Are these rotators?

[GB SISSON]

Been working on that blue 59ab I brought home two weeks ago. Got good spark now and went through the carb after that. New head gaskets came in on Friday so this afternoon I pulled the intake and found some good news. Remarkably clean in the valve chamber and it has adjustable lifters and drilled lifter bosses. The ford rebuild tag shows bore at .0825 and .010/.010. Pistons are stamped accordingly. Sadly the stroke is 3 3/4" but this was a pig in a poke situation at best. The valve clearances are quite big. I usually set them up in the middle of the range numbers in my orange ford overhaul book. I notice that the last variants of the V8 show .018 for exhaust valves. Is this because they used valve rotators? Does my engine appear to have rotators, and if so, do I need the big ,018 clearance on the exhaust valves? On a side note, you can see that on #4 the builder missed the groove in the valve guide with his horseshoe clip and set it between the spring and the guide. Maybe a good 1/8" added to the lash. Maybe this is why this otherwise good looking engine was pulled? There is plenty of cross hatch showing in the bores and cranking on 12 volts with no heads it shows 60 lb oil pressure on a mechanical gauge. I remain quite optomistic but want to set the valves tomorrow before I fire it up on the stand. I know nothing about the cam but expect stock. The adjuster bolts seem pretty deep in the bores though. Valve lash settings???? Thanks in advance GB

[Brian]

Nice, clean, tidy, organised shed. Yes, they're rotators.

[Mac VP]

In your picture of the five valve assemblies, one does not have the rotator cone. So he either mixed up some parts there or used the regular non-rotator type valve in that location. You'll want to verify that each part in that particular assy is the correct one.

[saltracer]

are the valve springs different for intake and exhaust? Looks a little like Isky springs on the exhaust with the rotators. I believe they are shorter and would work with the rotators.

[JWL]

All of the above--plus, some of the springs are upside down.

[37 Coupe]

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Originally Posted by saltracer

are the valve springs different for intake and exhaust? Looks a little like Isky springs on the exhaust with the rotators. I believe they are shorter and would work with the rotators.

This is something I never thought of before. I built an 8RT engine 30 some years ago,a '53 F-100 engine. I used an ISKY cam kit,they provided the springs. The '53 8RT engine used the rotators but I don't recall that ISKY ask if you are using rotators or not with springs they supply. My question is there two different spring sizes,rotator,non rotator? I don't think all 49-53 8BA engines were all rotator,correct? All I remember is it ran fine and just heard the other day it still is.

[GB SISSON]

I have had a thought about studs VS bolts. Just one of those 'can't fall back to sleep after getting up to pee in the early morning hours' kind of thought. With bolts we are cranking down a coarse thread fastener with our torque wrench. The inclined plane (thread) is steeper than the fine thread on the nut which we'd be cranking down with studs. Does the torque end up being equal? Is it not easier for the wrench to tension the fine thread nut, as though it was 'geared down'. And Ron can you tell me why you stopped using studs so long ago? Which ever way I go I will be using good used ford fasteners.

[Mart]

GB, I agree with this, it makes sense to me as a common sense engineer, coarse thread, steeper slope, less clamping force. I put forward this notion in a post some time ago and was told I was wrong. I still believe I was right, and I believe you are right too. I believe that to achieve the same clamping force a coarser thread should be tightened to a higher torque than a fine thread. I wouldn't refute anything written above, as there seems to be a range of torques that will work well for a flathead. I agree that it is not beneficial to murder them up too tight.

Further to Ron's note above, I too have successfully reused head gaskets a few times.

Mart.

[Ol' Ron]

The person that installed the valve train, had no idea what he was doing, and why. I did things like that when I was learning. I'm still learning.

[40 Deluxe]

Originally Posted by Ol' Ron

The person that installed the valve train, had no idea what he was doing, and why. I did things like that when I was learning. I'm still learning.

