Polishing new lifters

[frederick]

Hi,

A short question:
Is it beneficial for breaking-in a new flat-tappet camshaft to polish the lifters prior to installing them?

Frederick

[firefighter3931]

I've never polished a new lifter. Just inspect them closely and check for a small crown on the center of the lifter face. I use a piece of plate glass and make sure that the lifter can rock back and forth....ever so slightly. The crown is extremely important for lifter rotation. 


Ron

[frederick]

Thanks Ron,

I will leave them as they are then.
The lunati lifters have a pattern on the bottom, perhaps to keep the lifter rotating.

Frederick

[firefighter3931]

The lunati lifters have a pattern on the bottom, perhaps to keep the lifter rotating.

Yep, that's a good sign 

Perfectly flat and perfectly smooth is NOT what you want. 


When i'm installing new cam & lifters i like to torque the rocker shafts down and load the valvetrain...then rotate the engine over by hand and check for lifter rotation. You can use a sharpie pen and mark the lifters to see if they're rotating. After you do this the lifter faces will need to be re-coated with moly paste before the initial fire-up. 



Ron

[frederick]

Thanks for the Ron,

But I think you musunderstood, I think you're talking of the taper on the bottom of the lifter.
I was talking of a spiraling pattern on the bottom of the lifter.
Tried taking a photo, but I  can't get it to focus right, so I made a simple paint-picture to explain it.
You can barely see the spiraling pattern and you certainly can't catch your fingernail on it.

Thanks for the tip on rotating the engine to check the lifter spinning before starting.
I haven't heard that before, thought you only could do it with the engine running.

Frederick

[firefighter3931]

Thanks for the Ron,

But I think you musunderstood, I think you're talking of the taper on the bottom of the lifter.
I was talking of a spiraling pattern on the bottom of the lifter.
Tried taking a photo, but I  can't get it to focus right, so I made a simple paint-picture to explain it.
You can barely see the spiraling pattern and you certainly can't catch your fingernail on it.

Thanks for the tip on rotating the engine to check the lifter spinning before starting.
I haven't heard that before, thought you only could do it with the engine running.

Frederick

Yep, your illustrations are excellent  That is what a flat tappet should look like 



Ron

[frederick]

Great,

Thanks Ron.
The fear of a wiped lobe has me double checking everything.
I've even got a can of GM EOS on the way, although oil with a high ZDDP content is not as hard to get as in the states.
Next on the list: spring pressures and installed heights.

Frederick