real basic, car had a 236/238 cam, XER lobes on stock heads with duals and stock rockers......ran that for about 7000 miles. i then added brand new heads with psi springs, ws6 store trrunion rockers, morel 5315 drop ins, and a fast 90. was dead silent. no sewing machine noise, only heard the noise from the fast. after about 3000 miles, and lots of WOT pulls and some drag runs.....randomly started my car the other day and its sewing machine central.....took a video but its tough to filter it out. its there at idle, and to 2500 rpms when the exhaust takes over. no performance issues, sounds like rockers cause its more of a tick and can be heard at all sides of the motor, inside the car etc. could be lifter noise idk. could it be normal sewing machine noise 3000 miles later?

 

What is your oil pressure like? You don't mention it.

 

Always been a,little high. I forget if my buddy ported my stocker or not. Consistent 65-70 wot , 42 hot idle on pennzoil platinum 10 30

 

I should add, it's a little louder sewing than I have heard before. My pushrods measured up much shorter than usual, but triple checked and got consistent measurements. Really don't think it's anything like that tho since it was silent for awhile

 

I should say 60 to 65 hot wot

 

I get the same noise that comes and goes for the past 150k miles, I notice it has a lot to do with what Oil I use. If I use the Pennzoil high mileage 10-30 its pretty much completely quiet. If I put in anything else it can really get noisy to the point its too noisy. Example I tried some Delo 400XLE 10-30 blend, it was so noisy all the time after a 100 miles I changed it back to the Pennzoil and the noise stopped. I think its something in the lifters, too much clearance internally etc. Its never gotten any worse, oil pressure is always good but the noise sure is annoying to say the least. I wouldn't call it ticking, more like a light chattering sound.

 

as long as it's not a knock or a tap, i wouldn't worry too much about it. watch your oil, and send it in for analysis now and then.

as far as the type of oil, just because it is rated at a "something-somethingW30" doesn't mean it will act like every other multigrade oil at temp. they are all a little different, some formulations have higher viscosity than others at temp but still all fall into a certain weight range. i would worry more about wear protection than a little valvetrain noise, though.

 

but is it possible for a car to be silent for as long as mine has then randomly be loud? if you had to put a percentage on it, what percent chance would u guys say that this could potentially be a problem.

 

i'd remeasure pushrods. it's pretty common to order them too short. done it myself.

 

if thats true why were they quiet for 3000+ miles. i have no issue digging in, but would like to hear the opinion of others on what may be going on....normal or not. this weekend ill probably pull the covers and take a running video to post up. should i film with open covers with the motor cold or hot

 

If you're looking for a "just run it" answer I would be a lot more inclined to say that if it was say like a couple of years after a build. But you're only 3k into a build, for that reason I would pull the valve covers and the rockers and inspect everything, if it all seems good, run it. I'm with you though if the pushrods are too short it shouldn't be the problem, but "shouldn't" only goes so far.

Honestly, nobody can tell you what it is without looking at it so you really should look at it.

 

perfect world answer im looking for is "i have seen a few motors start to finish and some of them did develop more sewing machine later. they never missed a beat, just got noisy after a bit".

what should i look for when i pull the covers?

 

can we "for the most part" rule out pushrod length since it was quiet for a little bit? i currently am in contact with ws6 store discussing rocker possibilities

 

Pull the valve cover and try moving the rockers. See if any are loose.

 

move them left to right? they all had a microscopic amount of play left to right

 

I hear ya there and i'd love to give you that answer, but if I did or we did then we could be telling you to go beat on a hurt motor, so you're gonna have to look. I think that yeah if you triple checked your lengths and it was quiet that it's safe to assume the pushrod length isn't the problem.

So what I would look for is are any of the rocker arm bolts loose.. once they are off rotate them around and feel for any looseness or any rough spots or anything that looks or feels off, compare them to each other, any of them have looseness or funkiness compared to the others, if so check that one out, if not move on.

Pull all the pushrods, look for funky wear, roll them all on a flat surface and see if any are bent. If they look good and are flat move on.

Look with a flashlight down into the lifter cups see if they all look good.

Look at all valve springs make sure none of the coils are broken, make sure all of the tips of the valves are perfectly flat and smooth, no funky wear. Make sure all the retainers are in their place and all the keepers are all there.

If you don't find anything take a couple more pushrod measurements and see if something changed, if not put it back together and either run it or pull the pick up tube and check your oil pump o ring

 

Mine stopped making the noise for quite a while but after changing the oil pump and other craziness I'm not going into the noise started again. I keep a eye on the oil and its always clean looking without any hint of metal sparkles etc in it. I just don't feel its worth digging into it without knowing what I'm digging for. I'd bet its something in the lifters BUT I remember a while back GM dealers were after a chattering noise in the engines. They were changing lifters but the noise stayed, Turned out it was actually piston noise, So you never really know.

 

how do i make a proper pushrod measurement now that all the lifters are broken in and will "give" when torquing. i thought now its more tough to get an accurate measurement because there is no way of knowing if a lifter is fully bled down, in between etc

 

Do you have an adjustable pushrod? That’s how you measure pushrod length.

 

correct however don't the lifters need to not be collapsed which won't they be since the car has ran and they have bled down