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Looking at "cam degreeing" on youtube... What a pain in the ***...

Kern Dog

Life is full of turns. Build your car to handle.
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Looking at "cam degreeing" on youtube... What a pain in the ***...

What the heck, man?
I looked at several videos online and it sure looks like a pisser. I guess to do this I'll need some "kit" or else I'll need to piece something together. The videos I watched didn't show what to do IF the timing set was innacurate. I have the ONE bolt cam setup with the single dowel.
So what happens? If you need to correct the timing, are you supposed to oval out the dowel hole and cram a crescent in the open side? What holds it in? The single bolt is the only thing that holds the cam sprocket in place.
I have an Edelbrock timing set that has a hole for the dowel. I've seen others that have a slot. I suppose that the slot type means you are SOL for making any corrections??

- - - Updated - - -

Not that I am going to totally dismiss the idea, but how often are mistakes found? In all the magazine articles I've read, about half actually degreed the cam. OF THOSE, I cannot recall any of them mentioning that they found an error and had to correct it. There MUST be a reason for doing this, so I'm still planning on doing it. I just wish I had someone nearby to help me make sense of it.
 
Well, yes, on occasion there are mistakes made, even when you put the cam in 'straight up.' Plus, you are making sure actions happen when they are advertised, i.e. lift starts at X degree, reaches max lift at Y degree, etc. Yep, its a pain. Yep, its probably ok to slap it in and run. But....with the problems you've had, do you really want to chance it, just to save a bit of time?
 
Back in 1990, when I was building the 383 for my Bee, degreeing the 284/484 was a big diference in a good build versus a build that looked good on paper but wasn't quite right.

My kit came with three or four dowel plugs that were round, and had a hole drilled off center.

It really wasn't a bad process, and as mentioned allows you to verify the timing and adjust as necessary.

IIRC the cam bolt washer and the fit of the plug holds it in. It really can't go anywhere.

I'm not sure about 1990, but I hear a lot now about manufacturers grinding advance into the cam as built.

Might want to be aware of that, depending on your cam.
 
A good timing set from say Cloyes, will have three slots on the crank gear, one straight up, one for slight advanced and one retarded a bit. It's good to double check them.
 
Yep, cloyes, +-4, so you can dial it in. A lot of the time I've spun my cams forward when ordering, so things happen 'quicker.'
 
Do this long enough and you'll find errors. Also, production tolerances can stack up and sometimes all in one direction. If that happens, you can end up with a cam that's retarded enough to really kill the performance of an engine or worse...damage! A buddy of mine knew better but plugged in a cam and aligned the dots anyway and ended up bending all of his brand new 2.14 intake valves. keep digging and you'll find out how to make adjustments. Like mentioned, there are crank sprockets that have 3 key ways and some have more then there are offset keys to be had. Being a machinist, I've even broached my own key ways. You can also get offset bushings for the cam sprocket but then you have to enlarge the existing pin hole for those to work....
 
Cranky nailed it. Even 'custom ground' cams can be off. Years ago at trivalley we found crane was the worst, don't know if that's changed, but like I said earlier, it is worth checking with all the other issues you have had...
 
X3 for cranky
also if u assume its right....well...might be looking for things like thicker head gaskets
and why after all the $ you spent would you buy a 1 bolt cam Gregory C? they can and have sheared the pin off....pls tell me it wasn't to save money on a new timing set:BangHead::BangHead:
 
X3 for cranky
also if u assume its right....well...might be looking for things like thicker head gaskets
and why after all the $ you spent would you buy a 1 bolt cam Gregory C? they can and have sheared the pin off....pls tell me it wasn't to save money on a new timing set:BangHead::BangHead:

This cam was what RustyRatRod had suggested. I'd had trouble with advice on cam selection and he was the only one that took the time to help me pick one.
I'd wondered about how errors are corrected. My timing set has the 4* retard, zero and 4* advance settings.
 
It takes about 20 minutes to set up and do it once you have the tools and a little experience. I like the JP sets with 8 degree each way adjustment and the torrington thrust face.
 
you degree it because cams are not ground perfect.. they are off 99.9% of the time
 
you degree it because cams are not ground perfect.. they are off 99.9% of the time

It's the tolerance stack up of it all combined that's the issue. The crankshaft keyway location, the timing set tolerances, the cam/crank centerline distance, cam machining, and lifter bore locations. All of this has an effect on it however slight it all is, it still can add up to several degrees of being off.
 
.. that may well be true as well but cams are just close to the specs they are supposed to be and not always dead on.. that's what I'm told from my builder and have found to be true of the cams I've installed.. some of them are very far off and they come straight from Comp
 
you degree it because cams are not ground perfect.. they are off 99.9% of the time

I have heard and seen different. The instances where I've read of a cam being degreed in, the majority of them are within 1 to 1.5 degrees when checked. If you want to interpret that as not being perfect, thats cool. I wonder what kind of performance difference you'd feel being 1 degree off. When this engine had THIS cam in 4 degrees advanced, what stood out the most was that it detonated more than with the cam installed straight up. I don't recall there being any difference in street performance.
I understand your line of thinking though. People check because if you dont, you'll never know .
 
People check because if you dont, you'll never know .

Exactly.

The game has always been extracting the most out of what you've got. I cringe every time I hear somebody I know build a performance engine, and just play "align the dots"
 
It's not that hard to learn to degree a cam. Take the time to learn how to do it and impress your friends. It's a skill the you can use many times if you are going to be doing cam swaps or any serious engine building in the future. I actually like checking and rechecking everything in any engine that I am building for myself. Like Gregory says, most cams are pretty close, but it only takes one bad grind to really mess up an otherwise good engine build.
 
It's not that hard to learn to degree a cam. Take the time to learn how to do it and impress your friends. It's a skill the you can use many times if you are going to be doing cam swaps or any serious engine building in the future. I actually like checking and rechecking everything in any engine that I am building for myself. Like Gregory says, most cams are pretty close, but it only takes one bad grind to really mess up an otherwise good engine build.

I could not agree more. Like my Dad said - "Measure twice, cut once."

A few years ago I freshened up a 360 I had rebuilt many years before and I put the new bearings in it without plastigaging them, as I recalled the crank was ground 10/10. On fire up, as it warmed up, oil pressure went rapidly south. Long story short, the crank was actually ground 20 under on mains - Doh! I always plastigage now, once bitten, twice shy.

I will degree the cam this week in the 413 I'm building. No multiple slots in MP timing set crank sprocket, so if it needs adjusting, I will use the offset bushes in cam sprocket method.
 
The biggest complaint I have these days is spending all the money to build a motor then using a cheap timing gear set> Why people cut corners here???
 
The biggest complaint I have these days is spending all the money to build a motor then using a cheap timing gear set> Why people cut corners here???
Because understanding the quality vs price can be hard if this is your first high performance engine build. If you have built a basic stock engine the "off the shelf" parts work well so logic kicks in of "there is no difference" when there is. I always try to put a quality double roller in even in a stock build. Thats why sites like this are a great asset when doing things for the first time.

Thomas
 
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