BillK

To be perfectly honest with you unless it is extremely easy I would not even waste my time pulling the pan etc. Hopefully the filter caught most of the junk from your old gear. I would pull the drain plug and then pour a quart or two of diesel fuel down through the oil fill tube and maybe down through the distributor hole. That will flush out whatever is in the pan.

For what its worth if it was me I would absolutely have to pull that gear off and send it to Holley for them to look at.

Also. can you get a better picture of the cam gear with a little more light ? I know you said it was fine but I find that hard to believe considering what it did to the distributor gear.

CuttyShark

I will work on that when I have time. Working a lot of weekends now and projects take a back seat right now to making money to fund them. Once I verify I have oil movement out the back hole and the shaft is not locked up I will consider not dropping the pan. How do I get rid of the extra Diesel? Can I dump it with the Oil at the Autozone? I can rotate the Cam some more with the starter and get more shots of the gear and maybe a video too.

BillK

Run it through a paint filter and put it in your daily driver ?

Thats what I would do.

CuttyShark

I have a TDI Jetta. But I’ve already had to have the High Pressure fuel pump replaced when it was actually under warranty. Don’t need Two cars out of commission. If it were a Tractor I would though!

CuttyShark

Here are stills of a video of the cam. All
the way around

BillK

This looks pretty chewed up to me ???

rickw30

That's ugly !

BillK

cs,
If that cam gear is as bad as it looks you are wasting your time putting any distributor gear on it. I think you need to get with your engine builder before proceeding any further.

Battenrunner

Easier to fix it now before total destruction occurs to your bearings. I wouldn’t expect that cam gear to last much longer.

Time to pull it apart, clean and check everything and replace the cam and lifters.

I am also running a Holley dual sync so this is making me worry as well. I have been keeping a close eye on my gear as well.

I think one of those expensive gears is in my future…..

BillK

How many miles on yours ? Personally I think if something like that gear makes it thousand miles with no real wear it will probably be fine. I am in a middle of a build that will have the dual sync. I talked to Mark (cutlassefi) about it and he said he has used many of them with no issues.

I may be wrong but I would almost bet that there is an underlying issue causing the wear in Cuttysharks engine.

CuttyShark

is there some way to post a Video? The video is clearer and those shiny parts are not as shiny in the video. The flash makes them look worse in the screen captures.

BillK

I dont know if you can post a video. You could put it on you tube and then link it ? The spot I marked with the arrow looks like it has a raised edge on it. That was my concern.

Personally I think you need to have your engine builder look at it. Is he close to you ? Pay him to come and take a look at it for you. It is very hard to make decisions on stuff like this without the parts right in front of you to touch.

CuttyShark

he is in California. I am in Florida. I moved to escape Communism as a refugee. Hes not far behind! ha

I send him photos and he thinks it will be ok to put a new gear on the distributor, change the oil and maybe the pump, clean out the pan.

CuttyShark

here is a link to video

BillK

On your fourth crank I see that same spot I pointed out. It does not look good to me. Where are you at in Fl ? Maybe find someone else to come look at it in person for another opinion but I think that spot is what chewed your gear up. Are you anywhere near Mark ?

Battenrunner

I am at about 750 miles on mine.

CANADIANOLDS

all your seeing is the backside of the gear.. you need a mirror to see the drive side good

chuck_royle

Noticed some very inconsistent timing a couple of weeks ago, sure enough, my bronze or brass or playdoe gear was loose. Not chowdered yet but prob 8 degrees! HydrauIic roller cam (now solid). I use 20w50 vr1 so I'm not too surprised. Next year I may try driven xp7 10w40
I took your advice! Mine landed the other day, it's in and timed, hopefully 1 more run!
Not cheap. especially shipped to Canada. We'll see.

rickw30

Use this one from BOP. Great alternative to bronze. A little pricey at $179 but worth it. .50 shaft and you may have to drill the set pin depending how old your dizzy is.

CuttyShark

Update: based on what others had seen on their MSD gears, I bought the BOP Engineering Poly gear.

While I was waiting for MSD to repair my distributor and make sure it was working right, and for BOP to install the gear properly, I went about cleaning up things.

Dropped the pan and cleaned it out. I did not find any chunks. I did notice a very very faint glitter in the oil though. Very faint. I removed the oil pump and screen and washed very well. ALso washed the pan out with my dishwasher to get it surgically clean. Replaced my oil filter with a new one, reinstalled the pump, and put a new gasket and the pan back on.

Then I primmed the pump and make sure it was squirting outt eh 10w30 Lucas Oil for Classics cars out the pin hole in the back of distributor.

Dropped in the distributor after smearing with White lithium grease and turned the car over a few times and pulled it. The wear pattern seemed to be centered and even.

Reinstalled the distributor, started up, timed it.

Running better than it has in a while! Going to change the oil again soon just to make sure any bits there were floating around elsewhere in engine are take care of.

REO442

Can't help to wonder if this problem of excessive wear is a product of the cam "walk" and improper depth setting of the distributor. Is this not the same mechanical set up as the ring and pinion third member, requiring close tolerance fitment? Component metallurgy could only exacerbate the problem. Just my two cents.