I'm a rookie engine builder attempting my second round at building my 427.The first time I ate the cam! graemlins/sad.gif So I pulled it apart ,the bearings were shot and the crank need to be ground. :mad: Now I've reassembled the engine and ready for the valve train.The book says to prime the hydraulic lifters with a oiling can.(Which I did the first time)I've had two people tell me not to prime the lifters because( By priming the lifters they can go solid and eat the cam on break in.They are pre-oiled from the factory so don't have oil them!)What do you guys think?My worries are on start up the lifters will take longer to pump up which means the cam doesn't get oil as fast!

Thanks, Neil


67 Chevelle SS
66 427BB Isky 280
T400 4.11 posi

Old school was soak them in oil overnight,,,I don't think its necessary now. Just lube the bottom with your cam lube and I pour oil on top after valves are set.

Originally posted by BB427SS:
I'm a rookie engine builder attempting my second round at building my 427.The first time I ate the cam! graemlins/sad.gif So I pulled it apart ,the bearings were shot and the crank need to be ground. :mad: Now I've reassembled the engine and ready for the valve train.The book says to prime the hydraulic lifters with a oiling can.(Which I did the first time)I've had two people tell me not to prime the lifters because( By priming the lifters they can go solid and eat the cam on break in.They are pre-oiled from the factory so don't have oil them!)What do you guys think?My worries are on start up the lifters will take longer to pump up which means the cam doesn't get oil as fast!

Thanks, Neil


67 Chevelle SS
66 427BB Isky 280
T400 4.11 posi =
Neil,
You don't need to prime the lifters.
The lifters have nothing to do with when the cam gets oil.

You will fill them when you prime the engine,,, you are going to prime it right :D

If you see oil at the rockers it came out of the lifters.

The only oil the cam gets is what "leaks" past the outside of the lifters & what gets thrown on it from the crank & rods & what drains down from the valley.
This is one of the reasons you never want to let a fresh engine idle for the first 20 minutes or so.

Originally posted by Wolfplace:
You will fill them when you prime the engine,,, you are going to prime it right :D

If you see oil at the rockers it came out of the lifters. I was gonna say... :D Priming the lifters seems to be some kind of jury rigging to get around priming the whole engine. Prime the engine, using the special tools they sell for this purpose, or build your own from an old distributor. When you have oil coming from all rockers, the lifters are filled.

I am currently re-assembling my Olds 455. Has 1/2 hour run time, but had to rip the cam and lifters out in order to send back to the cam company. Why? One lifter out of the sixteen was defective. Missing an internal check valve, and so it would not pump up.

Failing to fill the lifters with oil before assembling the engine cost me time, money to buy gaskets and postage to return the cam & lifters under warranty, and effort. It could have been avoided if I had just bench-tested them with an oil can before dropping them in the bores.

Yeah, that was probably the only defective (missing parts) lifter I'll ever see...but I'll never again install lifters without pumping them up first.

I soak my lifters this helps remove any metal shavings from the machining process. Then prime with oil can. Never hurts to be cleaned and lubed.

Originally posted by Schurkey:
It could have been avoided if I had just bench-tested them with an oil can before dropping them in the bores.

Yeah, that was probably the only defective (missing parts) lifter I'll ever see...but I'll never again install lifters without pumping them up first. Probably a stupid question, but are you saying that you can actually bench test them to see if they'll pump up? How do you do that?

BB427SS I think you may have a basic misconception about how things on and around your camshaft get oiled. The oil galleries that supply lifter bores only lubricate the lifter bores , the lifter itself and the valve train above the lifter.


With respect to the lifters themselves the standard hydraulic lifter is made up of 6 parts. The lifter body, the pushrod cup , the check valve ( a spring steel plate), a piston , a spring and finally a retaining clip to hold the entire assembly together. Oil is pumped into the lifter body through the small hole in the side of the lifter , past the piston and spring , around the check valve , through the pushrod cup and thence upward through the pushrod to the rocker arm.

