pitted cam followers
Turbo Mini Forums

Changing the cam today and noticed 3 maybe 4 of the middle ones are quite badly pitted,any idea what causes this.

Oh it was a std turbo cam

Metro turbo weekend driver,Mini turbo in the making again!

Dangerous, i have (as we no) bad pitting on mine to every year, weather it's a new cam or not, EVERY thing has been checked and double checked.
Just one of them things i guess.

Mine you it doesn't take much for a piece of shti to get under the lob and start the wear.

Best 1/4 mile 13.2 seconds @116 mph
First 5 port miniturbo to make over 200 bhp on a carb?
First 5 port miniturbo to make over 200 bhp on Injection?

http://www.mattwoodsphotography.com

normally caused buy 1.5's if they havnt done much work ( the cam and followers that is)

caused buy excessive load on the follwer and lobe buy high spring and rocker loading.

always looking for them bigger bunches of bannanas

Pitting is an interesting one, probably just caused by general wear over the life of the engine in Dangerous's case. Microwelding if it occurs usually causes a lot more damage, remember the cam surface is only hard for a few thou, so as soon as microwelding starts to occur, you get visible obvious damage to the surface.
Another possible cause of pits is poor servicing over the life of the engine, leading to the oil getting quite acidic and corrosive from combustion by products.
Quite why you are getting pitting Mat is an interesting conundrum......

Just got another set from out the garage,This too a std turbo motor that I got of a proper gypo.1 heavily pitted, a couple with slight wear,rest as new condition.
This engine was run at 12psi+ with no intercooler or other mods,except for the obligitory dump valve--till the head cracked.

So could be heat related if its the middle ones

Metro turbo weekend driver,Mini turbo in the making again!

Jackman pulled these out of his 78000mile 92 Cooper SPi. They are pitted but I didnt think they looked too bad

Seems interesting that only 1 or maybe 2 out of 8 are a lot worse than the rest. If it is the two nearest the centre the only thing I can think of is maybe they are not getting as much oil splash, as they are near the centre main, rather than nearer a crank web?

the ones near the 'front' of the engine (speedo drive end) always worse as they have less splash, well the cam lobes are, not sure on the followers.

Interestingly i pulled a VDP engine appart not so long ago, regularly serviced with only 30-40k on the clock (verified by wear - there was none), but the followers were pitted and i seem to recall that the worse one of the lot (a lot worse than any of the others) was no 4or5 cant rem which.

I've seen the future and tbh its Pie

I've torn donw several A+ engine now, and it seems as camshaft survive, but followers are often pitted. Could it be rubbish followers from the factory? I've njever ahd any pitting on Minispares followers, although I've never driven 50000miles after a rebuild either though.

On 14/04/2006 23:07:18 Mini Sprocket said:

Jackman pulled these out of his 78000mile 92 Cooper SPi. They are pitted but I didnt think they looked too bad

Best 1/4 mile 13.2 seconds @116 mph
First 5 port miniturbo to make over 200 bhp on a carb?
First 5 port miniturbo to make over 200 bhp on Injection?

http://www.mattwoodsphotography.com

D'ya know what guys...
I'm going to look at the remote possibility of setting up a spray-bar 'pinto stylee' in my motor. Here is the trick though; I'll only drill out every other (taking into account the valve order) spray hole, such that two inlets, and two exhausts get sprayed, and four don't...

I'm running a windage tray this year aswell - so that'll help isolate it...

I'll take a look in a bit, and report back with a suggestion and we'll have a 'brainstoming' to get some ideas on the best way....

i still think oil fed cam lobes would be a super idea and cant cost that much to do from a blank once the cast is made.

alot of engines out there use this for there lube.

always looking for them bigger bunches of bannanas

Dave, i'd be very interested in the results of that as i was planning on something similar for my next build (when i hopefully go all out for racing).

I've seen the future and tbh its Pie

I have seen a few A+ cams which are cross drilled to oil feed the followers. This was on my mates miglia, they still get cam follower wear. But it does help

Team Racing

Wow thats great information mini1071s :) Learning new stuff every day.

Manchester Minis

You're a knowledgable guy Peter! :)

that is quality infomation!!

I surmise this will also affect gears also?

could this be countered by adding some zinc phosphate loaded cam lube at each oil change?

Edited by Joe C on 18th Apr, 2006.

Pete, what about (dare i say it) STP and similar additives... Do they have this magic ingredient which is missing from the oil?

This year I plan to run a pre filter before the oil pump, this will also give me more space up front of the engine.

Team Racing

fwiw,i put a slick 50 load into a 1293 mini running the 1300gt head and 1.5 rockers on a 276 kent cam 11.1 cr back in 1985 i think it was ..the tickover rose from 1100 to 2200 in about 3 minutes.most encouraging .regards robert.

Medusa + injection = too much torque for the dyno ..https://youtu.be/qg5o0_tJxYM

Would anyone have a diagram of the oil system in an a series?

ive seen one posted up in the past, but cant find it on the search...

"Turbo's make torque, and torque makes fun"

"did you know you can toast potato waffles?"

oh yeah, good thinking.

arse! i left my copy with a mate whos machining up some stub stacks for inside my 45's K&N.

"Turbo's make torque, and torque makes fun"

"did you know you can toast potato waffles?"