 976 tappets... the hole  inside not meeting with the exterior hole:



and if dissasembling them could check for anything like that on them

AND wondering if as you said, the 2011s could be made to feed rockers throught the pushrods even my pushrods are sealed balls, that could be the real issue I'm having with the 2011s actually running in my engine ? lifters bleeding through the top plate of lifters where the pushrods rest on.

[PRH]

I've seen that too.  Crazy.  But they were all PR oiling lifters.  I just assumed it was the additional leakage because of the PR oiling.  Do you see that on the non-push rod oiling lifters too? 

I'd have to disassemble a lifter to see how it works for certain, but I don't believe the PR oil comes from the inside of the "piston assembly", but is routed around the piston assy up to the pushrod cup.

To answer your question, it's pretty rare for me to be personally involved with hyd cammed stuff much anymore....... Meaning either building or testing the motor myself.

Since Comp sells the "2011" style lifter for the BB Mopar, those are what they usually get(so if there is a cam going flat situation, everything came from the same place).
A few years ago we did do one with the 976 lifters though.
It had the PRW Pro Magnum copies.
This motor kept spitting out pushrods upon restarts.
You'd go somewhere....... Like to lunch....... Motor was running fine.
Shut if off...... Come out after a little bit, fire it up...... Skipping.
Pull valve covers, pushrod laying in the valley.

Long story short, the pushrod cups in the rockers weren't very deep.
After shut down, occasionally a lifter would get bled down...... Then when you cranked the motor over to start it, the pushrod would just slip out of that shallow rocker cup.

The root cause of the problem was the 976(non-PR oiling) lifters bleeding down.

The cure was....... Swap to Mancini rockers, ball and cup pushrods(where the cup was quite a bit deeper than the one in the PRW rocker), and to preload the lifters more(can't bleed down as far), and it never bothered again.

Perhaps just running more preload would have been sufficient, but we wanted to be as sure as possible it didn't happen again.

[PRH]

If the lifter preload is too much, then the piston feed hole doesn't line up with the hole in the body and they wouldn't pump up.
That is correct.

You should be able to determine how much preload is too much by looking through the hole and depressing the pushrod cup.

On the other hand, something would have to be pretty far away from stock for that to be the case(heavily milled block or heads, cam base circle too big, etc).

It should be pretty easy to determine if there is a real "problem" with your 976's not pumping up.

I assume since they didn't pump up in the motor they are still in a bled down state, meaning...... If you put one on the bench, put a pushrod on it and pump the pushrod...... The lifter is "soft".
If so, just submerge it in a cup of oil and do the same thing.
It should be rock hard in a couple of pumps.

[BSB67]

I've seen that too.  Crazy.  But they were all PR oiling lifters.  I just assumed it was the additional leakage because of the PR oiling.  Do you see that on the non-push rod oiling lifters too? 

I'd have to disassemble a lifter to see how it works for certain, but I don't believe the PR oil comes from the inside of the "piston assembly", but is routed around the piston assy up to the pushrod cup.

To answer your question, it's pretty rare for me to be personally involved with hyd cammed stuff much anymore....... Meaning either building or testing the motor myself.

Since Comp sells the "2011" style lifter for the BB Mopar, those are what they usually get(so if there is a cam going flat situation, everything came from the same place).
A few years ago we did do one with the 976 lifters though.
It had the PRW Pro Magnum copies.
This motor kept spitting out pushrods upon restarts.
You'd go somewhere....... Like to lunch....... Motor was running fine.
Shut if off...... Come out after a little bit, fire it up...... Skipping.
Pull valve covers, pushrod laying in the valley.

Long story short, the pushrod cups in the rockers weren't very deep.
After shut down, occasionally a lifter would get bled down...... Then when you cranked the motor over to start it, the pushrod would just slip out of that shallow rocker cup.

The root cause of the problem was the 976(non-PR oiling) lifters bleeding down.

The cure was....... Swap to Mancini rockers, ball and cup pushrods(where the cup was quite a bit deeper than the one in the PRW rocker), and to preload the lifters more(can't bleed down as far), and it never bothered again.

Perhaps just running more preload would have been sufficient, but we wanted to be as sure as possible it didn't happen again.

Kinda amazing that Ma Mopar got it to work 55 years ago with stamped steel rockers on fixed shafts and the aftermarket still screws it up in an epic fashion. 

[69wannabe]

I've seen that too.  Crazy.  But they were all PR oiling lifters.  I just assumed it was the additional leakage because of the PR oiling.  Do you see that on the non-push rod oiling lifters too? 

