Lifter making noise
 

For those who happen to read this and don't know, my builds are new this year. So the port engine has been down on power for a little while by 200 rpm or so. Possibly from the get-go but really don't remember. I always lift the hatch when starting to make sure there's not a leak or a problem and just generally look around. The old exhaust tips had metal internal flaps and made a ton of noise so I couldn't hear the lifter making noise. Switched them out for straight through tips with rubber internal flaps and now I can hear it. It's a comp hydraulic roller cam and I have roller rockers too. Is there a way to find out if a lifter is failing? The lifters were pretty tall. I believe that they (comp) switched to this style because they will work in many applications? FYI oil pressure is always great on both engines. I am using the AFR 265cc heads out of the box. The clearances from AFR are on the tight side for marine use according to the guys on this site. Can a push rod hanging up do this or do tight guide clearances just cause a catastrophic failure? I am hoping that maybe it was not adjusted correctly when assembled? I doubt this is the problem but a guy can hope. I will also call my builder and see what he thinks. I'll get the valve cover removed in the next few days. May have other questions after that. Thanks for your comments.

I have my doubts be a guide or plate but easiest thing to do IMO be pull the valve covers and ck your rockers for excessive play while rotating your engine. Ideally on the heel of the lobe but doesn’t have to be exact. Even ck at TDC and then rotate 360 deg and repeat. If you have a loose one you’ll quickly identify.

Regardless of outcome re-adjust lifters to spec and fire it up.

Just hope it’s not a lobe but kinda doubt it

You could also ck all the spark plugs for any noticeable color difference to help isolate which cylinder is causing the rpm loss and noise.

TIcking at idle or at RPM?

Both. I noticed it at first start up today on high idle. Still there at 800 rpm idle. Then took it to the ramp (about 10 minutes at 1000 rpm) and it was still there.

Not just exhaust leak or plug wire arcing?(Wishfull thinking)

What oil/weight?

Nope. They all make distinctive noises imo. My wishful thinking at this point is maybe the lock came loose on the rocker.

I had horrible luck with the new comp lifters and cams. I wouldn't be surprised if it was bad. The build quality now a days just isn't the same for lifters. If u pull a valve cover and find a loose rocker or a pushrod kicked out id be pulling the intake to check the cam. I ended up going to teague for there cams and lifters

Could pop valve covers….when idling push down on rockers individually. See if noise goes away.

I'd change the oil and check again. Did't you mention that you were running in the 11's AFR. Might just be diluted oil.

Hey Rookie, I missed your post about oil and weight. I am running the semi synthetic Brad Penn 10w30. Oil pressure has always been great. If it's diluted would it still hold good pressure? Lol!!! Could you really tell if 10w30 is diluted!! It's held the same pressure all season. I do plan on changing the oil while it's in my shop. I did change the dyno oil which was the same stuff but since then have put another 40 hrs on it. I think next year I will change every 20 hours. I have the one side tore down already and didn't notice anything wrong. There was a couple exhaust bolts that weren't that tight but no signs of a leak. Plug wires are new and look good. Plugs are coated with soot. The 02 sensor is coated with soot. There is soot on the transom. The carbs are way out of wack. During the dyno runs they were in the 13's and 14's so I asked him to richen it up. Maybe I should have left the stock jets in there? I believe that with my wet exhaust it naturally will richen up. Part of the reason the plugs look so coated maybe because the last run I made was from my house to the ramp at 1000 rpm. About a mile. Maybe they still run fine at speed and just the idle is crap? The 02 sensors gave up the ghost a while ago. They had an error code that indicated a bad sensor so I tried removing them and recalibrating but they never came back. One had a different error code after that but now both are stuck in the "HTR" mode which is heating up. This happened right after I installed the new tips. I thought maybe some water got to them. Maybe they are just smothered/plugged and can't read? I have attached some pics of the plugs and 02 sensor. Also just an overall pick of the rockers etc. I did notice that the rockers are not really centered on the valve tip (left to right) on the ones where the valve is closed. If the valve is open it looks pretty good. Is this something with the head/valve design or could this be straightened out? My engine guy said he'd come out and take a look. I'm already in this deep so I think I'll have him redo the valve adjustment again on this engine and then I guess come back after I get it together (and new 02 sensors) and work on getting the carbs dialed in. Thanks to everyone who took the time to look and post ideas. I'm not sure at this point how pissed I'm going to be if it's actually just diluted oil. :hothead: Thanks again.
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#1
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A better shot of #1???

Are there guide plates on those heads, cant really see

Yes. I can take more specific pics if it helps. I just didn't know if this is typical of the BBC or not.

