The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Engine Shop Longterm Viability of Stovebolt 6's

Started messing around with these engines a few years ago. Fully rebuilt a nice 261 and have a couple good complete core engines. Haven't had any issues with getting parts for them yet- was able to get a cam from Schneider and found NOS hydraulic lifters on ebay. Appears everything broke in well after my rebuild but I don't have a lot of hours on it yet. They're such nice engines to work on but the skeptic in me is thinking the lack of quality lifters might be the crux of them.

So what's a guy to do? There will certainly be a day when NOS parts dry up and you'd have to resort to trying a reproduction lifter, no? Have even heard the quality of lifter regrinds have gone downhill in recent years. Reasonable to pull the cam and lifter matched set from another engine and reuse if doing a rebuild? Any word on the quality of camshafts these days?

Just my thoughts on these engines these days. Looking like still a good supply of everything else to keep them running. Really hoping we can figure out a longterm solution to the lifter problem.

The answer to your question lies in one word...demand. If demand for high quality camshafts and lifters was still as robust as it was even 30 years ago makers and sellers would respond and meet that demand. Lacking that, you have substandard suppliers making parts and hoping to sell them. Demand is also hampered by the fact very few consumers work on their engines today and even fewer machine shops still are operating. NOS parts will dry up and some of them are so old that today they won't work well...electronic parts don't last forever.

This is what has caused me to develop the alternative condenser...the need for a high quality answer to a significant problem. As I understand it, all condensers today are made in China by one company. They make one production run a year and the product is (at the very best) absolutely hit/miss lousy. So my time, effort and money went into developing an answer...one that will last and be good for around 200,000 to 300,000 hours. A couple of others with electronic knowledge helped with the design.

Not to say all Chinese products are lousy but many are. There are many very intelligent Chinese people who have a sincere desire for excellence. The people are fine. The government is another matter, however.

Currently I'm in the process of making an FM/MP3 device which will not just play FM radio and MP3 files but will also allow the user to answer telephone calls by pressing 2 buttons and it will do this on 6v, 8v or 12v. The guts of it are made in China and have been altered by me. Soon it will be available and it will fit right into many of the AD trucks. In addition to that I have made a true GPS speedometer which looks very similar to the AD speedometer. Hopefully I can negotiate for the units at a reasonable price...they also are made in China, but they're almost exact copies of a design started by an American company. And there are other things on the drawing board, so the answer is some people are working on solutions. It just takes time and money and unfortunately I don't have an unlimited supply of either.

As for lifters, the answer in my opinion is to adopt roller lifters and a roller camshaft into these engines and one member here (Jerry...Hotrod Lincoln) is doing that. It like all other projects takes time and money, though.