Roller cam and FE engine

[olddog]

Originally Posted by scottj

uhh... one minor note: Lifters are convex on the face and cam lobes are tapered...that is why they rotate.

My son is building a SB Chevy for a dirt track car (yea I know he is on the dark side). So I pull the lifters out of the box and put a straight edge across the bottom. Indeed they are ever so slightly convex, as stated. By eye sight the center is 0.001 or slightly more longer than the edges. This is a solid lifter. The lifter diameter is about twice the cam lobe width. When it goes in the block (block not done yet), I want to look at how the lobes line up to the lifter bores. I suspect the lobe only hits one side of the filter, and that this is what causes the lifter to rotate.

A couple of the lifters are rough around the edge. They need touched with a stone. Finish quality is not all that great. I remember in the old days lifters were polish like a mirror and shinning. These are not.

Your going to love this. The cam shaft is in two pieces brand new out of the box. The box is pristeen. Not a ding or dent in the box anywhere. Looking at the place it broke the cast material is very course. I have seen pot metal of better quality. I'm not saying that every cam manufacture is the same, but I do suspect that metal quality has gone down, as almost nothing is made in the USA anymore.