I've been told several times over the past couple years to steer clear of their roller lifters and rockers from friends and two engine builders who saw catastrophic failures such as this.
This happening @ 100 hours sucks bigtime and happening in a drag car with very few passes sucks just as much or more.
We need to hear about situations like these to stay more informed.
I'm sorry to hear about your misfortune and wish for you many hundred of hours of enjoyment from your new build.
See ya
Kelly

Yes, stud girdles.

The man speaks the truth. When those pushrods start flexing, it causes thee valvetrain to become unstable and unleashes all kinds of harmful harmonics that pulse all through the valvetrain and fatigue the parts. I have a set of 0.120 wall Manton pushrods that have never been run - I'll sell them at half cost if they will end up working for you. PM me if interested for details.

A decent amount do...but you are right, most do not.

So Randy, Is it possible your engine builder used the wrong parts and not the Crane parts Mercury racing assembled originally

Also the other work looks like it had issues so maybe the lash was loose

[ATTACH=CONFIG]530308[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]530309[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]530310[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]530311[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]530312[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]530313[/ATTACH]some pics of the cylinder walls & piston that the damage happened to. The date code on the piston says 2008, these engines were sold to me as brand new 2012 builds. The mystery gets deeper.

I would be very interested in piston to wall clearance and ring gap. I doubt all of that scoring is due to the lifter failure.

Suffice to say, it looks like mistakes were made.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]530314[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]530315[/ATTACH]Mcprodesign, these are not merc engines. Sorry for any confusion. These engines are Bullet Engines 650hp normally aspirated series 540 cid. They are Merlin III blocks, this one has a Callies compstar crank, Manley H beam rods, Manley flat top pistons, Edelbrock marine rpm heads, Crane cam, & lifters, Crower pushrods, & Scorpion rocker arms. At least that is what the part #s are telling me.

Just another reason I have built my own engines for the last 40 years. I have made mistakes and paid for it. But I learned from those mistakes. I am in the process of building a 598 right now.

I had a friend build me a 598 a few year ago . It was totally assume in a 28 ft sunsation .

I understand your frustration but I can definitely see a set of pistons sitting around on a shelf for 4 years.

I'm sure that's true depending on where you get parts from but a cam from the same year also? It will be interesting to see what's in the other engine

That adds a little complexity to it. Sorry man.

Was this a solid roller cam engine?

Hydraulic roller cam. I have been told that once in a while there can be a "bad batch" of parts that gets by quality control. I don't think that is the situation here as the engines have more than a couple of hours on them. I do not see that anything changed (something coming loose). I think if I had gotten more information from the builder I would have done any other required maintenance. As stated before I was planning on doing a compression & leak down test before winterizing this year. If testing valve springs was part of regular maintenance it should have been spelled out in a maintenance guide. Just saying. I was given no instructions at all.

Hyd rollers in a canted valve engine dont do all that well the more lift the worse it becomes. The pushrods must be shortend about .600 as the lifters are taller than flat tappes or solid rollers. The shorter pushrod increases the angle of the pushrod inthe set of the rocker and lifter. This increases issues with valve train geometry mostly do to side loads. There are hyd rollers with ofset pushrod seats in them but they still cause side loading issues. One might do well with a real mild hyd roller like just a bit over .500 maybe .550 or so.

Example Ford never converted to hyd rollers in a 460 because of pushrod angle

Turbo - I'd worry more about the machining of the lifter bores from GM. If these are not indexed true, the roller will have all sorts of bad forces going on.

IMHO.

I would wonder if your push rod length was correct also. Also wonder about the valve lash as someone said did it back off or maybe not correct to begin with.

I also heard that someone roller rockers were having issues as well but can not remember what brand. I will try to find out for an FYI.

Any builder that uses silicone and all over the place is an engine builder to avoid. Thanks for posting this info and who the builder was. Sorry for your bad luck. You seem very logical and not letting your emotions take over. Good luck

Manton makes a quality push rod as well.

Engines were picked up yesterday to get the one dyno'd for a baseline then rebuilt. Thinking seriously about going with solid rollers being the cams are getting changed. Making adjustments will not be an issue because I can remove the valve covers without removing the exhaust. Should have some dyno # soon. Am anxious to see what kind of power I really had.

