Worn PW3 cam

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I wish people would read posts a bit more carefully. I am not proceeding with the rebuild until I have a definitive answer. My cam is in transit. Again, would you rebuild an engine when there was a cloud over the components used? If you would, and risk another rebuild, then some people are more fith than I thought!
The rebuild is held up until AN come up with the goods, ergo, therefore, and amongst other things, my rebuild will be held up until I know the answer, agreed by all parties. This is really simple. Then, the Commando riders can get on with riding, and the rest can go back to their 27 page posts on what colour you should be painting your battery box.

I am extremely frustrated by this, because I am getting stuff criticising what I used, how I ride, that the colour of my bike is the cause of all this, and shit like, "do you run any oil in it?" FFS!

I just want a straight answer!

Which I am not getting. I'm told that the report is due shortly.

To each his own Ken.

And sorry I wasn’t more clear, but I would DEFINITELY proceed and build my engine without letttng the investigation of the old cam hold me up. You’ll be running a hard welded cam, a completely different animal.

IF there was anything wrong with the chilled iron cam, it’s irrelevant to your new one.

IF the isn’t, what are you gonna do then? Put the build on hold until you’ve got to the bottom of all 10 failure modes listed above, AND the interaction of possible multi faceted failures modes?

The latter is just not practical. Sometimes we just have to chalk things up to experience and move on.

Final comment from me (I won’t be posting on this thread again) is: if you don’t want people to post suggestion or ideas, don’t post topics on a public ‘discussion’ forum.
 
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Followers, other than the early one piece types, the tip has been Delcrome material, it has never been stellite. In the 80's there were followers being made others, the tip on some of these is known not to be Delcrome.

If Ken is using a stellite hard faced welded cam, and followers tipped with stellite, then there is nothing stopping him build. However, I suggest he looks up cam similar metals and takes note of the difference in hardness requirements to avoid galling and spalling. Maybe lucky, not all variants of Stellite has the same hardness, if you end up with a close match, it will be Deja Vu.
 
I mentioned this on the Facebook group discussion.

...what we need is some engineering genius like @comnoz and @jseng1 to come up with a drop in kit consisting of roller followers in a well oiled bronze block that is a drop in replacement for the standard followers, allowing us to use the standard camshafts that we all already have in our bikes.

These should be sold exclusively through @cNw and tested by the likes of @Brooking 850 @acotrel @Holmeslice and @yves norton seeley with their highly strung, highly stressed, race tuned beasties!

Everyone here and on the Facebook group would fit them in a heartbeat if it was a barrel off job only and you didn't need to split the cases and swap out the cam.

Worn PW3 cam

I know that Jim Schmidt is more than halfway there with his superb radiused lifter kit, but that requires a specialist cam, so limits the market opportunity and the amount of work that the everyday rider is prepared to do over a couple of weekends.
 
Grant, apart from the constraints of using roller lifters, I doubt that roller lifters would be suitable for the Norton cam
profile, in all its guises. I'll just stick with Megacycle cams
 
Roller lifters, I suspect the those mentioned have looked at it and moved on, you introduce a whole load of changes, including the roller pin which is a known issue in some rollers, then you need to ensure constant contact, and roll effect - if not you have radiused follower. They are also heavy, I have some 961 followers and they are nearly twice the weight of the standard follower.
 
...............

And sorry I wasn’t more clear, but I would DEFINITELY proceed and build my engine without letttng the investigation of the old cam hold me up. You’ll be running a hard welded cam, a completely different animal.

IF there was anything wrong with the chilled iron cam, it’s irrelevant to your new one.......

Eddie, Ken, I may be wrong here, but there are two components involved here, the cam, which is what we major on....and the followers....

I have interpreted Ken as saying he wants to cover the possibility of an issue with followers as much as the cam.

Having also lost a PW3 cam I do understand that. But I also understand that today we have more choice on cam than we do followers, with the exception of radiusing and additional coating.