The piston and spring inside the lifter body act to prevent the entire internal assembly from being pushed down by valve spring pressure and the check valve insures that oil flow is always towards the rocker arms but limits the flow by design such that too much oil doesn't get pumped upwards.. There is enough internal clearance in the lifter such that given a proper valve adjustment the pushrod cup is basically floating in the oil in the lifter. Neither bottomed out nor topped out. Were that not to be the case your valves would not close.

For anyone curious enough to see all this feel free to disassemble a lifter sometime and look for yourselves. They are quite simple. If you figure on reusing the lifter that you disassemble make very sure that you keep everything very clean.

With respect to presoaking the lifters all I have ever done is properly lubricate the camshaft bearings , lobes and the face of the lifter. I have used at various times , white lithium grease , tramsmission fluid and engine oil. Occasionally if I had it I have used the special lubes supplied by the camshaft manufacturers. All have worked equally well. To date I have never had a report of any engine I have assembled and STARTED having had a camshaft failure and I have been an active auto mechanic for 40+ of my years. The critical secret to this IMHO is the fact that I always prelubed the engines that I built and I ALWAYS set them up to start instantly. That means I had a fairly close valve adjustment and I had the distributor stabbed correctly the first time and the carburetor filled with gas to the normal level. All other systems primed and ready to go.

If you have everything hooked up properly the engine will fire up immediately and allow you to break in your camshaft to manufacturers specs.

With respect to valve adjustment (prestart): Given that on all our Chevelle small and big blocks the final resting place for the rocker adjusting nuts is essentially the same place ie: about 4 to 5 rocker stud threads exposed above the rocker adjusting nuts one can preset the valves fairly closely without going thru any complicated gyrations. On my small blocks I have always tightened the nuts such that there were 4 threads showing above the nuts. ( personal preference here) This gets things close enough to be able to start the engine. After seeing to ALL of the aforementioned preliminaries I fire the engine and do a quick adjustment immediately. Of course the valves clatter a lot but who cares...that won't hurt a darned thing. These pieces are TOUGH besides the noise subsides quickly as the lifters pump up to normal operating pressure. Once the engine is running a valve adjustment usually takes me about a minute per side(hydraulic only). I always have some hi tech cardboard smile.gif 3 corner dams installed in the heads to prevent oil from overflowing the lower edge of the head and I have splash guards installed on all 16 rocker arms.


Finally with respect to prelubing the engine. I have discussed this in the past on occasion. IMHO once you have completely filled the rod and main bearing clearances with oil your task of prelubing is done. All your effort to pump oil up to the cam and rockers is wasted. You and your arms or your drill motor will never equal the efficiency of your oil pump for pumping oil. Get the bearings wet and start your engine. The oil pump will quickly fill every nook and cranny in your engines oil system. If you want evidence of that watch how fast oil pressure comes up on a wet guage the first time a new engine is started and remember that the oil pressure tap is at the top of your small block engine. Generally full pressure is in less than 10 seconds right behind the intake manifold. Try that with a speed handle!

If you have hand lubricated all of those rotating parts you should have success with your engine assuming you get it started quickly. Its all in the careful assembly of EACH component both internal and external to the engine.

Good Luck!

Thanks alot for all the info guys. I'm just a little nervous about the cam breakin stage. And yes I do prime the engine before starting.
Thanks again.

charbilly,

Interesting post but I will respectfully disagree with a few points. ;)

First, how fast the gauge sees oil pressure has very little to do with the whole system being filled.
The passage that goes to the gauge on a small block comes directly from the beginning of the main oil galley not the end.
It is drilled directly to the internal passage that comes from the oil filter so the only thing the instant gauge reading is telling you is the oil filter is full & you have started putting oil down the main galley & to the lifter galleys which are oiled from the rear cam groove.

Second, my personal preference is to see oil at the rockers when priming as this is the last point in the oil system to receive oil so if you are getting oil here you can be pretty well assured you have oil everywhere.

Just as a side note, you can leave the front plugs out of the lifter galleys & you will not see it on the gauge when priming but you will know it very shortly after startup as you will never see oil at the rockers.

