Olds: stude adjustable valvetrain ???

So i started trying to piece together a fabled stude adjustable valvetrain for my olds motor. now, i ran into this issue and wondered if its able to be aleviated or if i just wasted my time and money.

now the problem is the angle at which the pushrod hole is and the angle at which the pushrod will meet the rocker arm. here are some pics of my set up bolted to the head. i know i read a post where heathen had mentioned he was building an adjustable set up with stude arms and i'm wondering if he ever used it and to what success and what he might have done to solve this problem.











these are daunting pictures, and seem as though the myth of these being usable has been busted. starting to seem as though i should just nut up and use adjustable push rods, seeing as how NO ONE has adjustable that arent new billet pieces. what you fella's think?

 

Hopefully someone more knowledgeable on this will chime in but I wasn't aware the stude rockers worked on anything other than same period caddy v8's.Cadillacinmarcus(now goes by maxwedgeheminut)wrote a pretty good post on early caddys and using stude rockers.Even on the caddy it requires custom length pushrods and dimpled valvecovers.You'll find it in the tech archives and might be of some help.Good luck.

 

Are you dead set on running a solid cam? I see more speed parts for the Olds. If someone makes one and it's billet so what.

 

I can't see the pics so I can't comment on that part of it, but to my knowlege the Stude rockers were a direct swap for caddy motors. I never heards of it as being a swap for the olds which is a different creature completely.
The cad and the stude (of the era) were designed by the same folks and share a lot of common parts.
My 394 has adjustable arms BTW. I wish I knew enough about them to tell you what to look for.
Let me ask you this do you just have a bad valve train angle can it be overcome by changing pushrod length? Have you considered adjustable pushrods instead?

 

Looks like you may need to open up the Pushrod hole, stick a couple in & see what happens when ya roll it over.

Did you ever callFrank in Phoenix about the Isky Olds Rockers i found ?

 

The billet adjustable rockers look very nice but are big bucks.
What year heads/rocker stands are you using? I wonder if you have stands for 1.8:1 rockers with 1.5:1 rocker arms. Look at where the rocker is contacting the valve stem.

 

Wow -- like Lugnutz9032, I had no idea you could use Stude rockers in an Olds. I know that when you use Chevy valves in a Stude engine you have to shorten the pushrods...

 

I can't really tell from your pics, but it looks like you are using 1.8 ratio Olds rocker shaft stands??

If they are, those stands move the location of the rocker shaft as well as moving the rockers.

If they are 1.8 stands, a 1.5 stand set would move the shaft and rockers more towards the valve centers...and that may be what you need.

How to tell what stands you have? Pull one of the BIG diameter stand bolts out, then look into the hole in the stand. If the bored hole actually cuts into the horizontal bore for the rocker shaft, then you have 1.8 stands that were stock on the later 303 and all 324 up.

A 1.5 stand set was used on the earliest 303; 1949 to about 1952, I believe.

A 1.5 stand can be ID'ed also by the fact that the rocker shaft bore in each stand is pretty much centered between the big bolt and smaller bolt. A 1.8 rocker shaft is almost touching the big bolt bore hole.

Hope this helps.

 

hey DE SOTO, yea i called him, unfortunately they were already gone, at a hundred bucks those wont stick around haha.

and i know my stands are 1.8's because no mater what they would have to be, the block is a 53 and came with 53 heads and the heads on it now are 324 so they would have 1.8's as well.

and yes, its sad that there are new adjustables being made but they are just as unattainable as the originals, and in my honest opinion, dont have the same wow factor or look as neat. so adjustable rods are looking like the cure with the stock arms.

 

While we tried to make the outside of our heads as period as possible, I didnt realize that looks under a valve cover was as important as being durable and of proper ratio.That is something Ill never understand.
The Stude rockers have the wrong adjuster angle for and Olds,And Im not a fan of adjustable pushrods sooner than later youll have problem with those
Id put a hyd cam in first if that was my only option
Though I dont think your commets are bad, or where directed at me.
I did take it a little personal because of all the sweat and blood that has gone into building new parts for vintage engines.
Sorry to butt in here,Its already been a long Monday....

Tony

 

i know tony, and they werent directed to you at all!!! youre parts are bad fuckin ass man, and i think its awesome there is stuff for early olds motors being made again. but theres a lil something inside me that just badly wants to do this motor the way it would have been using the parts it would have in the late 50's early 60's. if i could afford your rockers i probably would go that route, especially if adjustable rods will be a hassle. anyone use adjustable push rods and have testimonials??

