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Originally Posted by thehornworks
I been reading a lot about new solid camshaft and lifter failure on start up. I have a new Comp cam in my 69 Z28. Hasn't been fired yet. A engine builder I know said he won't build a motor with a solid cam because of all the failures. Any input is appreciated.
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Great oil engineer online who has a blog full of great info on motor oils, cam breakin oil too. Its called 540ratblog. Go on google search and type this in 540 Rat. This guy is very good.
n recent years there have been entirely too many wiped cam lobes and ruined lifter failures in traditional American flat tappet engines, even though a variety of well respected brand name parts were typically used. These failures involved people using various high zinc oils, various high zinc Break-In oils, various Diesel oils, and various oils with aftermarket zinc additives added to the oil. They believed that any high zinc oil concoction is all they needed for wear protection during flat tappet engine break-in and after break-in. But, all of those failures have proven over and over again, that their belief in high zinc was nothing more than a MYTH, just as my test data has shown.
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A high level of zinc/phos is simply no guarantee of providing sufficient wear protection. And to make matters even worse, excessively high levels of zinc/phos can actually “cause” DAMAGE your engine, rather than “prevent” it. Motor Oil Industry testing has found that motor oils with more than 1,400 ppm ZDDP, INCREASED long-term wear. And it was also found that motor oils with more than 2,000 ppm ZDDP started attacking the grain boundaries in the iron, resulting in camshaft spalling (pitting and flaking). The ZDDP value is simply the average of the zinc and the phosphorus values, then rounded down to the nearest 100 ppm (parts per million).
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From those failures where I was able to find out what specific oils were used, it turned out that those were oils I had already performed my Engineering Wear Protection Capability tests on. And all those oils had only provided poor wear protection capability, meaning that if they had looked at my test data before using those oils, they would have known in advance that their engines would be at significant risk of failure with those oils. And that is just what happened.
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A number of people who have had those failures, and some had repeated failures, have contacted me, asking what they can do to prevent that failure in the future. I tell them to forget all that high zinc nonsense and look at my Wear Protection Ranking List. And to select any high ranking oil there, no matter how much zinc it has, because zinc quantity simply does NOT matter. The only thing that matters regarding wear protection, is the psi value each oil can produce in my testing. The higher the psi value, the better the wear protection. I recommend they use the SAME highly ranked oil for break-in and after break-in. It’s that simple.
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WHEN PEOPLE HAVE TAKEN THAT ADVICE, NOT ONE PERSON HAS EVER COME BACK TO ME TO REPORT THAT MY RANKING LIST DID NOT WORK FOR THEM. Since my ranking list has worked in every case to prevent wiped flat tappet lobes and lifters, it can also work for you to provide the best possible wear protection for your engine. My test data is the real deal, it exactly matches real world experience, and it is the best and most complete motor oil comparison data you will ever find anywhere.
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And for those people who have been able to use various high zinc oils without having trouble with their flat tappet engines, that only means that the oil they used had enough wear protection capability for the loads their engines saw at that time. It does not mean they were necessarily using a great oil. And it does not provide any information about how much reserve wear protection capability their oil provided, nor how their oil compares to other oils on the market. Rat Recommends Quaker State 5W30 Full Synthetic oil. Best oil on the market today.