Third, in regards to how many threads are showing, there are so many rocker, stud, pushrod length & valve length combos out there now that this is probably not the best practice except perhaps on a stock engine but my preference is to adjust the lifters properly when assembling the engine.
Plus it is a bit difficult to count threads with locking type adjusters,,IE rollers or posilocks.

Originally posted by charbilly2001:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by charbilly2001:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Wolfplace:
charbilly,

Interesting post but I will respectfully disagree with a few points. ;)

First, how fast the gauge sees oil pressure has very little to do with the whole system being filled.
The passage that goes to the gauge on a small block comes directly from the beginning of the main oil galley not the end.
It is drilled directly to the internal passage that comes from the oil filter so the only thing the instant gauge reading is telling you is the oil filter is full & you have started putting oil down the main galley & to the lifter galleys which are oiled from the rear cam groove.


Second, my personal preference is to see oil at the rockers when priming as this is the last point in the oil system to receive oil so if you are getting oil here you can be pretty well assured you have oil everywhere.

Just as a side note, you can leave the front plugs out of the lifter galleys & you will not see it on the gauge when priming but you will know it very shortly after startup as you will never see oil at the rockers.

Third, in regards to how many threads are showing, there are so many rocker, stud, pushrod length & valve length combos out there now that this is probably not the best practice except perhaps on a stock engine but my preference is to adjust the lifters properly when assembling the engine.
Plus it is a bit difficult to count threads with locking type adjusters,,IE rollers or posilocks. I knew this would be controversial and it was. When priming your small block engine I will give you that by the time you have the mains and rods wet you will also have the filter wet. Perhaps I didn't clarify my point enough. If you are showing oil pressure at your guage then by definition you have wet the mains and rods to include the filter.

I still maintain that any further effort past that point is wasted physical effort and would be best done by the oil pump powered by the engine. We fully agree about where the oil comes from that oils the rods. mains , cam and lifters. However from a practical standpoint the only engine components that are at risk at engine startup are the rods and mains. The rest of the engine can wait the few brief seconds while the oil pump brings everything up to full operating pressure presuming that the assembler has hand lubricated each component as he assembles the engine of course. No one that I am aware of puts them together dry. At least not the second time.

With respect to rocker stud threads showing above rocker adjusting nuts I again failed to stipulate that I am referring to our STOCK small and big blocks and particularly to hydraulic lifter small blocks. Virtually all small block engines in any 1964 to 1972 Chevelle and any other chevrolet passenger car from 1955 forward equipped with a small block engine could have its valves preadjusted in exactly the same way. The same thing can be said of most if not all big blocks in the years that they are available in passenger cars. I make NO statement about any chevrolet newer than the years that this forum addresses.

The point that I am trying to get across here is that there is nothing magical or mystical about out small block and big block engines and the average layman can have good success getting his brand new engine running if he will follow a few simple practices. We all know that there have been more than a few camshafts ruined by amateurs spending hours , days or weeks trying to get an engine running that was improperly assembled. A few hundred turns of an engine while failing to get the engine running will destroy the stoutest camshaft however well lubricated it was upon installation.


</font>[/QUOTE]</font>[/QUOTE]

oops

"When priming your small block engine I will give you that by the time you have the mains and rods wet you will also have the filter wet. Perhaps I didn't clarify my point enough. If you are showing oil pressure at your guage then by definition you have wet the mains and rods to include the filter"
=

=================================

charbilly,
Not trying to be a anal (well maybe a little ;) ) or a pain here, but part of your above statement is incorrect.
The first thing to see oil is the pump, second you fill the filter, third you will see oil pressure as it is at the rear of the main oil galley before it gets to the mains & rods.
I will agree that within about 30 seconds from this point you should have oil to all the mains & rods but if you quit as soon as you see pressure this will not be the case.

I would guess at least half of the people on this board are into high performance & or altered engines & my point is you are far safer priming until you see oil at the end of the lubrication chain which is at the end of the valvetrain.

