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Ate my distributor gear....


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:sigh: Well I ate my iron distributor up fairly badly with my roller cam and when I drained the oil I looked at the filter and poured some of the oil out and poked at the shiny silver stream that came out along with the oil.... I just finished my 500 mile break-in but I'm worried that some of the particles got into my bearings. Of course I changed the gear out and I'm hoping it's not too late. What I'm wondering is how long until I'm out of the woods and know whether or not I'm not eating my bearings away? I'm not knocking or anything of the sort yet and hopefully I flushed out most of the stuff with some cheap oil I ran for about 5 minutes then drained. I wish I would have read about putting magnets in your oil pan before I assembled this engine. Anyway, thanks for any input.

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I don't know all I should know about this subject, but my understanding of roller cams is that a bronze gear is required (with some few exceptions), which helps prevent this from happening. I've been told the first (break-in) gear (again, a bronze gear) should be changed within 5k and that subsequent gears should last 25K-30K. Again, I've read that some roller cams are made out of a material that will not chew up the steel distributor gears, but I don't know the details of this.

With the bronze gear, the worn material will not affect the bearings, and yes, it can be seen (just barely) in the oil if you look real hard. I don't know if the same can be said of the steel gear particles.

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How old is your roller cam? My street roller is a steel billet as well with a steel gear on it, but it is 17 years old now. Many late model aftermarket cams use iron gears pressed on. GM and Ford use Melonized steel gears to run on their roller cams. I have heard that the Ford gear works well on the aftermarket cams, but the GM one does not. No experience from me here. The melonized GM gear is about $25, the bronze gear $35-$40, and the polymer gear is $105. I have a bronze gear on my motor and am not sure on its remaining life. The first gear made it about 500miles and I carefully adjusted the load on the next gear using Moroso distributor shims so as not to bottom out the oil pump gears. The next gear has 4000-5000 miles on it. I bought one of the new Comp Polymer distributor gears which they say has virtually zero wear and is now wet sump oil pump compatible.

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My cam is an SLP51010 which obviously does not have an integrated iron gear. I put a bronze gear on the distributor now but I didn't know about the break-in of that either. I'm guessing after all is said and done you would come out cheaper with a polymer gear and call it a day. Mostly I'm just worried that the pieces from the iron gear got into my bearings and I'm wanting to know how long it will take to know for sure that I'm not eating them right now.

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There's really no break in to the bronze gears. They are definitely a wear item and you have to monitor them closely. Usually the first one goes pretty quick, then then each succesive one lasts longer. At first, check it every 500 - 1000 miles to get a feel for how fast it wears.

 

You probably didn't hurt the bearings, but there's no sure way to say without looking at them. I would run it another 500 miles or so, then change oil and cut the filter open to look for any debris, and keep an eye on the oil pressure. If the oil pressure stays good and there's no shiny flakes in the filter you're probably OK.

 

John

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if you have a CAST IRON CAM GEAR whether its machined on a CAST IRON CAM or PRESSED onto a STEEL billet core a CAST IRON stock style DISTRIBUTOR GEAR IS WHAT YOU NEED, BUT..if you have a STEEL BILLET CAM CORE (NORMALL ONLY FOUND ON SOME ROLLER CAMS) with A STEEL GEAR MACHINED ON THE CORE a bronze/ALUMINUM STYLE GEAR IS WHATS NECESSARY HERE READ

 

 

The bottom of a Chevrolet distributor housing can be modified to spray pressurized oil onto the distributor drive gear. The extra lubrication will reduce distributor gear and camshaft gear wear. This is especially important when the gear is used to drive non-standard accessories, such as a high volume oil pump, or a magneto that puts additional loads on it and the cam

as was previously pointed out,you must use the correct gear for the cam used,

 

 

p106762_image_small.jpg

 

Mark a straight-ahead position on the outside of the distributor body to use as a reference mark for the distributor’s placement in the engine. Use this orientation to position the oil groove. Remember that the cam is on the driver’s side of the distributor.

 

Crane suggests cutting a .030-inch-wide by .030-inch-deep slot in the lower band of the distributor housing to direct a spray of oil onto the camshaft and distributor gears. YOU can Use a Dremel tool to cut the slot into this distributor.

 

Thought I'd best add that you would be ahead by disassembling the distriburor first & clean the debris out before you re-assemble ,but you already know that ;)

 

ITS just a tip for improving the oil flow to the distributor, GEARS TO PROMOTE LONGER LIFE,BUT it HELPS a good deal with cam/distributor gear life so its a STANDARD MOD I always do! (keep in mind youll want the grouve location to spray oil into the gear teeth contact area and that requires YOU to carefully match the notch location to the contact area WHEN the distributor is fully seated and timed correctly,

 

moving the distributor timing moves the oil spray pattern area so the time taken too CAREFULLY CUT a second shallow grouve in the block , on the lower band where the distributor seats and seal the oil passage as a secondary extra presureized oil spray source spraying oil onto the gear contact area,that can,t move seems like an even better IDEA . having twin high pressure oil jets spraying oil into the gears helps slow potential wear

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Comp Cams tech line (I know, I know) says that Ford ran one of the polymer gears on a distributor in a crate motor they were designing for a simulated 100,000 miles and it showed no appreciable wear.

 

BTW, CVproducts.com sells the gear for about $90:

 

http://www.cvproducts.com/cv/products/SpecItem.aspx?prodID=24003&keyword=12200&brandID=

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