FE Power Forums
FE Power Forums => FE Technical Forum => Topic started by: fekbmax on March 24, 2016, 04:25:47 PM
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Ok, which is the best, strongest, most durable standard sized shaft rocker arms for the FE . ?
Dove h/d ?
Harland sharp ?
PoP ?
Crane gold ?
Shelby stainless ?
T/D Street/sportsman ?
Something else?
Bushed, non bushed, or bearings ?
Small roller tips or larger ?
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im no expert,i would like to know too.i dont know if its true or a bunch of bull, but i heard somewhere that there has been no reported dove rocker arm failures. i didnt know there were that many different companies made fe rockers. pretty good list you got there.
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I asked that question of Ray Paquet several years ago. His answer was, "Dove HD. Put 'em in and forget 'em."
They are available from Dove.
KS
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A couple more for the list:
FPP- the pre- POP style rocker
Erson
Rocker Arms Unlimited- http://www.rockerarms.com/pages/rollerrockerarms4.html
PRW/Speedmaster- Not a fan of the cheap Chinese stuff
I'm no expert either, but from what I've gathered, it seems like the T&D "race" setup is the best. For conventional FE stand/single shaft setup, I couldn't say which would handle the most abuse. The biggest problem would probably be the four stand fasteners pulling from the heads with heavy spring pressures.
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I forgot about the RAU's, thanks for the reminder.. The only reason I didn't include FPP or PSE is because of availability.
I'm a big fan of the erson rockers, id love to have another set but they use the smaller shaft and sadly they are no longer available. The TnD race is a given, no question. I'm talking standard shaft dia rockers,useing standard oiling, no pushrod oiling.
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Oregon Cam Grinding has a system also, and you can still use the drain-back tins with his system. Link to a couple pictures of it here. http://www.oregoncamshaft.com/428-FE.html
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I've had the standard Dove rockers fail with high spring pressures, but have never heard of the HD Dove rockers failing. Can you still get the HD Dove parts? The other ones to keep your eyes peeled for are the Iskenderian ductile iron rockers; they are nearly indestructible. They are not roller tip rockers though.
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i have a set of isky rockers from back in the 70s,is that the ones your talking about,or are the good ones newer than that?
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I dont know how well they work on supper big roller cams, but the harland sharps are really nice, and i have never seen one break that i can recall.
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I think the HD Dove are still available, or kinda lol. I have 9 brand new h/d rockers , I think sets can be had but I'm if I can get them separately. I like the looks of the bushed pop's but wonder about the strengths. I have 5 or 6 Harland sharp rockers from the late 90's that have broken or cracked at the roller tip. I'm working on a mounting system for both standard size shafts and the smaller erson setup. I'm thinking that erson must be pretty decent cause no one wants to part with any pieces or half or full sets of them. How about the TnD sportsman setup, do they use he standard dia shafts ? I'm guessing those rockers are as good a quality as there are rockers. Although I have seen a couple TnD rockers broke just like the one on Jays older speed weeks post. I also like the looks of the Oregon support, would be a good starting point for a 9 point mounting system. I'm more concerned now though with the rockers themselves, standard size shafts. Has anyone ever seen or chewed on a set of the 'rocker arms unlimited' rockers?
Come on guys, which is it, Dove, PoP, Harland sharp, TnD, RAU, . looks like the Harland sharp and PoP are the only ones you can put your hands on in a day or two.
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For flat tappet situations, Harland-Sharp gets my vote.
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Sometimes I believe I am the only person running the crane gold rocker assembly .When they first come out pricing was inexpensive .I paid around $500 for mine about 2005 .Now I believe they cost closer to $900 Mine have been trouble free .BUT when I started setting them up I ran into problems .I had to have the stands milled to center my valve stem to rocker arm contact pattern.I believe I had .100 milled off my stands which are steel by the way.Afterwards Crane supposedly took care of this issue .I guess that is when the price went up.This is on a street car sft cam so no roll cam valve spring pressures .But still my spring pressures are 365-385 open .At the time I didn't have any rocker assemblies and wanted to use arp studs for my edelbrock heads .The crane kit worked for me .Doug
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Sometimes I believe I am the only person running the crane gold rocker assembly .When they first come out pricing was inexpensive .I paid around $500 for mine about 2005 .Now I believe they cost closer to $900 Mine have been trouble free .BUT when I started setting them up I ran into problems .I had to have the stands milled to center my valve stem to rocker arm contact pattern.I believe I had .100 milled off my stands which are steel by the way.Afterwards Crane supposedly took care of this issue .I guess that is when the price went up.This is on a street car sft cam so no roll cam valve spring pressures .But still my spring pressures are 365-385 open .At the time I didn't have any rocker assemblies and wanted to use arp studs for my edelbrock heads .The crane kit worked for me .Doug
I bet if you searched the FE forum, my challenges with those in 2005/2006 come up. I had the same fight as you, except Crane was trying to make it good since they had just came out. In the end, they told me they wanted to work with me, but couldn't give me a timeline, but if I cut them myself, I owned them. Unfortunately mine seemed to have more issues than just a cut, they also pushed the push rods into the intake, even in a closed position. I needed a set of rockers and bought Ersons instead
Do they even sell them anymore? Crane went out of business for a while, I don't pay much attention to them, easier and just as cheap to go Bullet cams
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Idk if they still make them or not. I know I have seen a couple sets of NOS ones on e bay. From my understanding crane is going strong and more focused on there roots, camshafts and components.