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Last pic, roller is way off center on the valve. How many more are like that??

Your plugs look terrible, your tune is definately too rich SOMEWHERE.
how far are your 02 sensors from water? ICL/LSA/ .050 duration of cam?
your rocker arms are poorly lined up, you clearly have adjustable guide plates, use them to align your rockers properly and relash the valves.
Comp cams hydraulic roller lifters are cheaply made, pretty sure there imported . I would cycle them out at some point before 100 hours for good Johnsons before they fail and destroy your engine as they are worse then Morels which have a terrible track history these days. And thats assuming you just have one out of adjustment at this point and not one failing already. Good luck with it

The cam is a comp marine extreme 230/[email protected] with 112 degree lsa. Eddie Marine puts the 02 sensor in the riser just above where the riser attaches to the manifold. The riser runs almost to the transom. I cant get them further from water than what i have with my standard bravo setup. Several of the rockers are off center. I think that was the worst one. Are those lifters available at Summit or can i buy from you? As much as i wanted to touch 80 mph this year, I would much rather end this season without a grenade going off. Thanks for the help and heads up.

Hydraulic roller lifters are a sore subject for a lot of people these days. It probably has one collapsed although you need to start with getting the guide plates adjusted correctly and setting the valve lash again. I wouldn't even want to suggest what brand to use as all of them seem to have issues in the last 5 years or so. If it were mine, I would probably put in some solid lifters and tight lash them.

Not much point to those adjustable guide plates.:rolleyes:

These were CompCams best lifter with billet blah blah blah..
The needle bearing and schrapnel thru the entire engine was cool.

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I would want to take it apart and get a good look at all of them. You don't want this. The noise is giving you a warning.
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Well the best news is IF they haven't takin a chit yet it's the best time of the year for it to happen. You have all winter to fix.

I tried everything under the sun to get my hydraulic roller lifters to stop ticking. I tried special top secret motor oil adjusting when we only had a full moon and on and on. Went to solid roller lifters with pin oilers on my hydraulic cam problem solved .

I always thought the roller cams were the way to go if you could swing the cost. It never occurred to me that there could be so many problems associated with them. I thought they were the "best of the best sir"! Maybe I should have saved a ton of money and gone flat tappet? Nothing in my builds required a roller set up, I thought it was better and LOL an added layer of protection. Anyway, I am going to assume that there has been a lifter failure however, I will do my best to troubleshoot (including the oil change) just so I know. I do not want a catastrophic failure so I am leaning towards different lifters and as mentioned by Wildman I have all winter to get this figured out. I probably wouldn't go with solid lifters because of the PIA factor at least yearly to lash them in. Maybe your setups are different but a lot of stuff gets removed including the exhaust just to get the valve covers off with my setup. Plus I don't think I can even get a socket on the crank bolt without removing the back seat. I think my build is towards the bottom as far as stress on components goes. Low compression, small cam, and the AFR heads use this spring package: "PAC Racing Springs #1940 Street Hydraulic Roller Spring 1.550 O.D. 175 lbs. on seat .725” max lift Max RPM 6500-6700" which I'm guessing is not very much. I would think that much higher numbers across the board put more stress on all components. Maybe that's why you guys unfortunately suffered the catastrophic failures and I got off lucky with a warning? Thanks again for your comments and help.

Dont be fooled solid rollers break to and dont do flat tappet, there is are literally thousands of roller motors out the there doing just fine,

Thanks F-2. I was thinking that both are rollers so the bottom ends are the same construction. I expected some things to happen being new builds and all, just not something like this. Still, it was a great season! Thanks again.

I know you ruled it out already but you did mention your exhaust bolts were less than tight....an exhaust leak at the flange can and will sound like a lifter tick just fyi....before you jump in with both feet I would be doing some more investigating rather than just changing parts because you think they are bad. I had a leak at the flange on one and at the elbow on my CMI E-tops and both sounded like a lifter tick. Fixed the leaks and no more noise. Search on here a thread called "do you use silicone on exhaust gaskets" or something like that. Very informative....not saying that's the issue but just offering some advice. Good luck.

Hydraulic roller is the way to go. I think there are some issues with sub quality parts unfortunately. I would never go back to flat tappet. Either the oil is a problem or cam/lifters are junkc. Heard of lot more people losing lobes/lifters on flat tappers than I ever use to. (good mechanics, not hacks) If solid lifters need a yearly adjustment something is wearing creating change in clearance.

I've had the same thing happen to me on a 525, would have sworn it was a lifter but it was the header leaking. I ended up doubling the gasket and the noise was gone.

