Sorry to say, but the 11522s should be used with caution.....something that Crane admits that they DONT tell people. Long story....I will post the details of my ordeal with them later today....gotta go to work.

Jason

 

Jason I would like to hear more about the issues with the Crane Solid Rollers and what Crane is not telling people.....I currently have them in my motor and I am getting a little concerned here. Thinking about adding some larger heads to my motor and possibly buying another set of rollers at the same time, before I go spend the money on some Isky's or Comp Cams Endura-X I would like to hear more about your problems with Cranes.

Thanks,

Dave

 

uh....interesting. I made the complete post on this thread last week.....its now gone? First time i have ever seen that happen.....sure glad I saved a copy of what I posted.

<<<In my opinion, lifters is not the place to save a few dollars, especially in a solid roller setup where cams (lobes) are alot more aggressive, and the rpms are higher.

Using the 11522 lifters ended up causing a perfectly fine engine to be pulled out of the car, complete rebuild The needle roller bearings on one of them basically just disinigrated (for lack of a better word). The actually round roller was still attached to the body of the lifter, but the bearings were no where to be found.

To top that off, I call Crane and speak with them and arrange to send the lifters back for them to look at. After not hearing from them for 3 weeks, I call back. The first person I talked to was less than helpful, so I asked to speak to someone in a higher position (R&D). That guy was cooler to talk to, but said he would look things over and call me back to let me know what they could do for me. A week later, no call (big suprise). So I call him again. At that point, he tells me that I ran a spring that put too much seat pressure on the lifter. The seat pressure on my setup was ~215lbs closed.....All i ran was the comp 943s, nothing exotic.

First they tried to blame it on an oiling problem, but didnt go anywhere. There were no oiling problems with the engine. The also tried to say that since it is a street car, that it probably sat around and idled alot. I informed him that I lived in an area which has NO traffic, and the car never just sits and idles for anything longer than a few seconds.

So in the end, the guy from Crane (in his exact words) told me, "welcome to the school of hard knocks" Lovely. They told me the best they could do would be to get me a set of lifters (the same ones) for $230....i can buy them anywhere for like $275

My final complaint to them was that if they were to blame this failure on too much seat pressure, then WHY dont they publish anything that lays that information out clearly to users. Its not in any of their catalog's. They said my setup borderlined on a "race" motor, not a "street" engine. Funny since the car was driven 8500 miles, 20mpg on the highway, and idled like a HOT cam. Not that that criteria determines if a car is a "street" or "race" setup, but come on. So in the end, this lifter cost me ~$2k in parts/labor.

So, I have now moved on to Crower severe duty lifters.

Hope this helps. I would strongly suggest someone not to buy Crane 11522 lifters, or for that matter Crane anything (also had a 1.6 roller rocker come apart, but that is a whole other story)

Jason>>>

 

That's what I ended up with, mostly because of the intake pushrod offset required by my 215cc heads, but I almost had a set of Crane lifters in the engine.

Thanks for recounting your story. It's nice to know when a company stands behind their products. Or not.

 

If your still in the machining/assembly process Spend the extra money on a good quality lifter. Many of the people have mentioned good quality lifters to use but if you want my advice as to what lifter to go with and it is rebuildable look into Jessle Lifters this lifter is available in offset and large dia lifter body with use of bronze bushed over sized lifter bores. But cost is high.

 

I have about 1300 miles on my Cranes so far. My combo isn't performing like it should so the motor (or at least the heads) is probably coming out over the winter. If I remember right my springs about have about 200 on the seat. I will definitely give the Cranes a close look when the heads are off and see about ordering some Crowers or something. The Crowers are about what $450?

Dave

 

Someone might have them for that. I paid $495 for mine, but they have a 0.180" offset on the intake lifter (PN 66292).

 

As far as lifters go on a street car, even 215lbs on the seat is on the high end, and if you have to run that much then it's not really a street lobe (well as much of a street lobe that a SR can be.)

