Solid roller lifters......
 

I checked my valvelash a few days ago and 1 engine had 3 different valves that had huge gaps, so i pulled off blower and intake manifold and found 2 completly ceased crower roller lifters and 1 that had lost all the needle bearings. camshaft is completly destroyed. Engines only have 40 very easy hours on them. I pulled engine and tore it down and took block to machine shop to get re-honed and hot tanked. I am scared to use crower lifters when i put engine back together. Machine shop owner suggested that i have lifter bores opened up from .842 to .903 and go with a 2500 dollar set of Jesel lifters. Does anybody have any kind of experience with these expensive Jesel lifters? Are they really going to be the answer to my problems??? And do u really think they are woth the money compared to the Crowers? I am all for it if it means i will have more reliability but the price seems rediculous!!!:eek:

Fixx
 

i would just get the isky red zone lifters..had great luck with them..

example listing..
http://www.summitracing.com/search/B.../?autoview=sku

Isky
+1

What are the specs on the cam ? what springs are you running ? is there any gas in your oil ?

What part number were they ? what oil were you running?

the can is a lsm systems with .730 lift with 264 intake and 272 exhaust duration. Springs are manley part# 221424 with 260 pounds seat pressure and 790 pounds open pressure. and i didnt notice any gas in the oil. it looked pretty good.

i believe the lifters were 66291 H

LSM, is that one of Wayne's motors or Par? I'd run the Isky's.

Just curious because I've run the Crower 66291-H for years without a problem. Little bigger cam and more spring pressure.
Dave Crower recommended straight weight oil.

Motors were originally built by Kieth Scroggen out of Oklahoma city. Wayne did retrofit them with the 8.3 blowers and mefi 4 ecu, used to have the 2.3 quadrotors and autronic ecu but were nothing but problems. I talked to Kieth and he puts new lifters in at 100 hours so not really sure why i lost 3 with only 40 hours on the motors.

Did you keep the motor idle rpm at the 1800rpm required to make it oil & live ? Is this a boat motor ? or top fuel ?:lolhit:

I dont think its the name brand ,something else is causing the failure.Ive had good luck with there lifters over the years,alot of endurance running.Had a set of race light weight taps with 10k miles and had about .100 slack in the roller,sent them back and they said they havent had any with that kind of miliage and sent me a new set free,



I would give Bob a call,I would even send him the lifters for analysis,Morrell,He's is pretty up to date with the high end lifters and has a lot of experance ,It would be worth you while to call him!
http://www.marinekineticsonline.com/services.html

At speed talk there is a discussion of solid roller failures. All related to the needle's. The recommend was the Isky EZX bushing type to prevent these type of failures. Not sure it that helps.

Isky EZX

We had problems back in the 90s not running enough spring pressure to follow the ramps we were running, it would beat the lifters apart. It definately helped when Crower added the Hippo option, and the severe duty lifter. You might want to check the springs.

i did blow a lower drive my last day out at the end of last season and i had to idle in on the 1 motor and it was at least 2 hours of it being at idle, i wonder if that could have caused this lifter problem?? thoughts??

790# open couldn't hurt anything ?

As long as you had oil pressure, the 66291-H lifter would be putting oil to the face of the cam at all RPM. We run more than 790 lb springs without a problem. Spend hours towing skiers, tubers, cruising. There's always the possibility of a bad set of lifters, but I would be checking everything else. What oil do you run ?

No question go to the .903 lifters no matter which brand.That gets you a slightly larger roller bearing in the wheel and the chance to true up your lifter bores. You also need a cam expert to look at your cam needs from an endurance standpoint. A drag race profile may just be too violent of a motion for the lifter to live very long. Bob Madera should be able to steer you in the right direction.

Fixx
 

are you tunning restrictors? not enough oil to the top end could be causing the problem.

running 50w mobile 1.

no i dont believe there is any restrictors. the last set of lifters i had before the rebuild lasted over 100 hours. same brand:eek:

Dave Crower told me to stay away from synthetic oil with a solid roller setup. Have you looked at your other motor ? Found this on Crowers site, Use of Synthetic Oils,
Crower does not recommend the use of synthetic motor oil in any application, particularly in hydraulic and flat tappet camshafts. If your car manufacturer's owners manual suggests running synthetic oil, you may do so. The minimum gains in horsepower are offset by the excessive wear to cam and lifter surfaces. We have found that the benefits, of synthetic motor oil, do not outweigh the costs and may endanger your engine's life. Crower recommends a non-detergent / race only petroleum based 30wt. motor oil in all performance applications. The lack of phosphorus and zinc in current oil blends is catastrophic to engine longevity. For all applications we do recommend running our ZDDPlus additive, which adds zinc and phosphorus back into the oil.

