Cam Lobe And Lifter Destroyed.....

[rritchey]

Hey guys, I'd like some of you other FE gurus to comment on this... I built a 427 center oiler stroker for a guy, ran it on the dyno and sent it out to him. Everything was great on the dyno - normal oil pressure, normal temp, no indications of any problems. The motor consists of the following:

Late model center oiler block .017" over
428 CJ crank
Lemans rods
Arias pistons
edel. heads and RPM intake
Crane hyd. cam .540" lift (the block was already drilled for hyd. when I got it, perhaps from the factory but not sure)
Roller rockers

Anyway, the guy gets it in his car and 20 miles later it starts popping and acting up. turns out one cam lobe and lifter were trashed. I got the motor back and tore it down, no signs of any problems anywhere except the one cam lobe. All other lobes and lifters were perfect and all bearings were perfect. I contributed it to either a bad cam lobe, bad lifter, or maybe I skimped on the lobe grease on that one lobe. I cleaned everything thoroughly, re-assembled with a new Lunati cam (.600" lift) and went back to the dyno. Again, everything was perfect. No indications of problems. But, once again, the guy gets it in his car and now it has a lifter tick again

I have heard that the late model blocks sometimes have problems with thte lifter bores. Could this bore be off center or something to cause it to eat the cams? You can not see anything wrong with it, I lightly hone all of my engine's lifter bores with a ball hone to make sure they are clean and did not see any evidence of a problem with them.

The motor ran real strong while on the dyno (440 HP 535 ft-lbs) and had good oil pressure. I am pretty well convinced it is not an oiling problem. This is the only engine I have ever had this problem with, so any help you guys can offer is appreciated.