I'd have to disassemble a lifter to see how it works for certain, but I don't believe the PR oil comes from the inside of the "piston assembly", but is routed around the piston assy up to the pushrod cup.

To answer your question, it's pretty rare for me to be personally involved with hyd cammed stuff much anymore....... Meaning either building or testing the motor myself.

Since Comp sells the "2011" style lifter for the BB Mopar, those are what they usually get(so if there is a cam going flat situation, everything came from the same place).
A few years ago we did do one with the 976 lifters though.
It had the PRW Pro Magnum copies.
This motor kept spitting out pushrods upon restarts.
You'd go somewhere....... Like to lunch....... Motor was running fine.
Shut if off...... Come out after a little bit, fire it up...... Skipping.
Pull valve covers, pushrod laying in the valley.

Long story short, the pushrod cups in the rockers weren't very deep.
After shut down, occasionally a lifter would get bled down...... Then when you cranked the motor over to start it, the pushrod would just slip out of that shallow rocker cup.

The root cause of the problem was the 976(non-PR oiling) lifters bleeding down.

The cure was....... Swap to Mancini rockers, ball and cup pushrods(where the cup was quite a bit deeper than the one in the PRW rocker), and to preload the lifters more(can't bleed down as far), and it never bothered again.

Perhaps just running more preload would have been sufficient, but we wanted to be as sure as possible it didn't happen again.

I had this same problem on my RB engine, it would be running fine and next day I would go to start it and I could hear it when it happened "TINK" then skip,skip, skip!!! Pull the valve cover and there it was, the pushrod was laying in there and luckily I was able to get it out with a magnet and it wasn't the same one when it would happen either. I also had the PRW comp copies which work fine after I replaced the adjusters with good comp one's. I bought a set of scorpion product hyd lifters that I found on jegs website and reading the instructions I found that the preload was supposed to be between .40 and .60 so I decided to get my dial gauge and see just what my guesstimate of 3/4 a turn were and I found that 3/4 of a turn was only about .35 and one turn put it in spec so when I replaced my lifters I put them all one turn from zero lash and have had no problems with that since. I guess the finer threads of the adjusters are what threw me off, I have not seen the scorpion lifters for sale anymore since but they seemed to be of good quality but they are still make the same amount of noise as the comp lifters did with the fast rate comp cam I am running so i'm guessing if I would have adjusted the comp's properly they would have worked fine too.

I wonder if the OP has an oiling issue somewhere between the cam and the rocker shafts?? I had a friend that put the wrong cam in his 318 and it didn't have the holes in the cam to oil through the head and it burnt up the rocker shafts and wasn't noisy as you would think for it to not be oiling the top of the engine. Something to consider at least and I also had a big block that wouldn't oil one side and the hole going up through the block into the head was stopped up with crud and it wouldn't oil the rocker shaft.

If I had it to do over I would go with a solid cam just to make it more simple and it would make more power which everyone needs...... :-)

[BSB67]

I've seen that too.  Crazy.  But they were all PR oiling lifters.  I just assumed it was the additional leakage because of the PR oiling.  Do you see that on the non-push rod oiling lifters too? 

I'd have to disassemble a lifter to see how it works for certain, but I don't believe the PR oil comes from the inside of the "piston assembly", but is routed around the piston assy up to the pushrod cup.

To answer your question, it's pretty rare for me to be personally involved with hyd cammed stuff much anymore....... Meaning either building or testing the motor myself.

Since Comp sells the "2011" style lifter for the BB Mopar, those are what they usually get(so if there is a cam going flat situation, everything came from the same place).
A few years ago we did do one with the 976 lifters though.
It had the PRW Pro Magnum copies.
This motor kept spitting out pushrods upon restarts.
You'd go somewhere....... Like to lunch....... Motor was running fine.
Shut if off...... Come out after a little bit, fire it up...... Skipping.
Pull valve covers, pushrod laying in the valley.

Long story short, the pushrod cups in the rockers weren't very deep.
After shut down, occasionally a lifter would get bled down...... Then when you cranked the motor over to start it, the pushrod would just slip out of that shallow rocker cup.

The root cause of the problem was the 976(non-PR oiling) lifters bleeding down.

The cure was....... Swap to Mancini rockers, ball and cup pushrods(where the cup was quite a bit deeper than the one in the PRW rocker), and to preload the lifters more(can't bleed down as far), and it never bothered again.

Perhaps just running more preload would have been sufficient, but we wanted to be as sure as possible it didn't happen again.

