New (2020) Andover One-Piece Followers

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robs ss

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I have started this thread in order to not derail other (eg RGM Follower) threads.
I realise they are prohibitively expensive ($900 a set here in Oz + shipping) but am interested in how good they actually are.

I'm aware that Jim (Comnoz) did a lot of testing and believe there were some disconcerting results. How has this influenced the product that is on sale?

The "blurb" on the Andover site doesn't give much information on actual testing of the final result - or on what cams.

Anyone know anything?

Cheers
Rob
 
Well - it appears everyone knows everything they want to know about Andover followers or don’t want to know.
 
Well - it appears everyone knows everything they want to know about Andover followers or don’t want to know.

Or more likely that nobody knows anything about them. It's highly unlikely that anyone has done any mileage on them yet, or maybe even fitted any, as they are only recently for sale.
 
There will never be $900 followers for me. (Plus tax on top in the EU ?)

Has Andover Norton done extended on road testing, I think not.... The only time warp I want is the one back to get sets at £40 a pop.
 
There will never be $900 followers for me. (Plus tax on top in the EU ?)

Has Andover Norton done extended on road testing, I think not.... The only time warp I want is the one back to get sets at £40 a pop.
I think you'll find the are £225 per pair. (+ VAT where applicable).

Cheers,

cliffa.
 
If they are verifiably made by a well-known cam/lifter maker that has a good (and long) reputation and comes with their logo/instructions, I would consider them if I was in the market for lifters. If they are "in house," no way.
 
They are not made in house, they are made start to finish by one of the worlds leading hard facing company's. A small rework was done on the tappets post Jim C testing to ensure that the face was totally flat.

If they were two piece as original then they would be nearly £1000.00 an engine set. Grinders refuse to grind two different joined metals and some could not grind the radius either.

You would not be getting these at £40.00, just the base metal in them is worth that alone.
 
As no one else has stepped up with a viable alternative to this age old problem ?

Well done AN for investing hard cash time and resources to bring it to fruition

OE followers were problematic from day 1 and without making radical modifications to original design using bronze inserts BSA followers etc
no one has managed to find a viable solution in 50 years , if the new materials prove as or more durable than original design we cannot complain
 
They are not made in house, they are made start to finish by one of the worlds leading hard facing company's. A small rework was done on the tappets post Jim C testing to ensure that the face was totally flat.

I think the new follower pricing is reasonable (£450 a set + VAT). What is the requirements for the corresponding camshaft (06.1084) and will there be a new camshaft made to match these followers?

-Knut
 
As no one else has stepped up with a viable alternative to this age old problem ?

Well done AN for investing hard cash time and resources to bring it to fruition

OE followers were problematic from day 1 and without making radical modifications to original design using bronze inserts BSA followers etc
no one has managed to find a viable solution in 50 years , if the new materials prove as or more durable than original design we cannot complain

Who is complaining.
The new followers showed distress in testing (iirc) and it seems have not been retested in any form since based on the Madnorton post so the durability is unknown but the consequences of what happens if not (durable) is well known.
They are a part that needs through testing before marketing and I see no reply to confirm that in the AN reply.
Do I appreciate the work done and money invested, absolutely but look at the drama the last time a AN follower was suggested as the catalyst in an engine failure (cam/follower)

Considering the old factory made 200000 + followers back in the day they are not that bad.
 
You would not be getting these at £40.00, just the base metal in them is worth that alone.

That post was referring to Baz's reply and back in the day (1970's, spigot follower onward)
£40.00 or £1000.00 each matters little without faith in them from the people who buy them.
That was all my point was.
What testing has been done since to guarantee they will not wear on the face or destroy an existing camshaft ?
Is it wrong to ask these sort of things ?
 
Yes, you are right to question this, and I will be using them so I can put a few thousand miles on them prior to the open day.

