The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Engine Shop Lifter Bores on a 235

One of our members has a 235 with worn lifter bores. Apparently there was a failure in the rocker oil supply. I have seen lots of discussion about boring cylinders etc. but I have not seen lifter bore problems mentioned. Is this something that is checked on a rebuild and is there a way of repairing the problem?

I worked for a very high end race shop for over 15 years, and the only way to do this correctly is to use a lifter truing fixture such as those made by BHJ to relocate the lifter bore angle and location precisely, otherwise you will wipe the lobe off the cam. Once that is done, the lifter bore can be bushed and re-sized. Since these lifter bore truing fixtures are only available for the more common engine like small blocks and others, someone is going to have to pony up some big bucks to have one made. At this point, it probably will be cheaper to get another block.

I know of people who have tried to do this without these special fixtures and the results were high percentages of failures.

12 Port,
do you have any idea how often this problem would have shown up on these old sixes? I think it is the first time I have seen it discussed here.

I have not seen worn lifter bores to be a problem on these early sixes.

What makes you believe your lifter bores are out of spec?

I've never heard of lifter bores being worn other than on race engines or severely high mile engines.

If your bores are out of spec, check out these sites.

http://www.wydendorfmachine.com/reamerkits.html

http://www.paeco.com/Valve%20lifters.htm

http://www.theengineshop.com/produc...-accessories/bronze-lifter-bushings.html

http://www.jesel.com/valvetrain/index.php/lifters/bushings

http://www.lsmeng.com/Bushings.html

Yeah it's probably not very common for these engines to have this issue. So repairing a block is going to be expensive and hardly cost effective.

I have only seen one post about the problem.

It's also possible it is and it just isn't recognized for what it is. How many people mic the lifter bores and check the lifter clearances when they rebuild an engine? Still it isn't super common, but mostly in neglected and abused engines.