Limited travel hydraulic flat tappet lifter

[tenxal]

Looking for your experiences with limited travel (.020-.015) flat tappet hydraulic lifters in SBC application. Not looking to go with the ceramic faced units. RPM will be 7200-7400.

Thanks!

[CamKing]

We have a limited travel hydr flat tappet lifter that we sell.
We use it a lot in circle track classes that require hydr lifters. Compared to our standard hydr lifters, they'll extend the RPM by about 400 rpm.

[cgarb]

Camking, do you modify the lifters yourself or do you buy the lifters manufactured with short travel plungers? I wanted to fool around with a ford 5.0L hydraulic roller and shim stock lifters and run the spring pressure much higher than hydraulic specs. I wondered what people were using for shims. I am a machinist so making a solid spacer would be easy. Didnt know if plain carbon steel would suit or tool steel would be necessary.

[Malvn]

Just in case you decide you do not want to make them your self you can always buy them or
maybe Camking would sell you shims

http://www.ferrea.com/Lifter-Shims/c7546

[dave brode]

Topic covered many times, but worthy of more imo. Fyi;

A guy here said they made spacers from 4130, heat treated, another just made them from alum.

The S&S spacers have been discussed [Harley]. Fwiw, I wonder why they make them .050" tall when the lifter has .100" or more travel. Some [incl me] ran no spacers, and had the lifter just off bottomed w/o issue. I did it with crane #10530 [oem chev roller lifter in twin cam harley], ran to 6700 on dyno, no float, but it had lots of spring - 400#+ open] I am now running the S&S spacers in another bike at .020" or so from bottomed in crane #10530s. Noisy as heck. When I get a chance, I'm going to try just off bottom.

Some claim that you could block the internal oil passage if you bottom the lifter [w/o spacers].Others have pulled the check ball out and run them just short of bottomed. I wonder if they might over-oil that way......

Fwiw - a guy at Lunati said that I could run solids on one of their voodoo family hydro roller cam at .003"-.004" lash.

I will dig up some threads later.

Dave

[cgarb]

Thanks for the ferrea link, If I had a Audi, Lamborghini or a Volkswagon I would be in good shape. I don't like the idea of bottoming lifters out. Some class rules state you can't do that but to me if you have .100" of potential travel and say an inner valvespring fails to me that could mean a valve hitting a piston possibly. Not to mention longer pushods to make the geometry correct. If I would just manufacture 16 shims all the factory dimensions would remain.

[CamKing]

I wondered what people were using for shims. I am a machinist so making a solid spacer would be easy. Didnt know if plain carbon steel would suit or tool steel would be necessary.

We use a 4140 pre-heat treat, but you can just check the hardness of the hydr plunger, and make sure you're harder then that.

[cgarb]

Ok thanks camking. Glad to hear advice from someone who has shimmed lifters before. We have a hardness tester at work so that's no problem.

[F-BIRD'88]

Funny how guys will go for a hyd setup, for convienience,,, save work,, then when they hit that brick wall, the time money and effort they will then waste trying to
make it do he job of the mechanical system they needed in the first place..

[Rizzle]

Funny how guys will go for a hyd setup, for convienience,,, save work,, then when they hit that brick wall, the time money and effort they will then waste trying to
make it do he job of the mechanical system they needed in the first place..

I think most of the limited travel lifter setups are for rules classes, or for street duty where mech roller is not known for being the most forgiving of setups....

[F-BIRD'88]

Funny how guys will go for a hyd setup, for convienience,,, save work,, then when they hit that brick wall, the time money and effort they will then waste trying to
make it do he job of the mechanical system they needed in the first place..

I think most of the limited travel lifter setups are for rules classes, or for street duty where mech roller is not known for being the most forgiving of setups....

This is mostly myth...

[tenxal]

We have a limited travel hydr flat tappet lifter that we sell.
We use it a lot in circle track classes that require hydr lifters. Compared to our standard hydr lifters, they'll extend the RPM by about 400 rpm.

Couple of questions for Mike Jones:
-Do you recommend your lifters for a cast core or a Nitrided cast core?
-Do they have a steel 'foot' like the GM/Delphi units?
-Snap ring or 'o' style clip?
-What kind of upper RPM range are they capable of?

Hoping we can do some biz!

[Dutchman]

Topic covered many times, but worthy of more imo. Fyi;

A guy here said they made spacers from 4130, heat treated, another just made them from alum.

The S&S spacers have been discussed [Harley]. Fwiw, I wonder why they make them .050" tall when the lifter has .100" or more travel. [incl me] ran no spacers, and had the lifter just off bottomed w/o issue. I did it with crane #10530 [oem chev roller lifter in twin cam harley], ran to 6700 on dyno, no float, but it had lots of spring - 400#+ open] I am now running the S&S spacers in another bike at .020" or so from bottomed in crane #10530s. Noisy as heck. When I get a chance, I'm going to try just off bottom.

Some claim that you could block the internal oil passage if you bottom the lifter [w/o spacers].Others have pulled the check ball out and run them just short of bottomed. I wonder if they might over-oil that way......

Fwiw - a guy at Lunati said that I could run solids on one of their voodoo family hydro roller cam at .003"-.004" lash.

I will dig up some threads later.

Dave

Tests on the twin cam And evolution style engines have showed growth as much as .060 in cylinder length from cold to hot

[MadBill]

...Tests on the twin cam And evolution style engines have showed growth as much as .060 in cylinder length from cold to hot

Sounds like they need aluminum push rods, to keep up with the cylinders!

[dave brode]

...Tests on the twin cam And evolution style engines have showed growth as much as .060 in cylinder length from cold to hot

Sounds like they need aluminum push rods, to keep up with the cylinders!

Off topic, but, I can't give #s [memory fails], but I saw data from testing on a twin cam and the difference in lash [or pre-load] from cold to hot was much less than what it is commonly thought to be. Fwiw, I have run my TC with as little as .025" cold pre-load and it was as quiet as any other amount tried.

Dave