I went ahead with my rebuild because I am a racer, two more race meetings and my limited race season will be over. After that, and hopefully no sooner, I will take a look at the cam and followers. It is cyclic, and short cycles. Sitting out race seasons at my age is not a sensible option, of course if I didn't choose wisely this may come at a cost. I chose a hard welded cam and radiused followers, for a number of reasons.

Ken is clearly planning that once his motor is closed up, it will be some years before it is opened again.
 
I mentioned this on the Facebook group discussion.

...what we need is some engineering genius like @comnoz and @jseng1 to come up with a drop in kit consisting of roller followers in a well oiled bronze block that is a drop in replacement for the standard followers, allowing us to use the standard camshafts that we all already have in our bikes.

These should be sold exclusively through @cNw and tested by the likes of @Brooking 850 @acotrel @Holmeslice and @yves norton seeley with their highly strung, highly stressed, race tuned beasties!

Everyone here and on the Facebook group would fit them in a heartbeat if it was a barrel off job only and you didn't need to split the cases and swap out the cam.

View attachment 5475

I know that Jim Schmidt is more than halfway there with his superb radiused lifter kit, but that requires a specialist cam, so limits the market opportunity and the amount of work that the everyday rider is prepared to do over a couple of weekends.

No, we don't.
 
Eddie, Ken, I may be wrong here, but there are two components involved here, the cam, which is what we major on....and the followers....

I have interpreted Ken as saying he wants to cover the possibility of an issue with followers as much as the cam.

Having also lost a PW3 cam I do understand that. But I also understand that today we have more choice on cam than we do followers, with the exception of radiusing and additional coating.

I went ahead with my rebuild because I am a racer, two more race meetings and my limited race season will be over. After that, and hopefully no sooner, I will take a look at the cam and followers. It is cyclic, and short cycles. Sitting out race seasons at my age is not a sensible option, of course if I didn't choose wisely this may come at a cost. I chose a hard welded cam and radiused followers, for a number of reasons.

Ken is clearly planning that once his motor is closed up, it will be some years before it is opened again.

Correct, Steve.
 
Ken, please do not get offensive. As I said (as clearly as I could) my choice for preferring hard weld cams is just that, my choice. And I also said ‘each to his own’.

So I have never ‘rattled on about the superiority of hard weld cams’.

My only point about hard weld cams Ken, is that you have already chosen one, so it would seem to make things a lot easier for you to commence with the bottom end build as soon as your new cam arrives. But again, that is only my personal opinion.

It’s a fair point you raise about testing the followers and perhaps looking for alternatives. The trouble is, I’m not aware that we have that many alternatives (JS BSA being the only real alternative that I know of).

I feel for your frustration Ken. But I’m not ‘taking my plastic football home’ at all. I Simply wish to avoid getting into a slanging match with you that adds zero value to either of us. You have taken some people’s input negatively Ken when (most of the time at least) that is in no way intended. I’ve offered my own (basically unqualified) advice and opinions, and it’s entirely your choice about what you choose to do with all such advice. I have nothing else to add.

I really do not think anyone is, or has, called you a ‘dumb fcuk’ BTW. It’s just people offering their own advice and opinions. And, again, what you do with that is, of course, entirely your prerogative.

I am therefore not going to respond to any of your unfounded derogatory comments against me, and I genuinely hope this situation works out well in the end Ken, and that you keep us all posted so that we can all, hopefully, learn something in the process.

I doubt we’ll all agree, but we may at least learn !

EDIT: just for the record, and for folk reading this for the first time and find it strange, it appears that the post I was responding to here has been deleted.
 
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Some of you will have noticed we (Andover Norton/AN) don’t currently supply camshafts. Following two incidents in Australia with worn camshafts we have decided to put all our camshafts in quarantine until we have established if there is a problem and if so what exactly the problem is.

One cam was damaged due to lack of lubrication. It is reasonable to assume any camshaft, no matter how well made and irrespective of material, had given up under identical conditions.

