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ipd Turbo Cam Lobe Wear and Lash Questions

muppetman342

Having too much fun
Joined
Dec 1, 2012
Location
Charlottesville, VA
I installed this cam about 7-8,000 miles ago and reshimmed it with some shims I had around which got me to about .45 mm all around. I realize this is out of the Volvo spec of .35mm-.40mm but I had read here

http://forums.turbobricks.com/showthread.php?t=245687

among other threads that suggested that being on the looser end wasn't a bad thing, and was in fact recommended by some.
Some guys were even suggesting 0.50mm

Tonight I popped my Valve cover off to recheck everything after getting some miles on the new cam and I noticed an oddity on the tops of the lobes, notice the marks coming in from the sides on the lobe second from the right:

y3m4CjW4DzjKf1h4ETJsFJjw0N80Djr8b-7ZlAuoaMJ_pIGKtMCMuvgLHdqDd3MZRHC9yqaxypkMhrjnPb-DNhJSpkYEDBU432q6frewJ92nbI9-yyTyVVoRMFa_AdZzHmDgOTaseApfiHCLVhvm726tB7iHIyQN1MTWOGQ0xmnQ7U


More pictures: here

Is this just a part of the initial wear of the cam? Is mine wearing too quickly, possibly because of the overly loose lash? What kinds of clearance are you guys running on the ipd Turbo Cam?

*Also, I broke in the cam with the ol' 20 minutes at 2K right after the install.
 
Any opinion on whether I should shoot for 0.14" or 0.16"? With the shims available for purchase it's up to me whether I want to hit the low end of the spec or the high end of the spec. I understand tighter will be quieter but it seems to be of great debate which is better for performance/longevity.
 
Honestly, anywhere in the range is fine. I try for +/- .001" with .015-.016" being my personal preference. It's that nice middle ground between quiet and smooth, solid vacuum vs. that extra .001" more lift. lol
 
I aim for 0.014" on the intake and 0.017" on the exhaust. I'd accept 0.013" on the intake and 0.018" on the exhaust. Erring on the tight side for intake and loose side for exhaust.

I set up the K cam in a 530 on our 9.8:1 B230F running ~14psi from a T3 on our 24hr lemons car, running on LH2.4 & 93oct Never had top end trouble, cam issues, or burned valves in all the races we did. The car did probably 12 races with a turbo and roughly 20 overall. It was a non-turbo head, too, with solid exhaust valves. I lapped the valves once, and we had the seats & valves cut once to correct a sealing issue after a bad overheat, but I can't say we ever had any real trouble that started with the cylinder head.

I've set up the head for my own car the same way. Had a 530, 531, 398 all on the same engine. Usually solid exh valves and a turbo.
 
Interesting, what's the reasoning behind tight on intake and loose for exhaust? Heat dissipation?

I would suspect that it may loosely function like an anti-lag system. Or more properly stated, a misfiring system... but I don't claim to know.

If you left the exhaust valves looser though, you would effectively be putting a constant stream of... something... out of the exhaust system and as such... are more likely to keep the turbine spinning.

Best guess from my small brain.
 
Actually. Saying this out loud... that doesn't make sense because there's still a gap, so the valves would each close all the way. So now... I'm outta ideas.
 
Actually. Saying this out loud... that doesn't make sense because there's still a gap, so the valves would each close all the way. So now... I'm outta ideas.

Yea, plus the clearances we're talking about mean that greater clearance means the valve is closed longer, a tighter (or too tight) is what would make the valve stay open all the time. This would also mean that the valve never uses the head as a heatsink and in a turbo application (which is what I've got) it could spell destruction.
 
I usually try for the middle ground to slightly loose of 15-16 thousandths. When I installed the cams I gooped them with a moly breakin product. Then I used that 2k rpm method after starting. In my turbo I now have over 80k miles on the V15 turbo and the 93 wagon has 130k miles on the n/a V15.
 