I have a question.....with an 8.3 L Whipple and only 1300 hp, why are you running a solid anyway. There is no reason you can't do it with a hydraulic roller and get 150+ hours out of it. Myself, along with several others do it on a regular basis. Hell, I can't recall the last solid I did. It was quite a long time ago. Just curious.
Eddie

Thats a good question, i would love to be able to go to a hydraulic, im guessing i would have to change my cams along with getting the mefi 4 program re-flashed?

Question for you, would i have to go back to the dyno to switch over?

Not as long as you stayed close in cam size. You will need to do some tuning, but it can be done in the boat. A hydraulic roller will need to have smaller duration and lift to be comparable to the solid roller you have. The general rule is the hyd. will be 8-10 degrees smaller than the solid roller because of the lash. Along with the cam and lifters, you will need to change the springs. The pushrods may or may not work.
The biggest problem I worry about with the solid lifters failing is the potential for a needle bearing to make it into the oil pump and lock it up. The needle bearing will just fit in through the screen on an oil pump pickup. It's amazing how it can make it in the pickup when it has to be perfectly vertical and is bouncing around in 14 qts of oil, but they do. All it takes is one needle bearing in the pump gears to lock it up and break the drive rod. I've seen it happen quite a few times.
Eddie

Anyone have any reports on the EZX?

I totally agree with Eddie Young here, why are you guys using these high spring poundage solid roller camshafts on this engine if you are keeping the rpms at 6300 rpms and under with reasonable boost numbers ??
A good grind billet hydraulic roller camshaft with a good set of Morrell hyfraulic roller lifters and about 200lb closed and 500lbs open will keep most good BBC valvetrains in one piece up to that rpm range in boost and without the need for valve lash adjustments and the beatings that solid lifters put on a camshaft and lifters. This seems like a bit of "Old School" marine engine building here. Going up to 6500-7000 rpms and yes a good solid roller setup and higher spring pressures will be needed along with a good shaft rocker system that's needed to keep N/A and supercharged BBC valve trains stable at these higher rpms and loads.
Just my old rusted 2 cents opinion here.

Best Regards,
Ray @ Raylar

Bringing this subject up again. Why did Merc go with solid on their 850 and 1075,1200? They are not turning the rpms to 7-7500....

Just curious...

What cam is in the new merc turbo motors?

Also curious.. bump.

why did merc go with a solid roller setup,good question,why does merc do half of the things they do.my guess is so they can sell more parts.the turbo engines are dual overhead camshaft design,no more pushrods.

Mike,
I have looked at a couple of the past ; post in this "thread". Talking about needle bearings falling out, the only times needle bearings fall out is from bouncing the lifter, lifter hours beyond service. I have seen; hydraulic roller lifters drop the bearings out at removal. Spring pressures are limited on hydraulic roller lifters, and you can push their limits with spring pressure, RPMs, valve, retainer weight and lobe design.
I think Merc wanted to cover their warranty, with the solids even with a less aggressive cam lobe. You have to remember; Merc likes a .375" valve stem and non titanium retainers, which adds to mass on the valve side. Madara, can give his; input on this subject.

Any thoughts on bushed lifters?

What do you guys think about rev kits for roller lifter motors?
Even if you are not turning high RPM's - wouldn't it help keep the roller ON the cam lobe and stop the roller slamming down on the lobe. I was thinking about running a rev kit.

The machine shop is telling me not to waist the $ on bronze bushing the lifter bores. I plan on turning 6500 - 7000 RPM.

You might look at the stainless shaft rockers if you haven't already.

Don't waste your money on lifter bushings unless you are going 55mm Cam and big lifters. Rev kit think its a thing of the past. One more thing to break.

I run the 904's with no lifter bushings either. A good quality rev kit isn't a bad idea, but a nice tight lash solid deal, with bushed axle lifters can be incredibly reliable too. Anybody who is truly making 1200hp+ with a hydraulic roller is leaving lots of power on the table.. Opening the exhaust valve against all that pressure is a biatch.

Sorry, I was taking about the bushings in the lifter rollers, not the bores. Scattering needles in a block would be no fun.

In the case of the 1075, this allows them to have a 75-100 hr recommended rebuild interval. They assume that most will send their engines back to Mercury to be rebuilt. They get $22,500 per engine, so that's a bunch of money on a regular interval.

The turbo engines are completely different animals. They use dual overhead cams.