Fullauto's cam has been tested and found not be in spec with our suppliers specification. A new random sample off the shelf at AN was found to be in spec. The suppliers will be now be asked to comment on the test report findings. Just because the material is out spec, does not at this stage suggest that the material is not fit for purpose. Further testing and investigation in to the material used and the suppliers specification are ongoing. We have only tested 2 cams from the past 3 years, we have cams known to be from very early days, one from 1999 / 2000. Depending on the suppliers comments these may need to be tested in the future.

Until we are satisfied all our stock is up to our standard we have stopped selling new camshafts.

Joe/Andover Norton
 
You are focusing on the camshaft, which our independent metallurgist gave a clean bill of health to. Give the followers to a metallurgist as well and he can determine if they are compatible. Otherwise you are wasting everybody's time. I would suggest to you that sometime in the last few years, the material bonded to the followers has changed. With or without your knowledge.
 
Read the report, it says the tips are not stellite - correct they never have been. Delcrome C has been the specification at the 22% Cr level found as per your metallurgists report. I have since found drawings back to the 60's stipulating Delcrome to be used.
Two reports, the report from Australia and the report in the UK have both found that the chemical composition of your cam was not iaw with the suppliers specification. The metallurgist made this recommendation based on the Cr & Mo level, typical for a chill cast cam he claims, but does not give a typical specification - though he did not have the suppliers specification it is still a brave call. Metallurgists usually see failed items, so if he basing his comment on his experience it will indicate that is is common for failed chill cast cams, therefore not suitable.
Had the Australian metallurgist concentrated on the cam he would have seen a consistent issue with it, that, as Joe points out, needs further investigation and testing.
Rest assured, myself and Joe are not wasting anyone's time, as above, a lot of stock has been quarantined and thus a hindrance to many frustrated customers, including myself who needs a cam to get to Austria. It has been hard work to get this far, and it is still not over, so my digging will carry on. Joe employed me 3 years ago and part of my job is issues like this, as Joe knows if it is not right or I smell a rat I will tell him, it is not nice for me to do it, but he has to hear it. When I started here some suppliers tried to pull the wool over my eyes, big mistake, as a qualified engineer and an ex Warrant Officer First Class I had 31 years of that crap. If I am not happy I will test, confront and accuse, so far it has paid dividends on several occasions.
 
The Commando is still full of surprises. PW3 chilled cast has been the camshaft of choice for many years and now there are issues. Reminds me of the very beginning . Having won Machine of the Year award for more years than one could remember and having just finished running in mine , I was horrified to read in the fledgling Bike maagazine an article by Mark Williams called Rollover Andover. Catchy title from a former Music journo but the contents were deeply disturbing .. main bearing failure at around 3000 miles..

In fact it was probably the first piece of honest bike journalism in the UK.. The Press stayed stum about these and other issues... Apparently many a dealer burnt midnight oil replacing failed bearings
Well the shit certainly hit the fan over that , NVT fell out with Bike magazine big time and indeed when I went to a show and strolled up to the NVT stand they were very hostile . I think they thought
I might be he. Much muttering about the ' unions ' and 'immigration' that had some how brought the Commando and the industry toits knees. No Mike Jackson was not one of the personal but I did wonder how with such an attitude they expected to sell bikes. The bunker is never a good place to be

So fast forward to present debate. Full marks to Full Auto for making this public and indeed to AN
for their eventual acknowledgment of the issue. Its been a fascinating thread and I would like to thank everone who has contributed..

The saddest read for me is that of Irckens post on Axtell. He was let down by a supplier changing the material spec and is left carrying the can and seriously out of pocket and with damage to reputation.

And this is one suspects going to be a serious problem for the future . Its difficult to get smallish batches of stuff made and to do quality checks on everything all the time is obviously a non starter

I am guessing its possibly an issue with followers and incidently have been told from a very good source they are often not refaced properly .
 
