You know, I get the impression that many folks are against solid rollers for the street because of the spring pressure, but the reality is, just like hydraulic roller, you can get solid rollers custom ground with street friendly lobes that do not require over the top spring pressures. I started this post with the hope of learning some hard facts, pro's/cons about the subject, from folks with experience in both types. When you get unsubstantiated statements like "Never run a solid roller on the street", that contributes absolutely nothing to help folks learn why you think that way. This is not meant to be critical of some posters, but the question was posed to try to gather some facts, and I am sure that I am not the only one that is wanting more info on the subject.
Let me throw this out, I have been told by knowlegeable engine builders, that solid rollers used on the street should not be subjected to extended idleing as they do not get enough oil splash feed on them, a problem that hydraulic rollers do not have. This makes sense to me and I had never thought about that. After running my roller for about six years, I decided to send the lifters back to Isky, to have them checked out/ rebuilt. I talked to one of their Tech guys about converting to the bushed roller from the needle bearings and he told me that it was way overkill for my build, but that one advantage would be that they are much less critical on the amount of splash feed needed to keep them properly lubed in a steet scenario. It cost me $400 for the upgrade, but I figured it was worth it from a long term reliability standpoint. He also added that I would probably never need them rebuilt, based on the cam/spring specs that I have. Now, I don't plan on any extended idling, but I have been caught in bad traffic on a cruise before the upgrade and would put it in neutral and raise the rpm up to 2400 for 10 seconds or so every few minutes to get some oil splash on the lifters, now, I won't worry about it as much as I did. That is one of the Cons that I know of for running a solid roller over a hydraulic on the street. Anybody got some others?
