This is more of a hypothetical question than a problem I am having. I just want to avoid any problems. I am running a 451 with a hydraulic roller cam and intend to push it to the edge of valve float. This should be about 6500 RPM.

I saw several posts here from the past that mentioned bending push rods in conjunction with floating valves. I am curious why this would happen? If a set of Hydraulic roller lifters were to float at high RPM then the engine would stutter and miss badly since the valves are not closing all the way. However for a push rod to bend something in the valve train would have to bind. The only thing I can think of that could cause that would be a valve hitting a piston. If that were to happen I would think a bent push rod would be the least of the problems. Is this an incorrect assumption?

To my way of thinking if the valves floated the engine would just stop accelerating and start to miss. Now if you held it at that RPM I could see where you might burn a valve since they are not going all the way closed.

Assuming the lifter is properly preloaded and does not collaps causing the pushrod to come off the rocker arm ball stud, what would be the harm is floating the valves for a short time? What else would cause a push rod to bend?