86T/AWS6

So I was at our engine builders a couple weeks ago dyno'ing our tour modified motor. While helping him remove the motor from the dyno we got to talking about my LT1 and my plans on doing a 383 forged street/strip bottom end, parts, prices ect.

During this convo I asked if, in his opinion, solid rollers are a good idea for an 80% street motor with the normal idling and such and if they were reliable for this. His answer was "I actually prefer them in almost everything over hydraulic rollers and are very reliable with the newer designs".

He then goes on to tell me that in the motors he builds for the local NASCAR driving school cars, he uses a Hydraulic Roller cam with solid roller lifters on it and 400lb open pressure springs. He said this is the most reliable setup he has found for these cars, which take a beating on them for multiple seasons and pretty high RPM without a rebuild. This guy is very well known in the drag community, holds several records of his own and builds some crazy turbo motors along with dirt oval stuff and some asphalt stuff.

So now my question...My valve train has been noisy and tappy from the day I did my cam swap. I have a XE 224/230, Comp R lifters (circa 2005), hardened push rods, the crane 1.6 RR's that come with the HOT cam kit (SA) and PAC-1518 springs (130ish seat, 330ish open)...

Does anyone think #1 by swapping solid rollers would it cut down on the ticky type writter sound of my valve train and, #2 would I benefit any performance from this by having less drag on the base circle of the cam by having some lash in the valves and possibly more duration under .050" and better lifter control.

Yes I have tried countless different ways of lashing my current setup. Hot, Cold, 1/8th turn preload all the way to 1/2 turn preload. Still noisy...Our tour mod motor runs solid rollers, crower shaft mounts, a .750"+ lift cam @.016" lash and its quieter than my street setup, which drives me nuts.

Any thoughts or discussion on this would be appreciated. I kind of think it would be cool to try.

WS6 TA

It depends on the lobes. There are some that will work well and others that won't. I would imagine that xe lodes dont have much of a take up ramp on them and would be harsh with solid roller lifters. I wouldn't do it, but I haven't tried it with xe lobes either.