Just having pressure at the gauge is not in my opinion good enough.
I have seen cases where it took over a minute with a running engine to get oil at all rockers & this to me is unacceptable.

Also, as I stated, you could leave a plug out of the front of a lifter galley & still have full pressure at the gauge when priming.
I know things like this "never" happen :D but unfortunately, sometimes stuff does happen.

I personally just get a warm fuzzy feeling when I see oil where it should be ;)

On the rocker adjustment thing, I realize what you are saying about the number of threads being a close approximation on stock engines since 1955 as I have been playing with this engine stuff since about then :D
But it only takes a few minutes to adjust the valves correctly & again, in my opinion, there are way too many people here with performance & or aftermarket parts to make counting threads even close to reliable.
It is just to easy to do it correctly & I feel it should be no problem hitting the valve adjustment within a couple of thou on the stand.

Of course, just my humble opinions ;)

Since 1955 huh? well that would be me too...I always love to discuss these things with another old fart. smile.gif

Perhaps we could agree that I failed , in my first submission , to mention the oil filter. I will stipulate to that. I will also stipulate as to the flowpath. Never argued that point in the first place. smile.gif The oil pump in our engines is a positive displacement pump. That means that if it is driven and has a pumpable medium it HAS to pump. It will continue to pump from the first time it is rotated until it stops again. As long as there is oil in the engine and nothing is broken oil will be pumped..... PERIOD. Each of our pumps has a high pressure relief that is calibrated to some preset pressure. When that pressure is reached the relief piston is moved and a "dump" port is uncovered and the oil begins to recirculate within the pump rather than be sent downstream to the engine. This allows our positive displacement pump to operate at RPM beyond the engine's design lubrication pressure limits without doing any damage to itself or the engine.

In the split second that it takes to pressurize the oil filter , the mains and rods with our positive displacement oil pump I am and will always be confident that by prelubing the bottom end I have protected the really critical engine parts that simply CANNOT operate with out adequate oiling ON START UP. All else in the engine will safely follow in the normal course of events. Having done this particular operation more than a few hundred times in the past several decades I have a large body of personal empirical evidence to draw from which definitely shapes my opinion.

Having properly lubricated the rods and mains of our engine as it was assembled our prelube effort does not fill them. They are already full of the lubricant that we assembled the engine with. All the prelube procedure does is PRESSURIZE them and wet any tiny area that we might have missed. Clearances being what they are in a properly machined engine the act of torquing rod caps and main caps will squeeze out all of the excess coating of lube you applied anyway.

Having read questions on this subject more than a few times since I signed on it is apparent to me that there is considerable angst in the automotive community about the act of first starting up a brand new or remanufactured or hand built engine. What I am trying to point out is that if you have lubricated and pressurized the mains and rods of your engine you are SAFE in starting your engine and letting the oil pump finish filling the rest of your engine with oil. Of course as I have said several times this assumes that as you assembled your engine you properly hand lubricated all of the moving parts. No one assembles an engine dry. At least not more than once.

I too have seen full oil pressure take quite a while to appear on a wet guage. I cannot answer for the vuageries of guages nor for the failure of a good hot tanking to properly clean out all of the smallest oil passages in an engine. Being the bright intelligent chap that I am however I have always believed in my indications....ALL of them including the lack of distressful noises coming from deep within the engine I just started. If the oil pressure is slow to evidence itself AND I am not hearing rods or mains rumble I am willing to wait a bit longer. Lets face it, either you assembled your engine correctly or you didn't, a few moments longer isn't going to make any difference worth worrying about.

My objective here was to let those who's mechanical knowlege/ability may not match yours or mine know that they needn't worry so much about this prelube business and that they should concentrate more on the correct assembly of all of the components of their engine that are essential for its immediate startup. What good does it do anyone to do a complete exhaustive prelube of an engine and then spend a month , 4 battery recharges , one starter , a couple of carb backfires maybe even a heart stopping carb fire cause you splashed gas all over the engine, several cases of beer during several midnight consultations with equally ignorant friends to finally get your engine started only to find out that you have wiped a couple cam lobes?