Soild rollers are a PITA always need tear down and inspection. Usally due to high spring loads bearings in lifters and rockers often fail. Have pulled rockes of such engines and find needle bearings fall out or have already. Pure race might go for it but not for pleasure / poker runs/ racing combo.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]532279[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]532280[/ATTACH]well the dyno doesn't lie, 603 hp. Paid for 650, Builder Said it was still building power when red line was reached but with a stated rpm limit on the ( sales brochure ) and proof of the dyno sheet that stated hp was not attained sounds like misrepresentation to me.

Well, what now?

Good luck with that. I am sure the original builder would argue variations in different dynos being the reason for the less than 10% variation. It sucks, but probably nothing you will get out of it. How about advancing the cam a bit to try and bring your peak HP down under redline?

What cam, intake, and carb ?

As an FYI: Eddy heads used on many 500-600hp NA Builds. You don't really see'm on NA builds higher than that.

AFR's / Specialized Brodix and etc, yes.

Many 600-640HP 502's out there with AFR's.

Many 600-700HP 540's with AFR's.

I just got my computer to bring up the dyno sheet.

There is some problems !

Mid .300's for BSFC's ?

Don't think so. This usually means the dyno sheet is jacked up power wise.

I'll run some #'s when I get back in from blowing leaves.

And yeh, the fuel usage and air flow used is down from strong motors in the mid 600's.

The dyno operator should have pulled the engine to higher rpm so the owner can see the whole picture.

I just got my computer to bring up the dyno sheet.

There is some problems !

Mid .300's for BSFC's ?

Don't think so. This usually means the dyno sheet is jacked up power wise.

I'll run some #'s when I get back in from blowing leaves.

And yeh, the fuel usage and air flow used is down from strong motors in the mid 600's.

The dyno operator should have pulled the engine to higher rpm so the owner can see the whole picture.

cams just about right for your Hp http://www.cranecams.com/product/car...detail&p=24223.
to get over 650hp,I had to use a cam in the 250° intake range.also on a 540 w/ canfield 320 heads

Randy I have 2 of those 651 cams I'll be selling soon

I just wanted to post the dyno results that we got so anyone can see what I have. He said it wasn't done making power at that red line but this isn't a race boat and was not propped to run above the stated rpm. We are changing heads & stuff so I will update when we get some progress made.

I'm glad Ryan stopped running the engine when he did because the #8 exhaust lifter was about to fail just like the other engine. Blocks have been cleaned up and being honed. Ryan said there is a lot of variation in the sizes of the cylinders. Got the new heads from afr & Ryan is going through them to make sure everything is right. I see the Sultan of Silicone is advertising again.

Who is Ryan - is he building your engines now ?

I'll say it again anytime you see a marine engine builder and or a marine tech using silicone on engine parts or even on the outdrives , its a builder and tech you want to stay away from completely. In the industry they are called shadetrees.

Well if that's true then Bullet Engines must be shade tree.

hAVE TO WOUNDER IF IT WAS RUN ON A dYNO IF A BREAK IN WAS DONE before making power runs. Have seen many engines blow doing power runs without a 5 to 8 hour break in soon after installing in a vehicle. Some with only a few hrs or minits after first use.
Rockers I always used Crane gold rockers didnt know they made blue except ones Crane made for Ford Motorsports. uhjyjjy76 < my cats thoughts on this thik she just cussed out the builder.

If you read the thread this is about two engines that have been in my boat and ran for 2 seasons. The person building the engines now is "Precision" on here. Retter Engine Development, the original builder was Bullet Engines in Kingston Ontario.

Silly question but why have so many manf in the valve train..ive always had great luck with crower and there tech line is great. They will grind anything you want and there roller rockers are great...just my .02

Break in is basically up to temp on a full roller engine... If it's built right it will he fine.... Break in is a thing of the past bud...

im in the middle of my first marine build but i agree with full force. on my mustangs i run them for 3-5 minutes to check for leaks, then i make 3 full 1-4 gear pulls wide open. as little run time as possible at idle. try to hold them around 1500 until i can WOT. they are either right or theyre not. i want to know fast. i treat the isx, m11, B, C, L, N14 cummins engines the same way.

I just found this thread.... i am surprised they ran 100 hours with no issues... Bullet engine seems to be a very unreliable engine builder.. It blows my mind how these guys stay in business!!!!!! I hope people read these threads!!!!

some of the pushrods were 3/16" of the roller rockers on 2 engines he did for me!!!!