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Keep in mind that if you use the Dove end stand system it limits your valve cover choices.
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You can clearance the Dove rocker arm stand to fit some valve covers. Mine are clearanced more than in this pic, I think. I run Mercury Pentroof covers. I also use Harland Sharp rockers. It works great at over 400 lbs open pressure on a flat tappet. I think on my next engine, which will be solid roller, I will use the T&D race setup.
JMO,
paulie
(http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee289/plovett/Dove%20Rocker%20Arm%20End%20Stands_zpslvuxak6u.jpg) (http://s231.photobucket.com/user/plovett/media/Dove%20Rocker%20Arm%20End%20Stands_zpslvuxak6u.jpg.html)
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Did I see somewhere that Harland sharp makes HD rockers with bearings ?
Also the new sharp set up looks to be a carbon copy of the RAU setup from a few years back.
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Harland Sharp does have needle bearing rockers. We have run them. They are in our race motor(13.5:1 solid roller). They are a little bigger than the standard bushed rockers. http://harlandsharp.com/ford_nb.htm
As Jay mentioned, a buddy of mine had a non-hd Comp(Dove) rocker break while cruising down the road.
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I've been waiting for somebody to pony up for one of these rocker arm outfits.....
http://www.jomarperformance.com/FE-Rocker-Info.php
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I'm thinking if one had a set of heads that were cut for T&D's, and had a set of Dove HD's with the end supports, and also had a Bridgeport, one could whittle out a steel plate that was the thickness of the cut for the T&D's, make whatever clearance cuts necessary for head studs etc., connect the Doves to the steel plate, maybe even add some stock underneath if possible before tapping the holes so one could use longer studs, and as the HD rockers seem to be a stout piece, have a pretty strong setup with the loads spread across the steel plate, and added thread engagement on the studs. If one didn't have the Dove's already, then new T&D's would be the obvious choice- but if one (like me) had this combination of parts in hand (X2 by the way), and the Bridgeport, with a little out of the box thinking, could build it. And not have to convert to pushrod oiling. Pretty sure no one has tried this, but there are some out there with enough cross- experience with the parts to comment- please LOL....
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i have looked at the jomar set up a few times, looks to me to be a nice girdle set up for shaft deflection but still only has the standard 4 mounting points and the rockers look alot like harland sharps.
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Mean Gene
In the 80s i did something like that for a
Volvo B20. The valve mecanism is more or
less a copy of the FEs. I made a steel plate
that i bolted down with the headbolts and
on that i bolted a stand i had made for the
rockershaft like oregon camshfts patented
stand in the link.
I dont remember what roller rockers i used
but i think it was for some mopar
I also made one with a steelplate bolted down
with the headbolts where i bolted SBF
roller rockers and guide plates on the plate with
SBF rockerstuds.... when i realised i would
have no oiling :-[
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We had an old set of Rocker Arm Specialists rockersl on one of our high risers. They were the same stainless rocker bodies that are still used by Shelby and were really nice pieces.
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i have a set of isky rockers from back in the 70s,is that the ones your talking about,or are the good ones newer than that?
Yes, those are the ones I was talking about. They are very good rockers.
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Yep, the Isky's are strong as hell- I bought a set in '77, they've been run on up to .660 lift, and are on my Galaxie today and are still like new
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Ross from what I understand they still make them .And fixed those issues .Luckily enough I had a good machinist at my job ,Crane wasn't helping me other than telling me nothing was wrong .I would take the rocker stands and have him cut no more than .030 at a time .Take them back home assemble my top end and see what the contact pattern looked like .After getting it centered up we just took .100 off the other stands and all was good .A LOT of effort for someone working in their backyard shop .A couple of years ago Joe Sherman built a nice stroker fe he ran the crane rockers we are speaking of .No mention at all of any valve train geomentry issues .He did say that the rockers weren't a 1.76 ratio .According to Joe they were Closer to 1.82 .Please don't take that as a definite I am going by memory .No issues with my pushrods and like I said after all the headaches they are fine with me .One other thing the end stands they come with have cleared a set of tall pent roofs and regular cjs too
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I remember Joe Sherman's comments about the ratio, I wonder if he didn't bother to fix them because back then was the heart when they wee bad.
Ironically, he wasn't able to make much power with that motor either, but it just goes to show you that although an engine is an engine, each has its little tricks to really make them run.
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Any one still making offset rockers for the FE ? Who and are they readaly available ?
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At what level does the stock rockers start to be a problem?
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Any one still making offset rockers for the FE ? Who and are they readaly available ?
T&D has a few different varieties of offsets. Not shaft mounted however....
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On the TnD street/sportsman setup, do the rockers use bearings ? Are they standard shaft size ?
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T&D streets are bearing in the fulcrum. Non-factory shaft diameters.
They will make any reasonable offset on the race parts, no options I am aware of on the street stuff but likely possible if you ask.
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Thanks.