The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Engine Shop cast vs. forged

after talking with tim this morning i thought id post this

im at the point where im starting to assemble the 59-235 for the dump. along the way i had an issue with the engine shop supplying hydraulic lifters instead of the solids like i wanted. i was told that the solid lifters wouldnt work with the cam that was supplied with the hydraulic lifters and the cam had to be changed. so with some words between me and the engine shop they did swap out the cam and supplied me with solid lifters at no additional cost. when i got home from picking up the block with the correct cam and solid lifters friday night before the big storm i saw that the lifters were the old style milk cans and will not work and i need the new style with the oil groove machined in them. i think i can use the old style lifters for my 270 build because from the surface they are identical in size, shape and form. with that in mind to eliminate fustration on my end with the engine shop i was just going to buy the correct lifters from carter. and for a dollar more per lifter it will cost me twelve dollars more but eliminate the fustration factor plus the gas to possibly get the run around.

i see that the lifters that carter has, has a note that says "these lifters must be used on a cast cam for proper mating to occur". i also see here in the archives that the dist gear when replaced needs to be a cast gear to match the gear on the cam.

so with the cam, lifters and dist gear all made by the same process (castin or forged) how do you know by looking at these componets if they are cast or forged?

what if any can be mixed or matched between the two

is there any metal urge ist out there?

What brand name is the cam? The simplest way to resolve the problem is to talk directly to the cam grinder, and use the lifters they reccomend. The only serious problems I've seen with distributor drive gears is with racing roller cams, where a bronze gear has to be used on the distributor. Those cams are ground from a solid steel billet, and a cast iron dizzy gear gets chewed up almost instantly. Mixing up manufacturers between cam & lifters can have some bad consequences, and will void the cam warranty in some situations. I don't know of a definite way to tell the difference in a forged or a cast cam core, unless you can see a casting parting line between the cam lobes.
Jerry

The answer to your question begins with the last paragraph on page 18 in that famous

May 1955 Hotrod Magazine article,
Soup that Chevy.

www.selectric.org/55chevy/soup.html

thats good reading

That's such a good article. I learn something everytime I read it *(poor retention maybe?)

But it doesn't really answer the original question, unless I missed something. I looked at the Master Parts Catalog and it seems to confirm that beginning with the '54 PG engines, and including all the 261's the cam was "cast". But if you buy a new cam from someone, you would need to find out what material they used, and what lifters they recommend (as Hotrod said earlier), but you also need to match your distributor drive gear to the same material. Here again, if it's an aftermarket distributor, some research needs to be done. If it's a stock distributor, the Parts Catalog describes some identifying marks to determine what gear you have.

I think if I ever need a new cam, I'll call Patrick and let him figure it all out.

after talking to the shop he said it was a cast cam. i asked him who's cam it was but because i was asking other questions he never said. he did go on to say that the cams he gets are either cast or billet. with that being said i felt ok about what lifters should be used. he wasnt happy that i brought the liters he supplied back which was the second time they were wrong first time they were the right design but were hydraulic. i took him one of the original lifters to show him and a sheet showing why the type i had needed to be used. he just looked at me and said he'd call me when he got them.

The article is very interesting and loaded with valuable information.
It's good to know that 1954, as listed in the magazine article, is the same year that Waldo found in the Master Parts Catalog. Because sometimes catalogs may have errors/typos.

Also in the article......
the steel distributor drive gear can be identified by the plain shank on the gear.
a cast iron distributor drive gear can be identified by a single groove around the gear shank.

Waldo, do you remember the catalog year you were referencing.

Yes, here's the page