If so many people are running them with no problem, then as stated maybe you just got a defective set. Now if all of a sudden alot of people using them get lifter failure (knock on wood for you guys) then theres a serious problem.
-Joel

 

patriot extremes. 2.04/ 1.57

 

Not sure if you answered this, will you be replacing them with Caddy lifters again or a different brand?
-Joel

 

Which ones were broken? Were they in the same lifter tray? The reason I ask is because I went through a few sets of lifters before i found that my trays were worn and causing lifter failure. I put in new LS2 trays and Caddy lifters and havent looked back.

 

intake on number 6, and both on number 5. car only has 25k on it so i doubt it was worn trays but once again anythings a possibility. and no im not putting another set of these back in.

 

I agree 100%.

3 lifters, 3 seperate issues, all at the same time...

Not gonna happen.

I wouldnt just replace the lifters and go. I would find the cause of the problem.

 

I'm still attempting to decide on what lifters to run in my new engine. It's a toss up between these and the morels if I can save up some more money.

 

I have a set of Morels that i used in my 6.0L setup. They where noisey for about 3-5 minutes. I believe they loose oil prime due to the oil feed on the lifter lining up with engine oil gallery easier than stock and caddy lifters? Stock and caddy lifters line up 45 degrees from engine oil gallery. I use the Caddy lifters in my 408 setup and are very quite. Just hope they keep working?

 

The offshore racing guys use the Morels a lot because they will take a lot of abuse. Crane also now makes a much more durable lifter as well that will take a lot of abuse.

The thing to remember, when you pay for these premium lifters you are buying many things you can't see like better steel, tighter tolerances, better bearings etc. If you buy a set of 16 GM lifters for lets say $160, that's $10 each. The vendor is making a profit, GM is making a profit and the manufacturer is making a profit (likely Eaton or another company). How much do you think they cost to make then, if you figure all that out and the actual cost per unit then I think the Morels make a lot more sense as to why they cost so much.

 

The Morels do look very strong, but the non encapulsed roller bothers me? And the oil supply to the lifter? Stupid reasons i guess?? One thing i did notice was the morels can take more preload than the Caddy lifters. The Caddy lifters for me do not like much preload at all. I have about .045" preload on my Caddy. But this combo revs so easy, I mean fast..

 

The open roller is a stronger design. If you look at a comparison of the Morel next to a closed roller you will see what I mean (I think there are some that can be found with search). Also, the closed design can be an issue with ramp rate. Strength is also derived from the material, and the material is better to start with. There is no issue with oil supply. I had mine tick cold with German Castrol that went away with Amsoil. If anything, they are a much better design for aftermarket cams due to their oil supply design, that is exactly what they were built for.

 

GM has millions and millions of lifters produced, Morel does not. There's obviously a price advantage there.

This is the only GMPP lifter failure I have heard of...maybe there was one more somewhere else and I missed it...but to me it doesn't really qualify the GMPP lifters as a poor quality part.

 

I was told caddy lifters recommend .060 preload. Thats what i set mine to and no problems yet.

 

once again im sure anything is possible but i dont see it being an oiling issue. i had 23k on stock lifters with no problems. less then 2k w/ these and they killed my motor. this is the 3rd that i have been able to find of their failure since they became available. and honestly i think something is being overlooked somewhere be it on the production side, shipping side or just the needs of the lifter for safe operation.

 

Who recommended that preload? I work as a service manager at a GM dealer and when I called GM does not recommend this preload. I did ask for some instructions in box, but it will not happen...

 

katech.

 

Dude, look at the lifter trays CLOSELY. I chased a lifter problem for months. I checked everything, preload was fine (.060"), spring pressure was fine, no coil bind, great oil pressure.
Come to find out it was worn lifter trays, the lifter would turn in the bore slightly, causing the roller to get off center with the cam lobe.
If the lifter doesnt fit tight in the tray, go spend $20 and get some new ones, I wish I would have sooner. It could have saved me a lot of time, money, and headaches.
Im not saying this is your problem, but it sure cant hurt to check.

 

I don't think I was saying it was poor quality, but the GM designs are aimed at a specific setup. A lot of guys here (myself included) ramp up the cam acceleration rates, the spring pressures, the RPM, etc. and I am willing to bet these parameters are beyond those which GM spec'd the lifters for when they were designed. The point I was trying to make is that Morel did it the other way around, they were designed for an aftermarket cam setup with a smaller base circle and higher loads. Crane recently released a similar design approach lifter aimed at the offshore market and came up with a hydraulic lifter that will take very high loads and hours of non-stop abuse.

 

I bought LS7 lifters and new retainers/trays. I hope they work ok, but good gosh those Morels are expensive. I guess they should be a superior product.

 

There is no doubt that the Morels would be a better lifter for a non-budget builder, they have a solid reputation and I've never read about any problems. They are the cream of the crop when it comes to excellent lifters. Most people should (but do not) spend the extra money when doing a head/cam swap to make sure that the engine will not have any issues, but most feel it is not necessary or too expensive.

What I'm not understanding though, is there is tens of thousands of cammed LS engines out there that have been doing just fine with the stock lifters. The GMPP parts are a direct replacement, so, it would seem that if the problem were due to ramp rate/spring pressure/rpm, then we should be seeing far more stock lifter failures of the same nature. The lifter trays in my personal car would hold up all but 2 lifters at my 50k mile cam swap. LS2 Baits lifter trays have 25k miles on them (if I'm reading that correctly) so they should not be worn out. From a logic standpoint, it doesn't seem like they would be the culprit on only 3 of 16 lifters, that's a 19% failure rate that we are not seeing with stock lifters and aftermarket cams. How many people throw in a XER lobe cam with some 918s and that's all they do? How many do it on engines with 50,000 miles or more? There are a lot of them out there.

It was my understanding that the GMPP lifters were designed for the 24hr (?) CTS-Vs when valvetrain instability was seen near 7,000 rpm. Please correct me if I'm wrong about which race the CTS-Vs were for. Obviouslty, RPM, ramp rate, and spring pressure would play a huge role in the performance of those engines. And the LS6 already has a smaller base circle than the LS1 does, but as far as I know both engines use the same lifters...again, the GMPP lifter set being a direct replacement.

It makes me think that it was something besides the lifters or the trays that caused the problem. I'm not trying to start any arguements at all, rather, I'd like to raise some other ideas in hopes that we can find what caused this damage. I have a set of GMPP lifters waiting to go in and I still plan to use them because I am not yet convinced that there is an issue when used with aftermarket cams and valvesprings.

LS2 Bait....any pics??