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**TurboZ24** · 04-22-2007, 09:51 AM

I have a few questions...

I assume you are running hydraulic flat tappet cam correct?

You don't happen to know what the oil temp reached do you?

**87SC/SS** · 04-22-2007, 12:15 PM

Yes I am running a flat tappet cam. I dont know what the oil temp reached. I was running Shell Rotella T oil because of the lack of zinc in todays standard oils. The engine is naturally aspirated so i didnt think it was necessary to monitor the oil temp.

Thank you for your quick reply, any expertise you can offer is greatly appreciated.

Brian

**TurboZ24** · 04-22-2007, 02:14 PM

Well, my other questions then would be..

On the lifters, you did get 2.8/3.1/3.4 lifters? They are basically identical to .842" bore SBC lifters, but have a flat spot (or spitter as some Mfg's call it) on the side of the lifter. I did once receive lifters from one company that didn't have this feature and not knowing any better, I used them anyways. The cam failed in short order.

On the oil temp. the only time I've ever had issues with my mains and rods was when I reached excessive oil temps. I tend to get my engine oil pretty hot (rpm, boost, etc on the built motor.... Even on my basically stock turbo 3.1, the oil temp before the cooler is 35 degrees higher than the coolant).

I know some people have had issues with the cams even on basically stock motors, but I never have myself.

**87SC/SS** · 04-22-2007, 05:14 PM

Do you happen to know if there is any sort of oil pressure valve or reglator other than whats in the oil pump itself? Are there any other differences between the 60 degree v6 and a small block chevy that would have any bearing (no pun intended) on the problems i've been running into?

Thanks again,
Brian

**geoffinbc** · 04-22-2007, 09:58 PM

The pump design is the same basic design as a small block. So is the filtration system.

The problem with the pressure guage is that it will never tell you wether you are getting flow to the mains or not. Infact you may not even be getting flow to the cam bearings. I would say the first approach would be to check the galleries for blockage and also make sure the plugs are in the ends of the lifter gallies. Obvioulsy oil is being picked up and pressure is built in the system after the filter so that side should theoreticly be fine.

These engines have no history of oiling problems. No Traditional Chevrolet motor really does since all the V engines use 1 of the 2 different syles Chevrolet employs.

**87SC/SS** · 04-23-2007, 09:32 AM

Thanks for the feedback guys. I'm going to tear the engine down the rest of the way next weekend and see if there's some crap in the oil passages. I'm actually hoping that there is so I have a conclusive answer as to what is going on. I'll post my findings next weekend in case anyone is interested.

BTW TurboZ24, nice ride. I checked out your site, very nice work. I was designing my 3.4 for a turbo setup. I did some reasearch and found the guys at force-fed-fabrications.com designed a turbo setup for the 3.4 Camaro. Hopefully I'll get the setup installed as soon as I get the engine to live past 3000 miles LOL.

Betterthanyou thanks, the guy at the machine shop that did the work kept mentioning something about a valve that has to go into the lubrication system, but I couldn't find anything in AllData or Chiltons referring to any valve or regulator other than whats in the pump itself. Now that I'm sure there isn't anything like that, I can start going through standard troubleshooting to find what the problem is.

Thanks again guys, I really appreciate it,

Brian

**geoffinbc** · 04-23-2007, 12:34 PM

He may be talking about the bypass valve. It needs to be in the block or the filter housing (depending on the housing).

A Camaro engine has the bypass valve in the block. An S-10 engine has the bypass in the filter housing.

You either need this valve or need to plug the passage it sits in. Leaving it open means the oil will never get filtered.

The bypass valve opens when pressure difference between the inlet and outlet of the oil filter is around 6 PSI. This happens when oil is very cold or if the filter is clogged. It prevents oil starvation. Now if this valve is removed and never reinstalled then you will never get oil going through the filter. If you are always up on your maintainence and use good filters then you can block this passage to force 100% filtering in all conditions.

This image shows what I am talking about. The one on the left is a Camaro adaptor. You can see there is no valve because it sits in the block. The one on the right is from an S-10 and it has the valve present. The valve in the S-10 housing looks just like the one you should see on your block. It sits in the filter mounting pad on the block.

**87SC/SS** · 04-24-2007, 09:36 AM

I got a call from my dad last night and he did some further inspection on the block. He removed the gallery plugs and there is nothing obstructing the oil flow. The oil passages he said are all clean. There is a theory at the moment that may the cam bearings weren't installed right and the oil holes are misaligned but we don't know yet. Either way that shouldn't affect the rod and main bearings. One thing he did mention was that when he took the main caps off, the bearings had a good coat of oil on them but they were completely wasted. Have you guys had any experience with running into a soft crankshaft. At this point our guess is that when the crank was cut .010 the hardening was cut off of it and that is what has caused the crank to go bad. I'm guessing that once we remove the cam, if the cam journals are still in good shape then the crank must have been soft.

BTW the oil bypass valve was not in the block, so the oil was most likely not being filtered. I don't think that is what has caused this because the lobes on the cam are good. I would think that if the oil not being filtered was the problem then everything would be equally damaged not just the main and rod bearings.

Any thoughts?

Thanks,
Brian

**boostedrs** · 04-24-2007, 10:18 PM

Originally posted by betterthanyou View Post

He may be talking about the bypass valve. It needs to be in the block or the filter housing (depending on the housing).

A Camaro engine has the bypass valve in the block. An S-10 engine has the bypass in the filter housing.

You either need this valve or need to plug the passage it sits in. Leaving it open means the oil will never get filtered.

The bypass valve opens when pressure difference between the inlet and outlet of the oil filter is around 6 PSI. This happens when oil is very cold or if the filter is clogged. It prevents oil starvation. Now if this valve is removed and never reinstalled then you will never get oil going through the filter. If you are always up on your maintainence and use good filters then you can block this passage to force 100% filtering in all conditions.

This image shows what I am talking about. The one on the left is a Camaro adaptor. You can see there is no valve because it sits in the block. The one on the right is from an S-10 and it has the valve present. The valve in the S-10 housing looks just like the one you should see on your block. It sits in the filter mounting pad on the block.

both of my camaro motors have the bypass in the adapter not the block

**sharkey** · 04-24-2007, 10:36 PM

if its just taken the main bearings out of it and there is no obstructed oil passages, id almost start to think the block needs to be line bored. if the line bore is out, it can cause exessive bearing wear.

just for the record, the block has a groove around the cam bearings so it doesnt matter if the holes line up or not.

**geoffinbc** · 04-25-2007, 10:37 PM

Originally posted by boostedrs View Post

both of my camaro motors have the bypass in the adapter not the block

Are they 3.4L blocks?

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