2000000 tappets were made in the day, was there anything wrong with them - no. But why did the cams fail, it could be considered that there was nothing wrong with them either. Nice hard cams and nice hard followers - with this combination make it your number one priority to ensure that the tappet stays in contact with the cam, if you don't no matter what you use will fail.

We could have just gone for material that was hard enough and said the hardness was there so they have to be good and sold them, basically that is what Norton did in the 70's. Once you introduce Stellite type or other hard facing material the connection between wear and hardness is right out of the window.
 
As no one else has stepped up with a viable alternative to this age old problem ?

Well done AN for investing hard cash time and resources to bring it to fruition

OE followers were problematic from day 1 and without making radical modifications to original design using bronze inserts BSA followers etc
no one has managed to find a viable solution in 50 years , if the new materials prove as or more durable than original design we cannot complain

Improving the stock Norton lifter hasn't worked out well because it has a weird half moon shape that is difficult/expensive to machine. The bulky design gives you a heavy lifter that contributes to valve bounce and wear/stress on the cam.
 
Improving the stock Norton lifter hasn't worked out well because it has a weird half moon shape that is difficult/expensive to machine. The bulky design gives you a heavy lifter that contributes to valve bounce and wear/stress on the cam.
I agree with you. Just imagine the extra weight of the one piece design, and you'll get extra wear on both cam and followers. No surprise there. The only reason AN goes this way, is to save money...Each grinder pass costs $$$. No extensive tests known so far...Norton owners are the guinea pigs. Bad movie scenario already seen?
 
Some need to catch up with the latest spintron information coming out of the US regarding where weight is a problem and on what side of the system. Spring rates are a killer, but the control of the tappet leaving the cam is paramount. So where do you trade off. Ideally you would spin the cam that experiences no spring force, and the tappets remained in contact with the cam but that condition does not exist for the Norton, overcoming springs uses power. If you use high spring rates and still loose control the impact is worse. You will get to a point where any increase in spring rate would be lost in the power needed to spin the cam. How the weight relates to and the effect it has as spring rate increases may also come into play. Would a lighter tappet that has lost contact with cam hit the cam harder with a higher spring rate than a heavier tappet.

Sergio, you need to look at the near net finish that you can now get with investment casting, grinding passes are not an issue these days. We could have renewed tooling with similar tip and body and joined them, in this day and age one piece makes sense. Grinders do not like grinding joined metals, extra cost brazing them together. And even with both bits investment cast you could be looking at errors of up to 0.016'' and thus more expensive grind passes to get the dissimilar joint flush with each piece.
It was no Joe Bloogs cast shop that made these and the EU company with a US parent used all the metallurgist experience it had to make these from start to finish.
As above, the original design was not ideal, but at the time they were going in a 500 twin of limited power, if it was suggested in 1948 that the same could be used in an 850 + engine then I suspect they would have said a new way would be needed.
 
Mad Norton - I've heard the talk about the lifter leaving the cam and causing the most damage when descending and impacting. I re-checked dozens of stock cams and most of the wear was on the nose. Valve bounce occurs AFTER the lobe descends but you don't see any wear on the cam where that would happen. Someone said that the groove you see on Norton lifters is because of the lifter impact after it leaves the cam and comes back down. But if you build a jig and study the contact patch through the cam rotation you'll see that the groove in the lifter is caused at peak lift by the nose of the cam because the cam is contacting different areas of the lifter than the center when the cam is not at peak lift (see this in video below). I smelled misinformation so I put together my own spintron. I ran it at low and medium RPM so there would absolutely be no separation of lifter from cam. Sure enough - the groove formed in the center of the lifter when the cam was at peak lift and most of the wear was on the nose of the cam - the same as you see on typical used Norton cams.

See the spintron video at this new thread:

https://www.accessnorton.com/NortonCommando/spintron-demo-showing-norton-cam-lifter-wear.29763/
 
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Yes, you are right to question this, and I will be using them so I can put a few thousand miles on them prior to the open day.
Madnorton
What do these followers weigh, in comparison to the stock followers?
Cheers
Rob
 
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