Thanks for the video Jay. I'm now confident that with my rocker setp and restrictors in place, no provisions are necessary for additional oil return.
Since I have the heads off, I'll likely just clean up the factory returns for insurance.

Make sure you wash the right side real well. It looks like you may have parked a bit close to that Chev...

Nice!

Yes, the previous break-in failure was on the break-in machine. At least that's what they told me. I question if it ever really happened or if that was a convenient excuse when I called asking where my cam was 2 weeks after it should have arrived.
When I asked what he thought happened, he didn't know. He said "sometimes it just happens, better on my machine than in your engine". Although that's true, the engineer in me says this should never happen. There are very few unknowns in the tribology of materials.

Purchased a cam, solid lifters and springs from CamResearch broken in on their machine. Had to wait a while for them to run and ship a 2nd set because the first one wiped a lobe. Well, I'm not sure I like some of the things I see on the surface of these lifters, but have never seen a set at this point of their life. I do know that I'm not comfortable with the nicks seen on almost every lifter. Some are very deep. Doesn't appear to be induced by the break-in process, but an overall quality concern. Some also have circular rings that others don't. In my opinion, they should all look one way or another, not different.

To be clear, I'm assuming the off-center grind marks were there to begin with, to promote rotation? The rings I'm talking about are concentric to the center of the face.

Looking for any input here.

Pics aren't great as they were taken with my phone. Dark color in some areas is an artifact of the lighting, all lifters are actually the same singular color.

http://s238.photobucket.com/user/cyclonic66/library/CamResearch%20solid%20lifter%20break-in?sort=3&src=wap&page=1

Jay, I suspect your heat treater is using a 2 stage heat treat in air and a liquid quench at the end of the solution heat treat? That's the dirty option.
You could source a vacuum heat treat utilizing a helium quench. This would eliminate the post processing required for the look. Parts would come out of the furnace looking bright virgin silver. Cost will be higher, but that depends on the cost of blasting. A single furnace would do both heat treatments (solution and precip) required for T6 in a single run as well. For cost purposes, you would likely need a high number of parts to maximize the load.
Not sure what options you have where you are or near your foundry.