The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Engine Shop Camshaft & Lifters

I have a 1953 235 powerglide engine that I plan to completely rebuild. Today I took the block, cam and crank to a local engine shop. The owner pointed out what I was already afraid of; my cam has a few badly worn lobes. I know the hydraulic lifters are toast as they all are badly pitted. So….. now I need to learn more about the cam and lifters. The shop owner told me that there were two different cams; a cast iron can with larger bearings and a steel cam with smaller bearings (mine). He also said that the two cams require lifters made of different material.

Looking in some of the catalogs I found a couple of them only offer one lifter for all 235 hydraulic lifter motors and another says there are no good hydraulic lifters. Does anyone know more about this ??

I’d like to save a couple of bucks and have my cam reground, and was wondering if anyone has ever ground the bottoms of lifters to remove the pits..

Give these guys a call. http://www.egge.com/ They can either regrind your cam and lifters or sell you a new one. New ones may be less than you think. Resurfacing lifters can be done, but it is very critical machine work.

You need to make sure your distributor drive gear is compatible with your camshaft if you change the material in that too. There are steel and cast drive gears to match the cam material.
Chuck

Egge has good prices on lifters. I called them inquiring on the cost of resurfacing my lifters,and it was more cost effective to buy new ones. $12 and some change to resurface each one versus $8.50 each for new ones. Now my lifters are Mechanical, and I don't think there should be much difference on price?

I bought my cam and lifter set from Patricks also got the push rods from them.