Solid lifter valve lash at light speed

[Guest Anonymous]

Many articles on the web and print have covered how to set solid lifter valve lash, and I am sure most of us are somewhat familiar with the procedure. Running a radical cam in a street/strip car requires very frequent lash adjustment to keep things in check and also to keep an eye on wear before breakage occurs (paticularly with solid roller lifters and big springs).

 

I will go on record as saying I HATE setting lash! Messy, awkward, time consuming, hard on the back. I one day thought why not try to make this a little quicker? Here's what I tried:

 

Requires a degreed dampner. remove spark plugs, valve covers. bring engine to TDC, compression stroke on number 1. set both intake and exhaust to specified hot/cold setting. rotate engine 90 degrees. set intake and exhaust valves on the next cylinder in the firing rotation. rotate engine another 90 degrees, set the next cyclinder in the firing rotation. repeat the 90 degree rotation/setting of intake and exhaust valves until all eight cylinders are set.

 

This procedure departs from the usual "exhaust opening/set intake, intake closing/set exhaust" routine. I found my method to be much quicker, and the valves are set with two manual engine rotations. Interestingly, I used this method at a local machine shop where I was assembling my engine and was told by an employee who is a crew chief on a local blown alky car that "there is no way that can work on an engine with a big duration cam" when he realized my cam was 288/308 @ .050 and 114 lobe centers, we checked the "right way" and found the lash to be perfect! He had kind of a puzzled look come over him!

 

Try it, test it, it works!

[BillZ260]

So have there been any other testamonials for this method? I am fixing to buy a shortblock with solid roller lifters and I want to make sure I know what I am getting into. This is the motor that Storm280ZT is selling. On DD200 I ran his set up with my vortec heads and performer intake and it showed 400 ft/bls and 375 hp at the crank. Way more than I need so I am happy.

 

Back to the lifters, for a daily driver are these solids ok or do I need to invest in a set of hydralic roller. I have confidence that I can set the lash, I just want to know how often I will need to do this and what the pro's con's are with hyd vs solid roller lifters.

 

Should I also invest in a set of roller rockers? Is it worth the extra $300 or can I upgrade to them later. Try to build this on a budget.