After doing a top end job a few years ago my motor ran great. I used a reman head, Offy dual port manifold, 32/36 Weber, LCE header, and ARP head studs.


After the intial break in it ran great! Slowly but surely it started to lose power, but still ran good. I decided one day after a few thousand miles to check the valve lash. I noticed a few lobes were wearing more than the usual break in wear and that made me pretty concerned. I ended up just setting the lash and buttoning it back up.

Recently I decided to go ahead and pull off the head and redo the cam and rocker arms. Upon taking out the cam I was amazed at the wear on 6 of the lobes! Has anyone had this kind of wear and if so what do you think caused it? I've read about using ZDDP additive or break in oil, but they always refer to flat tappet cams that V-8s use. Anyone not ran break in additive and experienced the same rapid cam wear? Here are a few pics...

This was the worst one...



Another one..



Any input would be appreciated.. Thanks!

 

:wabbit2: Just one of those things .

I take it the cam came with the head?? Also the new or refurbished rockers and shafts .

If you are using your old cam and rockers it has to go back together with the rocker on the same lobe it came off.

Unless you reface all the rockers suggested with a new cam.

I would say you got a bad cam those lobes were just softer or the grinding was a little off.

Could be the rocker arms got plugged or the oil passages were not drilled out correct and those lobes did not get oil .

I can`t tell from pictures did it look like it was scored from no oil??

it has been so very long since I was into racing engines and talked this stuff 24/7The fact you kept driving does not help

Bottom line is Bad Cam or no oil

 

There is a thread all about this by trainwreckinseattle I believe. Cheap cams that wear out the lobes.

 

I'm with Wyoming. Soft cam and/or no oil. Even with improper break-in, cams don't wear that fast in my experience.

 

The rocker assembly was new from LC Engineering and the cam was a TRD cam. I want to say that TRD sources these cams from Crane..? Anyways something sure happened. Maybe a combo of lack of oil and bad cam.


Anyone know how to check to see if the rocker shafts are delivering oil the way they are supposed to?

 

Take the vlave cover off and rotate the engine by hand. You should see oil coming out and covering all the lobes.

Disconnect the coil first...though.