A solid roller, that is 75% of the time a street car, even with mid .600's lift only needs about 185-200lbs on the seat. If you want to spin it more RPM then yeah a little more seat pressure is usefull. When it's a 50/50 stret/race car (driving to the track and back) then 200-220 is going to be what you shoot for. When it's a all out race car than you put as much as you need to make it work on the seat too. Any idle time on a SR lifter is more than what they design it for. So cutting back the spring rate and seated pressure is going to make sure they don't wear out a bearing prematurely.

Funny thing of peoples thoughts on roller cams differs greatly from Hyd to Solid. When in reality the really aggressive Hyd Rollers need as much seat pressure and spring rate as the Street Solids do. Look at the 319X series of Comps HR lobes. The 224,230 and 236 HR lobes are alot more aggressive than the solid roller lobes in that duration range.

Look at the two 236 lobes.

HR 236 @ .050, 162 @.200 and .390 lobe lift
SR 236 @ .050, 159 @.200 and .376 lobe lift

For the duration the 319X famliy of lobes is super aggressive compared to almost any Solid Roller you would run on the street. On the other hand most HR lobes are pretty tame, which is good on a street car. Stiff and light valvetrains are expensive.

The aggressiveness of the lobes is why you need spring pressure.

So then it makes you wonder why do guys need 220lbs on the seat with a 245-260 duration cam that's not as aggressive as a lowly HR lobe? Most SR lobes aren't since you would need about .430+ lobe lift in that duration range to warrant it, or you need to turn some serious RPM (7K+)

Think about it the other way, why don't guys run more seated pressure on HR lobes? It's not like we can't, we have the Crane, Comp and Morrell lifters that will take more seated pressure than anyone throws at them. There are alot fo sub 130lbs on the seat springs out there on HR lobes that need alot more than that, and guys run them with $200-$400+ lifters that can take it.

So basically, guys don't run enough seated spring pressure on HR cams and too much on SR cams. Which gets back to the basis of the post, the solid lifters. The Cranes cost what they do for some reason. The big problem is Crane doesn't tell you not to run less spring pressure for a street setup, either they should or the cam company you get your parts from should. You sometimes don't get what you pay for, but you rarely get more than what you pay for. When all the other manufactures sell them for $425 and up, something is odd there. The Comp .300 longer lifters for roller blocks are a good way to go, since they are around $440. When you are in Jim and Jay's shoes with the RR AFR's, then Crower is the only one who has offset lifters for the roller blocks. Unless you machine the lifter bores down, then you can use about anyones lifters. To me the weight you save with the shorter lifter when you cut the lifter bores down is not a bad way to go and you save $100 on the lifters.

Just my thoughts on this.

Bret

 

Well, you dont have too much room to play with when you need to adhere within reason to an install height. I even let a professional shop do all the spec'ing of my last engine.

In any event, the 11522 is not properly designed in my opinion. The design tolerance is just not there. I had a very tame solid roller, and for them to tell me I need a "race" lifter? I just am not buying it.

Heh, wish I got paid for doing Crane's "R&D" for them

Nowhere does Crane document that the 11522 lifter is to be used within the parameters/dynamics of a given valvespring spec.

Jason

 

Jay,

Yeah somewhere down the line you got screwed out of usefull information.

I've been talking to Comp alot about Solid Rollers and Hyd Rollers. It's just helps to have them re-enforce some things. The 943's are a good spring since they are made of better material, but there are trade offs by using them compared to a 954. You have to run at least 210lbs on the seat with the 943's while the 954 can run 185lbs. Not only is the pressure on the seat going to be more, but the pressure over the nose is 75-100lbs more, so the lifter is constantly loaded more on the pac alloy springs. Then as you know, the cost is a big diff. 140% more for the set. When you realisticly are only going to get 10k out of a set of SR springs and maybe 13K out of the pac alloy's and wear the lifter bearings out faster too. There are some new springs out there that give you the better alloy, lower seat pressures, the ability to shim them up for more seated pressure, a decent spring rate and alot of lift potential.

Bret