So I just did the first oil change since re-shimming this cam and I found an alarming amount of "material" on my magnetic drain plug. Now I also put in a new-to-me 16T during the last change so metal could be coming from there (doubtful). But Looking at the cylinder one's intake lobe through the oil fil cap, I could see some scarring on the peak of the cam lobe, almost like lines that run along the lobe in the direction of rotation.

Is my cam dissolving? Could the new shims have rubbed off some sort of coating into my oil that got picked up by my magnet? It seems weird to me that I was getting nothing on my magnet, now all of a sudden I'm seeing a lot after shimming the cam.
 
Does your oil have zinc additives in it, looks like a lot of wear for that short of time. Put an IPD cam in a customers car in 2000 with 180K miles on it, ended up buying it in2001 for my wife's DD . I run Mobile 1, Her car now has +475K miles on it. Checked the lash last month, one lobe off .002" It looks like something is wrong.
 
My motor is about .017-.020"

The wear pattern is only the coating on the lobe. You're fine.
 
Did all the buckets go back into their original hole?
Yep, didn't switch the buckets around.

Does your oil have zinc additives in it, looks like a lot of wear for that short of time. Put an IPD cam in a customers car in 2000 with 180K miles on it, ended up buying it in2001 for my wife's DD . I run Mobile 1, Her car now has +475K miles on it. Checked the lash last month, one lobe off .002" It looks like something is wrong.

When I first installed the cam I was running Castrol GTX High Mileage which I'm not sure about its zinc content, but switched to Mobil 1 after a few thousand miles and have been running that on there for the last 9-10K.

The wear pattern is only the coating on the lobe. You're fine.

The marks that I looked at today looked more severe, I should've snagged a pic. I'll be gone this weekend but I'll try and get some pictures up next week.

EDIT: Another thing that was new for this oil change compared to other oil changes was the use of a MAHLE oil filter instead of a MANN filter. I was having issues with defective MANN filters so I decided to give MAHLE a try. So basically a thousand variables have changed and the engine's got 307,000 miles on it so who knows what's going on.

EDITEDIT: Also I have a ticking at ~3000 RPM that sounds like it's coming from the top of the engine. Started a few thousand miles into having the ipd cam, part of why I went back in to look at it in the first place. I'll likely be swapping in the stock M at some point and seeing what happens, gosh I love shimming solid lifters.
 
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You realize that shimming it loose that your leaving some of that lift and duration you paid so dearly for on the table right? I use comp cams break in oil. Even diesel oil is losing its zinc. I would contact the cam grinder and ask them what the clearance should be, why go by Volvo specs is not there can anymore rite? If your can is going flat when you change cams back Replace!!!!!!!!! The cam buckets too!!!!
 
So I pulled the cam cover today to check out the cam and I got a picture of the lines on two of the lobes. What's up with these lines? I can feel them with my finger too, so they're deep. It doesn't look like the lobes are disappearing or wearing into a weird shape, it's just these lines that weird me out.

y4moV3xkhm9YTtDoH16v9rK0ZbIae8Mur1Ps6EQdt50HHHoBLqmPytogKKKKRGqjmBJar3bVxuYkG7iQBdfIIEneZDO6G_6eqnUZe4zLW_gZSEkNyLnArsH2gLINth7G61BCHLucr_ueU9oO4vstit9faUAyAg3gQVE0qeeyUsv3hEt_z4l1cCcc6R13RR7wjUOuhVusGxZJIR3Wqz-znSlfQ


y4myjMLOvpOJJeBAu2E1YrwP_hzZvre-wdk-XbB-j4pu9wzHLQx2DyUIaNLcLbY3vasUVMYgEavGMrFkJtlCDsSttatiL7cqxV05PkYIhHog911SoXRTT7Il4K-eA8sPcIhpp7bNCWh3SIG6Bx9zNHOsWOui-iZ7Yy50DirA7Auh_8o6zoSeTjrPWRkEcteSD9ULKEKwG9HN_aGy5gRRNVn7g


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