 

My point is you could get a cam that uses stock internals and changes your power range for a lot less than tying to make parts that don't work or until you can buy the right parts.

 

well if i just lay back and let my motor dictate what i use, then it just aint hot rodding.

 

No but buying stuff so that you can spout off ain't either. I'm saying wait till the right stuffs comes about. You didn't buy a SBC 6x2 for your olds to have a 6x2.

 

ok well i did read and have been told in several instances that the stude arms WILL work, so its not like i just went out and bought shit just to have it. i got it so i could move away from the stock cam, everything i have read from don_wow and the like have stated that if you change from the stock cam you have to make the valve train adjustable. that being said, in the various olds tech articles i have read on here there was mention of using the stude arms because adjustables like the Gotha, Isky, Engle, etc. are priced so out of reach for kids like me. so im not just buying parts to spout off.

i posted this thread because i have an issue and hoped someone out there might have a remedy or a better idea.

 

why dont you use the caddy adj arms ?

 

Don't worry, I also bought some stude rockers for exactly the same reason, and the reason I opened this thread up. I for one am glad you posted as it looks like I would have been stuck in the same position. I can't remember where, but I too had read that they would interchange. will have to do some research into it I guess.

 

not sure, never heard of that being done. for one, stude adjustables are the most common to swap onto earlier 331 and 365 caddy's. That being said if the geometry is right for the cad but not the olds, reason stands to say that the caddy adjustables would still not be geometrically correct for the olds.

flatoz, im glad i helped someone else atleast, sure wish Heathen would chime in and let us know if he hit the same problem or if he made it work somehow.

 

Cadillac never made adj rockers from the factory they ran a Hyd cam not a solid.

 

thats what i thought too, same as olds. no one else has any thoughts, no one tried this before and made it work???

 

Having two Studebakers, I can tell you those rocker arms work great on a Stude engine...

 

ha...ha....haaaaa.... lol.

really though.. anyone?

 

A lesson I learned from an oldtimer get the car built and RUNNING then start worring about making it faster. From the looks that motor is not in a car and you don't even have all the carbs for the 6x2. As for a the rockers put them on the shelf for now. Get your car on the road

 

Not an expert but I read that you need a Cad shafts to run Stud arms on an Olds. Not sure why that would move anything around the way you need it moved though. Might need a specific Olds stand or the Cad stands and shaft?

 

Hopefully the attachments worked. If so, these are pic's of the Gotha
rockers I'm building up for my '56 324 Olds.
They are still out there. Don't give up the search!
I understand needing to build them the way we did back in the day.
Some don't.

 

yea, i'm not sure why but i just have to use the old parts, i think the motor is just been something of an obsession for me. especially because the car its going in has been a part of my life since i was born and this is my shot to really make it something and i want to do it right and the way i feel it should be done.

i just missed out on a set of isky adjustables, in anyevent, you get tired of those gotha's let me know!

 

Try running ball type adjusters (216, 235 Chev '6') into cupped pushrods from the top down. Also, Google Crower Cams and study their tech article on checking for correct rocker pad-to-valve stem tip relationship.
You'll have to fab your own cupped pushrods - kits available from most cam companies.

 

A number of ya'll have mentioned adjustable pushrods and I can't see any sense in using them either.I can't remember the name of the company but I've run across at least one who advertises in Drag Racer (Drag Racing?) magazine that makes custom length pushrods.There must be others as well.Just order an adjustable length "checking" pushrod from Summit or other to determine the correct length needed.I advise setting the rocker lash screw about half way thru its travel to give your self a little room for error.

 

Smith Brothers makes custom pushrods.

 

ok the point of having adjustability is to set cam lash, at least i swear thats what i read in an early 60's popular hot rodding issue i have on cam kits, because the Olds and Caddy engines came from the factrory with a hydrolic cam set with 0 lash, and i believe i was told this on several occasions by others. i have always been told that if you diverge from the stock cam you HAVE to gain adjustability in you valve train somewhere, thats either adjustable arms or rods. i have doen ALOT of reaserch on early olds', and got good sound advice from guys that live on building early olds motors and have been doing it since the hay-day. now, what exactly are the supposed down-sides to adjustable rods?? i know smith-bros makes them, they are out of Bend here in Oregon, and i know Isky makes them for early olds' that retain the stock rocker arms. whats wrong with using them?