Oil Flow v Oil Posuer
 

Ok.....

So since rebuilding the motor over the winter with:
95 flat tops
37b cams
Big boys port and valve job
Baisley LMR2 spring



First off the oil pump was in great shape so nothing new used there. Runout .002 I did have the incident of breaking off a wire brush in the pinion and had to drill it out. Pretty sure I got all the debris out, but I can't be positive. I flushed pinion with oil after vacuuming and then flushed crankcase thoroughly. Additionally, when putting the pump back together I got the washer that separates the supply and scavenge side installed incorrectly and on start up had no oil pressure. Shut it down right away and corrected, I'm inclined to think not enough (about 15 seconds or so) run time to cause damage, liberal amount of assembly lube on all parts when I put it back together.

All is good for a while and then I have the valve train/lifter taking to me. Front cylinder exhaust......take the lifter out, clean the bore and reinstall. Problem goes a way for awhile, happens again and replace with a cleaned up one I had laying around with about 25k on it. Ride to the poconos, cold start on Saturday morning and same lifter is clacking good and takes a minute or so to quite down. An added symptom at this time is a stumble every few seconds with one stall, upon restart no stall but a stumble until it warms up, not sure it's related, as I think I might have an IAC issue after looking at some data runs, but include it as new symptom associated with the clacking lifter.

Order new lifters from AMS, installed them Thursday, after pumping up for a few seconds valve train is quite. Start it Friday morning and ticking back for about 15 seconds or so. After work Friday, I take the rocker cover off to check torque on rocker arms. They check out, but breather cover bolts don't, tighten them up. With the rocker cover off, I restart and I'm not impressed with the oil volume I see. Took a second or so to see any oil out of the pushrods, but within a few seconds oil seams adequate to lubricate the top end, but volume is still suspect to me especially when it took a few seconds to even see any oil. Subsequent cold starts and there's a tick for several seconds.

Oil pressure within spec, yet restricted volume????

Cold start oil pressure @ idle 40-50 psi
Hot idle pressure @ 8-10 psi
Hot cruise pressure @ 38-42.

All thought out suggestions as well as mocking welcomed.

They all do that?

Thought out 0
Mocking 1

I dunno.

Your hot idle pressure seems good, but a bit high at cruise when hot, based on what I see on the gauges on my bike.

Maybe there's some stuff in the oil pump or the check valve.

Pushrods clean internally? Low volume would make your lifters slow to pump up, too, or so one would think.

Logic tells me that restricted flow would increase pressure.

But sometimes stuff ain't logical........

Not related, but I had an intermittent oil pressure bleed off problem in my GTO. Turns out whomever rebuilt the engine really really liked blue form-a-gasket. Some of that stuff got loose and into the pressure relief check ball and spring in the pump. It sorta acted like a rubber band, but in reverse. I cleaned the crap out of the pump and all was good in the world......

Wouldn't that depend on whether the pressure is being measured up-stream or down-stream from the blockage?

Going to take the cam chest apart in a few minutes to check oil pump, check valve etc. with the Baisley spring hot cruise is the same as my last bike. Pushrods were cleaned and checked when I put the new lifters in.

Pressures w/ the Baisley spring are consistant w/ mine.
You just about gotta figure that the restriction is in the path that is unique to that front lifter, though.

I'm assuming new oil. Did you change the filter?

Did that yesterday to rule out the filter.

I should have known that but I don't like to assume.

Oil pressure is fine all around.

Flow to the top end is restricted by design, early in the R&D phase Harley found that too much flow to the top end caused problems with oil temps.

Check the underside of your lifter covers for witness marks. Bet you have a lifter kissing the cover. Two gaskets stacked will fix it.

Yeah, I read about the twin cam development and it's release delay for two years before they got that figured out.

Here's where I'm at.

Cold starts can produce no noise, turn it off after a few seconds and it may or may not tick. Start it hot and it may or may not tick.

It can be ticking on a cold startup, shut it down and restart right away and it's quite. After talking with Steve over at AMS, he suggested before going any further to check the rocker arm end play. They are seeing more and more outside the .004-.008 spec. The heads were dissembled for porting and valve job, maybe they mixed up assembly front to rear etc.

So stay tuned.

Several over at HTT have tried shimming rockers to quiet a tick and had no change.

What are you running for oil? Mine seems to like Valvoline VR1 20/50wt Synthetic. It has a high zinc level which helps with plain bearings and sliding surface(lifters) wear.

Syn or dino?


Yeah, I'm going with the mocking.

Castor

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