ISKY EZ Rolls. Not cheap but worth every penny. Bullet proof Hyd roller lifters. They use Johnson bodies with ISKY bushings. They do not have needle bearings. Theyll take a ton more spring psi than a regular needle bearing lifter. We have them in race motors turning 6k for hours at a time, have yet to have a problem in the 8+ years(50+ engines) we've been using them.
They're rebuildable as well. God forbid something did fail, no needle bearings to spew around your engine.

FWIW I will not use any comp cams lifters after the several sets that had issues. the isky with the bushings, jesel has bushing ones as well, supposedly will start to squeak when they start to have a problem but as said they will not fill the oil with roller bits and as said can be rebuilt. really the cost to step up to the better lifters is nothing compared to the total cost of an engine.

Lifter issues (IF thats even what you got going on) have became a real big deal in past 10-15 years. Heres my experience/opinion on it: I used Morel lifters (hyd rollers) when they became a "thing" back in 05/06, running 180/195 seat and close to 500 lbs open up to 6300 in my own blower engine WITH 20/W 50 oil. Never had a tick or issue. Retired them at every refresh interval at about 100 hours. Also used them in quite a few customers builds with no issues regardless of oil weight. Fast forward, no matter what lies CHRIS S####B, JOHN C#####S perpetuate, around 2014 they changed something. They sped up production, sent lifter bodies to Mexico or China, IDK BUT they started having failures , plungers failing/sticking. tie bars breaking, roller wheels disintegrating. CHRIS SXXXXB in conversation on FB made THIS statement: They ONLY have 1 pair of lifters out of a 1000 sets that fail, thats funny because I flow/clean injectors for several other engine builder/dyno guys in this business and EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM HAS HAD FAILURES and will never buy Morels again. The comps are a step below, seen guys have failures on street engines before 5000 miles with them.
As far as hyd flat tappets, the ONLY engines I build with them anymore are class rule engines that dictate you run them (which is rare for me), and I wont warranty them in any way, shape or form. I put it in writing that any failure is customers problem and make them sign it as cam core/lifter construction has went right in the trash..Ive used johnson lifters successfully in last 40 or 50 mild bbcs ive built with no isuues.
I had one customer who i used the Morels with from that 2014/2015 era, in 2019/2020 Bob M who had sold them to me asked if customer had any issues with them. I said NO except they were noisy cold. He highly recommended changing them before they failed. I mentioned this to the customer who said nah, Im selling boat soon anyways, not worried about it. a couple rides later one failed and destroyed his cam, lifter bore etc and trashed his whole engine. Was around 150 hours IF I remember correctly

Articfreinds,

How much HP and cam specs on the motor that you change them every 100 hours?

Not unusual to put that many or more on per year here. It's really BS that in 2023 BBC lifters could not last hundreds of hours, not like this is new tech.

Have you ever tried the ISKY ones SARIS mentioned?

No wonder people go OB.

For Gen VI engines, what about factory GM? Their performance lifter is a tall body, p/n 17120060, and supports the camshaft in the 572/620hp (.623 lift - 254/264 @ 050). I would imagine that it would be more than capable for most of what people here would use. I haven't heard too many people complaining about them either.

This would be useful for those that have factory roller blocks. I was going to go that route but ended up with a nice set of Crane lifters.

Just a note with my success with jones cams and lifters. I had mike spec me out a couple SR inverse radius cams and his in-house or nearby lifters and couldn’t be happier. Easy on the valvetrain and cams are spot on for my 565 NA builds.

255/259-724/724. Pushed my heavy 12m straight bottom 87 gps (best to date) Gotta give Valako a big thumbs up also on the heads!!! Great combo for me anyway.

Mine are gen 5.

Yeah, I started to follow the lifter part of the thread.

Did you have a chance to locate the rocker that's giving you noise?

Not yet and if the only way to check it is to reassemble the engine without the valve cover to get it running and look around then to be honest, I'm not looking forward to that. Especially if it turns out all the lifters were fine and I actually just had an exhaust leak.

I've run solid Isky Red Zones on HR cams since 2006 with no issues. Isky lifters are rebuildable and I sent them back for rebuild 2yrs ago.
I have Comp HR lifters in my Merc 420's with 500 EFI cams. I bought them from the Swap Shop used, later to read later that the member had issues with them ticking in his engines. The lifters ticked on initial install, but I quieted them down by increasing lash a little not tightening the rocker nut. I run Comp 933 springs on both applications.

PQ, to me the sound difference between a lifter tick and exhaust leak is distinct.........Id pull the covers relash all the valves reassemble and fire it up