I saw that as well. Hmm....wonder why? Maybe they had to make the PRC's competitive in price so they had to cut something out? I dunno. But I do know I'd rather pay a few extra bucks for better parts than skimp and screw myself in the long run.

 

Since the arrival of better springs there has been no failures with the stock locks.In the past I believe the valve springs was just poor quality.I would run the stock valve locks on my personal vehicle with any hydraulic roller cam on the market.I am not convinced there is a need for aftermarket locks on a hydraulic roller setup,solid roller,yes.I am going to try and set up an appointment with a friend who has a spintron machine.I want to perform some test with stock vs. aftermarket locks.Maybe I can do this in the next month or so.Anyone have a damaged LS1 block to setup for the spintron?
There is nothing cut take make PRC competitive in price.There is no way that PRC will sell a lesser quality spring kit vs. others on the market.PRC will only sell the best.At this time,PRC is testing a better quality valvespring.Hopefully this product will be out real soon.

 

We include the Super 7 locks in our kit because we strive to give our customers the best quality at the best price. Instead of asking customers to dig out their nasty, old, worn out, stamped locks, we provide a high quality machined lock for our customers to use. All of our titanium is 100% American. Attached is a pic of our Romi CNC lathe.

 

It comes down to weight for me, the stock locks are lighter, will RPM better and we have never had a failure.

To add to this, about 6 years ago a buddy of mine in BG, KY was running the "Worlds Fastest Small Block Camaro" in the NMCA events, you may remember this car. The engine was built by Pat Musi and routinely turned 9000 RPM, the heads had standard 7 degree locks, not super 7's and not 10 degree's. I will include a link to our web site with the weights of valvetrain components.

BTW, we always clean our locks before we install them, our NEW 5.3 castings come with NEW locks, where as the PP castings were bare and they had to buy some type of lock from somewhere.

http://www.totalengineairflow.com/te...ainweights.php

 

Actually, our 5.3 heads do come to us complete. If anyone needs any stock locks, just give us a call we will be glad to give you a great deal on some, just to get them out our way.

Also if a company were worried about profits only and needed locks for their products, they would not spend the extra money it takes to buy the machined super 7 locks. They would simply supply the stamped, OEM locks with their products.

 

I agree,there is a big difference between foreign materials vs. american.When it comes to materials,just because someone buys the material in America does not mean it was manufactured in America.There is tons of Russian and China titanium imported into the USA,unless you get certified material you have no idea what type or grade material.Titanium prices in the last few months have sky rocketed.Certified American titanium is selling for $40 dollars and up per pound.A 1.25 diameter bar will cost roughly $100 per foot.

 

Good to see Patriot retainers are not being made in the Ukraine anymore. We've seen a few Super 7 locks break on install at our machine shop, but were told that something was out of spec, either the PP valves or the PP retainers. FWIW Manley makes a hardened lock kit now for stock type locks that I recently installed with the PRC kit on an employee's car. To be honest I've never ever seen a problem with stock locks at all though. I buzz them to 7200+ on some cars.

BTW, Terry is not the owner of PRC (for those that didn't know), he is a reseller of PRC the same as TSP is and many others.

 

Sorry, my mistake.