i am going to buy a 460 motor to put in a 77 f-250 4x4 i want low end torque. i was going to out in a comp cam extream 4x4 210/218 kit with the valve springs. i was thinking of puting roller rockers? what do i have it do the guide plates and rocker studs? also i plan on geting new push rods but do i really need to put hardend push rods in they are a bit high priced? and what are good roller rockers? has any one ever seen rockers made by a company made by cat? and what has to be done to the heads?

 

Need to know what heads you have? You will need hard pushrods with guide plates. Don't buy pushrods until you have everything else and a pushrod length checker to get the correct pushrods. I have no experience with Cat rockers ,but have read several times that they are junk.

 

Cat roller rockers are cheap to buy originally but you will replace them 3 or 4 times in comparrison to a better set of rockers, don't skimp on things like this it ends up more expensive in the long run. Same thing with pushrods, I have recommended switching to 3/8" hardened pushrods even on mild builds with cams barely above stock. The reason for that is with the canted valves your pushrods are actually at an angle so your putting a side load on the pushrods and you would be absolutly amazed at how much they flex. Did a little test awhile back just to see (you know the courosity saying) and with stock springs and a mild crane cam, and I mean really mild almost a stock replacement, and used a solid lifter so as to take that out of the equation, I used first a standard 5/16" pushrod, and measured the actual valve lift, then switched to a 3/8" hardened pushrod and measured actual valve lift just turning the engine over by hand, the 3/8" pushrod gained .012" of lift just from pushrod flex now you start taking that flex at higher rpms and it's going to flex the pushrod even more costing you even more lift, and actual duration the valve sees. It's my thinking that you are almost stepping up one whole cam step just by putting better pushrods in.
BTW along the same lines Lem Evans did a little test using several different brands of rockers and found some very serious variance there too, I don't remember all the ones he tried but I know the closest to cam specs ended up bieng the Crower stainless, then the FRPP blue/crane golds, and they went down hill from there. I beleive the worst one he had was the harland sharp the cam card said .813, and the HS rocker only gave I believe it was .785 were as both the crower, and FRPP rockers both ended up with better than .800 if that tells you anything about what cheap parts give you.

 

when i buy the engine ill post what kind of heads i will be using. also are roller rockers worth it on a low end torque engine?