The needle bearing cages in these rockers keep failing. The last time I had problems I checked with Jesel and they admitted to some issues with the older parts that I have. From what I find, the pushrod angle was hammering the needle bearing cages against the snap rings on the rocker shafts, causing the cages to wear out the snap rings and crack the ends of the cages, leading to failure.
Before this failure(30 runs ago?) I got rid of the snap rings that hold the intake rockers in place and switched to a steel washer against the rocker body's to try and solve the problem.
I don't know if this rocker failed due to being already hurt and I missed it, or something else went wrong. Anybody else having these issues?
I don't know if I should say I am lucky or not. Crank looks perfect, all but one rod bearing looks good, mains ok, one piston damaged and others scratched, block needs to be honed. luckily no severe damage to the gear drive or oil pump shaft, cam or lifters.
I hope that really damaged piston can be salvaged, the scratches in the skirt are pretty bad.
I am thinking this might be the time to pull all the 1.55 rockers and put in the new 1.7 ratio ones that I have, and get some recommendations on a different cam to work with the 1.7 ratio.
Here is a link to the thread where I tried to fix the problem. Tig, had the same issue, and someone else said Big Chief Chevys also suffer this.


https://board.moparts.org/ubbthreads/ubbt...tml#Post1215020