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Im getting ready to go through my motor in my truck pretty soon and I have been thinking for quite a while now what I am going to do to it. I have been looking at different cams and never having a motor with a solid lifter cam I am curious about the pros and cons. I know with a solid lifter cam you have to really keep an eye on valve adjustment and check springs alot more than a hydraulic cam. The big question is what is the advantage? If you have 2 motors built identically the same and say you have one with a solid cam that has the same specs as the motor with the hydraulic cam. which one would have the best performance and why?

You probably started a a debate with this one. The "advantage" of a solid lifter is that there is no loss of lift like the hydraulic lifter. At lower rpms you will lose some of your lift with oil pressure. I used to run dirt track cars that had to have hydraulic lifters and there are some lifters on the market today that to me are very close to running mechanical.

just my 02

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Money can't buy happiness, but it can buy horsepower...and that's kind of the same thing...

The last stock car I had there was a rule hyd. cams only and with the vacuume rule we used rhodes lifters. The cam I am thinking about using is a speedway motors tight lash cam most of the stuff they sell is circle track stuff. Like I mentioned above I have never had a motor with a solid cam. I quit the circle track thing a couple of years ago because I was sick of rules and politics and figured it would be fun to do something I can drive on the street and ocasionally drive it to the strip. Im learning as I go since I dont have an engine builder to sponser my street truck. Im kind of at the mercy of my own imagination.

I have built a few motors for the street using circle track solid cams and they work great as for valve adjustment its is not as often as you would think. If you use good parts you would not have to adjust the valves for most of the year depending on how you drive it. Heck i even put a solid lifter motor in a 72 Chevy wrecker and the valves were right on after over a year and he was not easy on it ,also did a jet boat with a big block chevy and it was good after a whole season.

Here is the kicker the solid cam is less prone to flatting the lobes as the hyd cam.

So run the solid and a good set of rockers and have fun.

Oh and a circle track solid cam with about a 276-288 adv dur would sound like the baddest cam on the street but still is very drivable due to there wide torque band.

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1978 pro street step/side 455Buick, 4sp,4.11s, 31/18.5s

As a Old school guy I will say this. The hydraulic cam of choice was the 327 cu.in. 350 hp cam for us. It covered a lot of engines applications. I have used Rhodes lifters with a lot of brands of engines and sizes. I feel they work. It is one of those things you agree with or you don't.

I think the solid lifters needing adjustment all the time may be a carry over from early engines, flat heads? I do know that a bunch of us worked at gas stations, and we would adjust our lifters at night when not much was going on . Our friends would come over and do that too. It was a cool thing to do and impressed our friends.

You can mess with valve adjustments(tighter or looser) on air cooled VW engines and get a little performance gains or losses. But it can effect valve and cam life.

New technology makes a lot of the old wifes tales, no longer valid.

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75 Luv, 350 V8, TH350, Camaro rearend. New 1975 Luv Step side. Stock for now.
Grandmaster of the "Shade Tree" way.. I can't see the yard for all the cars. Come on down and we will sit on the porch and watch the grass grow.

I hang out with or should say did hang out with a bunch of old school guys and they say solid cams are the way to go and anything under .500 lift is a waste of free horsepower. The solid cam that I have decided to go with has .504 lift on both sides 255 265 duration at 0.50 cam lift 106* lobe seperation. Im a young guy only 25 but I have to say I like the old school way of thinking I know with the newer technology its not the best stuff on the market but I like the radical idle and the way everything was back in the days. The cam I have decided to go with is speedway motors circle track grind designed to make good torque with a relativly stock motor.

I ran a 295, .555 with 108 centers on a lot of street motors back in the day, but I ran 4 speeds with them. That should be a good cam you have spec'd with your slushbox. The main thing you will need to look out for is the break in at start up. Current oil standards have had the zinc content removed. You need to find an oil with the good additives to run at start up to keep from wiping a lobe. Some of the diesel oils still have them.

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