I had this same problem on my RB engine, it would be running fine and next day I would go to start it and I could hear it when it happened "TINK" then skip,skip, skip!!! Pull the valve cover and there it was, the pushrod was laying in there and luckily I was able to get it out with a magnet and it wasn't the same one when it would happen either. I also had the PRW comp copies which work fine after I replaced the adjusters with good comp one's. I bought a set of scorpion product hyd lifters that I found on jegs website and reading the instructions I found that the preload was supposed to be between .40 and .60 so I decided to get my dial gauge and see just what my guesstimate of 3/4 a turn were and I found that 3/4 of a turn was only about .35 and one turn put it in spec so when I replaced my lifters I put them all one turn from zero lash and have had no problems with that since. I guess the finer threads of the adjusters are what threw me off, I have not seen the scorpion lifters for sale anymore since but they seemed to be of good quality but they are still make the same amount of noise as the comp lifters did with the fast rate comp cam I am running so i'm guessing if I would have adjusted the comp's properly they would have worked fine too.

I wonder if the OP has an oiling issue somewhere between the cam and the rocker shafts?? I had a friend that put the wrong cam in his 318 and it didn't have the holes in the cam to oil through the head and it burnt up the rocker shafts and wasn't noisy as you would think for it to not be oiling the top of the engine. Something to consider at least and I also had a big block that wouldn't oil one side and the hole going up through the block into the head was stopped up with crud and it wouldn't oil the rocker shaft.

If I had it to do over I would go with a solid cam just to make it more simple and it would make more power which everyone needs...... :-)

I've known that hydraulic lifters today are bad, but it appears worse than I suspected.  Here is how we set up all hydraulic performance applications; 0.000 - 0.005" preload.  In the right set up, they would go 7000 rpm.  Pushrods never fell out.

[c00nhunterjoe]

Thats how my preload was on my 383 russ. 15 years of 7k+ abuse wjth no problems.

[Nacho-RT74]

I definitelly got an oling issue too somewhere, because  half front of  PRW rockers bushings said good bye, but even with this, the 2011s got to work but 976 never

engine is dissasembled at this moment and will take a while to reassembly yet.

untill now we haven't found damaged or spun camshaft bearings

[BSB67]

I definitelly got an oling issue too somewhere, because  half front of  PRW rockers bushings said good bye, but even with this, the 2011s got to work but 976 never

engine is dissasembled at this moment and will take a while to reassembly yet.

untill now we haven't found damaged or spun camshaft bearings

Your oil pressure suggest to me that you do not have a global oiling issue.  Your rod and main bearing are getting enough oil.  Your cam bearings are getting enough oil, and your lifters are getting enough oil.  You really cannot have high oil pressure and have any of these being oil starved with maybe one unique exception.

For the valve train itself, it is less certain.  If you do indeed have a wear issue, it is one of two things: 1) poor materials of construction, 2) inadequate oiling.  Lets talk about oiling. But let me reiterate that the standard factory oiling system has proven adequate for much higher hp applications than yours.

Check the oil holes from the #4 cam bearing to the head.  Could be partially plugged or an alignment issue (IMO very unlikely), From there look at how the oil gets into the shaft from the head.  Also look closely where the oil can be going in the shafts.  The more places that oil can exit the shafts, the more likely that the front will be oil starved.  How many holes are there in the shaft per rocker?  Where does that oil go in the rocker, and where does it leave the rocker?  Remember that the shaft mounting holes are places for oil to potentially escape too if the shaft to head fit is not correct, and the shaft retainer to shaft fit is not correct.  Are the rockers adequately covering the banana grooves?  Were the banana grooves appropriately polished to eliminate any wear potential.  Are there dedicated oil holes for roller tip oiling? if so, is too much oil being lost there?  How do they line up?

Remember, the valve train gets oil for a few degrees of crank rotation, it is not continuous.  So with that, it is not hard to send too much oil where it is not needed while starving something else in the valve gear.

Finally, for added insurance, you can slightly groove the #4 cam journal like a 1/4" in the leading direction of the three the oil holes.  This will put more oil up top.  But you kinda need to know what your doing.

[Nacho-RT74]

Ok, it took me couple of days to find the 976 HLJ lifters ( I didn't remember where they were storaged ) they are definitelly charged! I used a pushrod againts the wall and all my weight/force as posible to push them down! No way, they are hard as a rock! Of course the valve springs are way stronger than me ( 120 lbs installed ) but definitely I couldn't push them down! Just got couple of them a bit wet around the cup.

I'll try to post the pics, but they are on my cellphone.

What now ?