Wet the mains ,rods AND your oil filter , stab the distributor CORRECTLY, fill the carburetor with gas, make sure that all systems are filled, connected properly and start your engine.


"The first thing to see oil is the pump, second you fill the filter, third you will see oil pressure as it is at the rear of the main oil galley before it gets to the mains & rods.
I will agree that within about 30 seconds from this point you should have oil to all the mains & rods but if you quit as soon as you see pressure this will not be the case."


Ok....we are starting to split hairs here. Guys.........from now on lets agree that from the moment you first feel your oil pump start sucking oil by whatever means you are using to do your prelube you faithfully PROMISE both myself and Wolfplace ( when you are as old as we are you can extract promises like that from later generations:)that you will not cease in that effort for a full minute...not 30 seconds but a FULL minute. That will not get oil up to your lifters yet or not fill them in any event but it WILL get your drill motor pretty warm or your arm very tired. It will also ensure that your rods , mains and oil filter are full too and I will be very happy with your performance. :D

Well,, I guess we will just have to agree to disagree on how to prime an engine.

I agree completely that after a minute of pressurized priming (cool new term :D ) you are going to have oil to all rods & mains.

I will also agree that in the majority of cases this is probably enough.

Butt,,,, always a but huh :D
From there we disagree.
As I said my preference is to see oil at the end of the system.

I will not install the valve covers until,,
1: the valves are adjusted extremely close &
2: I see oil at the rockers ;)

I dyno a lot of engines & they do not get started until this criteria is met & in almost every case I do not have to readjust anything but the timing before making some pulls to see if I can "oil the walls" :D

Just a difference of opinion from different experiences I guess but most of what I do is performance related.
And, I am I suppose considered a bit "anal" in the way I do things ;)

Of course, just my humble opinions ;) [/QB][/QUOTE]

Mike, If you want to be humble, Go to a F--d site. :D

Question for you Mike: I have built four engines (SBC) in recent years and I have never been able to get oil to come out of all the push rods during priming. My oil pressure always comes quickly up to 50 pounds while priming with my Dewalt 3/8" drill. I can prime and prime until my drill is too hot to hold on to, but I can only get oil out of about 2 or 3 pushrods at best. I've tried turning the engine in 90 degree increments while priming with no change in the results. This is with both hydraulic and solid F/T cams. By the way, I've never lost a cam lobe - even breaking in with full spring pressure (135/315), or had any other problems with any of these engines. It does bother me though not knowing why I can't get oil out of all the push rods during priming. I recently helped a friend build a Cleveland stroker and the exact same situation occurred. Any thoughts?

Fuji in all probability you aren't using a cut off distributor body as part of your priming tools. The distributor body completes the oiling circuit such that oil gets up to all of the rocker arms. Thats another reason why I don't worry about prelubing the top end. I oil it, I just don't initially pressurize it.

You're right Charbilly. I just have a cheapy priming drive shaft. So you're saying if I had the deluxe model that seals in the intake I would get oil out of my push rods?

High probability.

My priming tool is a prehistoric points-type distributor that I set against the bench grinder until the teeth were gone from the distributor gear.

I have a 3" machine screw in one of the rotor screw holes, jammed with an appropriate machine screw nut.

I can grab the machine screw with my hand, spin the "distributor" with arm power, and get oil at the rockers before my arm falls off. I assure you that I'm not built like "scHercules".

How tough can it be to do this with a drill motor?

In response to an earlier posting, yes, you can bench test lifters to see if they will pump up. Squirt oil into the hole in the side of the lifter, and see if the plunger goes "solid". It should stay that way even after you quit pumping oil in the side. You will then need to be careful when setting lifter preload, as it will be easy to lift the valve off the seat when tightening the rocker nut. The lifter will bleed down eventually.

what's the best way to prime the carb. with gas on a new short block with a new carb. and gas tank ?

For future reference, probably best to start your own thread on this rather than posting in an unrelated 3.5 year old thread.

I squirted gas into the bowls and made sure they were full before attempting to start the engine.