I have lifters in my oil pans. Mostly they don't cause any trouble.
However in "Righteous", the 73 164E that I stored in Charleston, SC when
I lived in Panama, I had one lifter that dropped to where it got hit by
the #2 big end. Not sure exactly what happened as I didn't figure out
what that sickening "KLUNK" was for about 15,000 more miles. Headed east
across the Arizona desert I began to get some serious knocking, overheating
and loss of power and oil pressure. Just did make it into San Simón, Arizona,
with wife, daughter Esther and lots of baggage. We finally hitched a ride
to Lordsburg, NM where we caught a Greyhound into El Paso where we rented a
car and finished the trip. The rental car about paid for itself in savings
on gas and heartburn. Several months later, after son in law Andy had driven
over from Yuma and recovered the car, I was on a business trip to Yuma and
we took the head off. #2 piston was at TDC and was VERY CLEAN where the
cylinder head was flat, as was the flat surface of the head. Andy reached in
and touched the piston and it dropped a little more than 1/4". I didn't get
into the lower end but theorize that one rodbolt was broken or bent and later
broke and the big end opened up, and it gave out just before throwing a rod.
The trauma took place over about 75 miles after about 15,000 miles of being
relatively trouble-free. BTW it was the 6-cylinder equivalent of the IPD
7001 (street perf) cam. Mighty hard to get nowadays. That was about
1994. Since Andy was soon going to Korea we salvaged what we could but
the car with engine and M410 tranny went to the crusher. He had bought it
for me in Phoenix for $700 a few years earlier. Cam went bad on the way
from Phoenix to Yuma, hence the need to replace it.
--
George Downs, The "original" Walrus3, Bartlesville, Oklahoma