I suck at rhyming.

OK so I have the VHP/Crane 1.8 roller rockers with the shorter pushrods and Crane dual springs. A couple weeks after I first got everything in and running I developed a nasty tapping noise. Open up the driver's side valve cover and two of the studs have come loose. Not the nuts, the studs themselves. There are marks on the aluminum piece that is inside the valve cover where the nuts have been tapping it, corresponding to the first and sixth valve. I take the studs out, loc-tite them, and put them back in. All is good.

Fast forward a couple more weeks. Tapping comes back again on the freeway. I pull off, concerned, and as the engine comes back down to idle the tapping slowly diminishes and goes away. Weird, I think, but whatever. A few days later, it comes back again. This time it continues once I come back down to idle, but goes away a few minutes later. Pull the valve covers again, check, everything is tight. I loosen all of the nuts, some I get the nuts by themselves, some the nut is tight enough that I get the whole stud/nut/rocker assembly to come out. I loc-tite everything and put it back in. A few days later, the tapping comes back again. Tappy tappy for a few minutes, then it goes away. Repeat again a few days later.

It got loud again tonight on my way home so I decided to open up the cover again and check it out. Everything is still tight. There are no new marks on the inside of the valve cover. There are no marks on any of the rockers to indicate that I am having clearance issues between the rocker and the iside of the head. It tapped on the freeway, down the exit ramp, at idle waiting for the light, down the street to my house, and right until I pulled into the garage. Then it started to quiet down, and after a few seconds it was gone.

What the hell is going on???

 

Only thing else I can think of is a damn lifter. Mine sounded like what you are talking about. I had the stud problem on my Comp RR's it will drive you nutts huh.

 

Mine is loud occasionally on startup, But it goes away quickly. It always sounds like a sewing machine though, wish there was a way to fix that. haha maybe I'll dynamat my valve covers

 

Sounds like a lifter to me to. The lifter is bleeding down. I had a similar problem. I could go down the road and it would start tapping. I would drop it down a gear to get the rpm's up to fill the lifter back up with oil. So, now I just put a whole new set in and the problem went away.

 

What causes lifters to go bad? Do I have the rockers tightened too much or does that just happen after awhile? Motor has 110K miles on it.

 

Happens after a while. My truck had 125K on it when I got it and it had the damn lifter tick. It was driven by an old man(72) to and from teh deer lease and town. Probably nothing you did. Have fun pulling the heads and dropping them in there I know I did

 

To much preload can collapse a lifter, All the rocker problems I have saw yesterday with mine, I am going back to stockers with the a new cam.

 

Just the rockers or the springs also?

 

Just the rockers, I have Patriot Gold springs. They will work with what ever new cam I get.

 

Forgive me for temporarily 'jacking the thread, but I'm curious about this issue. Pretty soon I'll be having a pair of mildly worked stock heads (shaved .005) installed along with a mild Lunati LS1 cam, and the Lunati springs. For budget reasons, I'm staying with the stock rockers and pushrods. What's the likelihood that I'll have similar issues with valvetrain noise?