I've read about using studebaker rocker arms on a 331 cad. fi this is true, what year and where can I find these rocker arms. The engine is a 55 cad 331. Thanks for any info
Yes, you can. Any 1951-64 Studebaker V8 will have adjustable rockers, as they all came with solid lifters. Rockers from a Studebaker OHV six are the same, and may be easier to find.
Sent you a PM about some V-8 Stude rocker shafts I have. Now, for the technical part of this. You need to disassemble both the Cad shafts and the Stude shafts. Then put the Stude rockers on the Cad shafts. I know it seems obvious, but you can't use the Stude shafts, just the rockers.
I've found that the six's are way easier to come by, and for far less money. Correct me if I'm wrong... but I believe the ratios on a caddy a 1:1.5 and a stude are 1:1.8. I've been told that chevrolet solid lifters will fit the cadillac bores easily, as well, although I haven't measured it up myself.
Once again thr HAMB comes through. I have been looking for a source of adjustable rockers for my Packard. Just called the guys mentioned above. Happy days are here again
That is my understanding also, the Stude are 1.8 ratio, while the stock Cad are 1.5, so you need to be careful of the increased lift and may need to change out the valve springs and watch piston to valve clearance.
Thanks for all the feedback guys. It won't let me read my pm's right now, it keeps asking me to login for some reason. As soon as I can read them I'll respond. I've also found a company called smith brothers that sells adjustable pushrods and I may go that route. The problem I'm having is I completely rebuilt the engine and in doing so I had to resurface the cylinder heads. I only removed .010 from each side which was enough to clean them up, but I'm afraid now they may have been resurfaced before because I've got no valve lash whatsoever.
Well , for now I've ordered a set of adjustable pushrods from smith brothers. I'll keep the rockerarms web site in mind as well. I've got a 365 coming up for a rebuild soon and I'll probably go the adjustable rocker arm route with that one.
Do you run solid lifters ? I run a hot 331 and rebuilt the motor with Lunati hydraulic lifters. They work great with everything but the most radical cams.....dont believe what some folk tell you ! And they make life a whole lot easier if you run the motor alot. If you do have hyd lifters, and you grind the heads, you just need to put shim washers under your rocker blocks to get your correct preload back !
The guys who build and race Studebaker engines have checked Stude rocker arm ratios multiple times, in spite of claims of more, they always check out to approx. 1:1.5 I seem to recall reading years ago, that the original Studebaker V-8 engine design specifications did specify a higher ratio, but evidently camshaft failures during testing led to the 1:1.5 rocker actually being used in production, and even then Studebaker early on needed to replace many failed camshafts. That problem appears to have been from the lack of zinc additives in contemporary oil formulations, once the oils were improved the problems pretty much disappeared. The advantage of using Stude rockers in an early Caddy is the adjustability feature that can compensate for machining operations such as milling the heads or decking the block, and restore proper hyd. lifter preload. For street use I'd stick with the Caddy hyd. lifters, as the Caddy is a torque engine and does not well tolerate the ultra high RPMs that would require, or give any advantage to solid lifters. I presently own 2 Cadillac and 6 Studebaker V-8s.
Dont believe what the uninformed tell you on this site...I paid a fortune for a set of Stude adjustible rockers and the ratio is 1.5:1, which WORSE than the cad arms.
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