My friends 403 has just been freshened up with rings, bearings cam, lifters, etc. We just primed it today and no oil would come up through the pushrods!! Swapped in an old lifter and oil came right through. These lifters came from a famous OLDSMOBILE guru in mississippi. These lifters were stuck and he had to compress the plungers in a vice, all 16 of them, until they would let loose with a CRACK. The lifters were in a LUNATI box, but......there is a problem. Any ideas. The old lifters have less than 1000 miles, can we use these on the new cam?
Don't know if it makes any difference in your case, but for years by habit I disassemble, clean and reassemble each individual lifter one at a time before use. No way to know how long some parts have been sitting. Usually what I find is old gummy assembly lube full of cardboard particles. Devon
Take a fresh razor blade (to use as a straight edge) and place it across the bottom of an old lifter. Does the old lifter still have it's crown? If the center of the lifter is a little bit above the outer edges, the lifter still has it's crown and the blade should rock back and forth - you can see this if you hold it up to a light. The effect is small, but noticeable. Compare it to one of your new (useless) lifters if you need to. Check all your old lifters before re-using them. If the crown is present, you can safely use them, just go easy on breaking the lifters in to the cam. Any that are dished in, even slightly, are done. Hope I've made sense, instead of just rambling! Been a long day! Good luck! Dan
A few years ago, a good friend of mine's son had a very reputable machine shop build a small block Chevy engine for him. On cylinder 8, there was a no run situation, and they tried everything, except to simply back the rockers off to past zero lash, it was a flat tappet hydraulic cam, performance specs, and, start the engine to see if the cylinder came back. So, one day Rudy asked if I would look at it, and, we backed cylinder 8's rockers off to past zero lash, clearance, and, the engine picked the cylinder up. We readjusted those two rockers to 1/4th turn tight from zero lash, dropped number 8. What we did find out was, these super-duper special racing lifters weren't that at all, but were regular "rebuilder" lifters from a company in Bolivia, that had very bad valving in them, reboxed as a reputable hot rod cam company's performance lifters. At that time, the good lifter guys here were stopping making lifters, Johnston, and, the Bolivian ones were the only game in town. We found a new set of old stock Johnston lifters, installed and adjusted them, and the engine ran the way it should, all 8 cylinders. The Bolivian lifters were pumping all the way up with positive oil pressure, engine running, holding those 2 valves off their seats. Then, bleeding off, closing the valves when the engine was stopped. Backing the rockers off to past zero lash allowed the lifters to extend all the way, and still let the valves close. Regards, Milton
Lunati finally sent new lifters. These are not stuck, but oil still will not push up through the push rods to the rockers with 50 lbs presure preloading. We're disgusted with all this and will probably bite the bullet and fire the engine with our fingers crossed. Any one have this problem on Olds engines?
Try contacting another Olds engine builder like Bill Travato at BTR Performance, John at Rocket Racing, Jim Lapikas at J & S Machine. Also could try M&J Proformance. All these places do a lot of Olds work and have good reputations overall. Lunati and Mondello may not provide answers...at least that's how it sounds so far. http://jsmachineoldsmobile.com/home.html http://mjproformance.com/ http://www.btrperformance.com/ http://www.rocketracingperformance.com/ Keeping your fingers crossed will do absolutely nothing for a lifter that doesn't seem to "oil".
X2 on that advice...All the shops listed are very good. Some have more time to spend with you than others, but all certainly know their stuff. I'll reserve comment on the others...
