Camshaft caps interchangeable? b230

Are the camshaft retainers interchangeable between heads? I'm sending a head to get redone but I'm missing one cam cap I was wondering if I could hit the junkyard and grab one from there and be able to use it.

yes

Jack said:

yes

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BOOM. I can now go send my head off to get redone.

Not really

Might need a line hone if you're taking it from another head. That cap may have been machined differently than your original cap, or could have gotten tweaked from heat.

I vote no.

centason said:

Might need a line hone if you're taking it from another head. That cap may have been machined differently than your original cap, or could have gotten tweaked from heat.

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This.

centason said:

Might need a line hone if you're taking it from another head. That cap may have been machined differently than your original cap, or could have gotten tweaked from heat.

Click to expand...

I would concur. The caps are THEORETICALLY the same, but since they act as a bearing, ever wear patter is different.

Nope. They're supposed to be a matched set, since they're line bored at the factory.

Best to clean up the shop and find it, or plan to use a head that's complete.

-J

welp guessing I'm buying a head from the junkyard tomorrow then.

lummert said:

I vote no.

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Me too........^^^^^^^^^^

The bearings surfaces are line bored in the head casting with the caps attached at the factory.
This makes the center to center alignment perfectly straight.

Using a different cap would misalign the concentricity of the bearing bores.

This would cause the bearing surface to wear badly and quickly damage the head.

It would also cause the camshaft to be hard, if not impossible to turn, causing galling and quick failure of the bearing surface.

Although, a good automotive machine shop should be able to adapt a new bearing cap to the camshaft.
It would probably mean installing a new cap and line boring the bearings to match the other existing holes.
Either that, or the shop could build up the bearing surface on a used cap using a aluminum welder, and then re-bore the hole.
Extra $$$$

Cam bearing ? shells are available to repair heads with galled caps. Of course, line boring is required to install them, but that would allow a mismatched cap to be used. The bearing shells aren't cheap and neither is align boring, so the head better be worth it.

^^

This. The correct answer is NO. Same thing with a connecting rod cap, main bearing cap etc, etc. You might get lucky and have one fit perfectly without first removing material from the mating surfaces and having the whole set line honed. You would need a set of bore gages and a good micrometer to determine whether the tolerances will work.