Agreed! It must have been the new guy in the shop doing this. Likely not his fault, but rather a lack of training. He was left to just muddle through.

[JSeery]

With all of this what are the odds that the seat pressures are correct or consistent?

[Ronnie]

A little hard to tell but it appears some springs are upside down.

R

[GB SISSON]

So it looks like I have a bit of a project ahead of me. I have 'overhauled' about ten of these V8s in the past 25 years. Most of what I know about setting them up I learned from all the books available in the '90s. I have read them all so many times they are falling apart. Living on this island I have never had any association with other flathead V8 folks until I discovered the internet, and I really appreciate all the help I get here. I have a couple of coffee cans of valve parts and know there are rotators and associated parts in there. I will fix/replace the screwed up parts and get it all dialed in. Once this is completed should I adjust the valves as though this was a 1953 engine .018 exhaust and what on the intake? After I re-work the valve train I will install the heads. They were on with 8ba head bolts and I plan to re-use them and I must have a hundred here to choose from. I have aviation permatex for the threads, blue felpro gaskets and I'm planning to use grease on them. I don't have enough good studs, but thought about using two studs on each head just to make for easy assembly. Is it a good idea to use head bolts?

[Ross F-1]

These are the specs for 8BA's of different flavors (non-rotators and rotators)

[GB SISSON]

OK, thanks Ross. That was not too bad changing things around. The valves with no rotators were at least correct as far as correct spring length for what they were, but now they all have rotators and the horseshoes in the right place and all have the short springs correctly oriented. Looks to me as though someone 'freshened up' a ford remanufactured engine. There is evidence of lubriplate on the lifters still. I think the .0825 means this engine is bored to 3 5/16?. It will most likely go into my somewhat ragged '47 jailbar 1/2 ton, or depending on how it checks out, maybe my even more ragged '47 tonner pickup that is destined to become my 'junkyard dog' around the place. Looks like it could be real nice though. Off to adjust those valves now.

[bbrocksr]

Originally Posted by GB SISSON

OK, thanks Ross. That was not too bad changing things around. The valves with no rotators were at least correct as far as correct spring length for what they were, but now they all have rotators and the horseshoes in the right place and all have the short springs correctly oriented. Looks to me as though someone 'freshened up' a ford remanufactured engine. There is evidence of lubriplate on the lifters still. I think the .0825 means this engine is bored to 3 5/16?. It will most likely go into my somewhat ragged '47 jailbar 1/2 ton, or depending on how it checks out, maybe my even more ragged '47 tonner pickup that is destined to become my 'junkyard dog' around the place. Looks like it could be real nice though. Off to adjust those valves now.

3 & 5/16" equals .125 over standard .0825 was a oversize piston designed to use when the tin sleeves were removed on the earlier engines.
Bill

[Russ/40]

Jumping Jehosafat! Check out those crankshafts way up on that shelf. Clearly does not live in southern california as they would be hard to catch during the frequent shaker.

[GB SISSON]

Originally Posted by Russ/40

Jumping Jehosafat! Check out those crankshafts way up on that shelf. Clearly does not live in southern california as they would be hard to catch during the frequent shaker.

There is a piece of 1/2" steel rod drilled through the 3/4" plywood shelf support that runs across the cranks about 1/3 way from the top. The other end of the rod has a piece of steel lag bolted to the studs. I call that deep storage because there's 4 more in wood cradles on the left and my new merc crank just kinda laying there with the masking tape on the journals. Those are the best five....They DO talk a lot about a possible 9.0 here in the Puget Sound Region.

[Walt Dupont--Me.]

The .0825 over bore is not 3-5/16, it,s .0825, 3-5/16 is .125 over. Walt

[Ronnieroadster]

Originally Posted by Russ/40

Jumping Jehosafat! Check out those crankshafts way up on that shelf. Clearly does not live in southern california as they would be hard to catch during the frequent shaker.

Certainly A hard hat area