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Read the report, it says the tips are not stellite - correct they never have been. Delcrome C has been the specification at the 22% Cr level found as per your metallurgists report. I have since found drawings back to the 60's stipulating Delcrome to be used.
Two reports, the report from Australia and the report in the UK have both found that the chemical composition of your cam was not iaw with the suppliers specification. The metallurgist made this recommendation based on the Cr & Mo level, typical for a chill cast cam he claims, but does not give a typical specification - though he did not have the suppliers specification it is still a brave call. Metallurgists usually see failed items, so if he basing his comment on his experience it will indicate that is is common for failed chill cast cams, therefore not suitable.
Had the Australian metallurgist concentrated on the cam he would have seen a consistent issue with it, that, as Joe points out, needs further investigation and testing.
Rest assured, myself and Joe are not wasting anyone's time, as above, a lot of stock has been quarantined and thus a hindrance to many frustrated customers, including myself who needs a cam to get to Austria. It has been hard work to get this far, and it is still not over, so my digging will carry on. Joe employed me 3 years ago and part of my job is issues like this, as Joe knows if it is not right or I smell a rat I will tell him, it is not nice for me to do it, but he has to hear it. When I started here some suppliers tried to pull the wool over my eyes, big mistake, as a qualified engineer and an ex Warrant Officer First Class I had 31 years of that crap. If I am not happy I will test, confront and accuse, so far it has paid dividends on several occasions.

Well, I have read the report. Well, the only one available to me. That is, the report by the local to us metallurgist, which, contrary to what you say, does NOT, indeed, say that the camshaft is out of spec, because he does not have access to the manufacturers specifications, but falls within the spec for chilled iron cams, which he has seen quite a few of over his working life. So your reading of this is incorrect. Not only that, but you are quoting from the report that AN commissioned, and despite asking for the test to be made available, Ben has NOT received a copy so he can compare. Neither has anybody else. When is this report forthcoming?

Next, in an e-mail to me, you stated that stellite, as such, did not exist. You said that it was the name of the manufacturer, and when I queried you on this, you denied having said it. Your next statement was that stellite on the followers was "overkill". In a following statement, you said that stellite 6 was unsuitable for the application!! Three widely varying statements that I can prove by presenting e-mails received from you. So, three different answers. Which one is it?

In an earlier post, Worntorn was saying that the answer lay in an early book published by Phil Irving, another Australian genius, who stated that STELLITE 6 was the one to use. So, pray tell, the difference between applications in Vincents and Norton Commandos is.....? You are more qualified than Phil Irving?

I have asked you the question three times and you have failed to answer or even refer to the question and steadfastly refuse to test my followers. The question is, "when did the composition of the material brazed to the lifters change"? The reason given for not testing MY followers was that you'd tested followers twice in the 90's and once this year so mine don't need testing. Are you serious?

Then, unbelievably, you say that one of the followers had a fault, AND SHOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN FITTED! Well Ashley, who supplied it and where is your quality control? Having said that, Ben, who rebuilt the Norton, said he has seen this many times, and has never seen a follower fail where the material looks like it hasn't bonded. Never. Besides, if this was a genuine fault, surely it would have manifested itself in 26,000 miles. But, it didn't.

You talked about "having the wool pulled over your eyes" and you will "test, confront, and accuse". Not very nice words to be used regarding customers.

Now, let's look at qualifications. My qualifications? None. Just living and breathing Nortons over many years and a lot of miles. The man who was picked out of a local business directory to test my cam and followers? 6o years old and an investigative metallurgist all of his working life. He was an expert witness in a court battle over camshafts and their failure, which he won, against a fairly well known Italian local Ducati person.

Ok. And your qualifications? Being an ex-military man myself, only doing 9 years in the service of my country, your statement that you were an engineer with 31 years of military service behind you, reaching the rank of Warrant Officer Class 1, an excellent achievement I might add, and knowing how closely our armies do things, I thought it odd that, if you were a fully qualified Mechanical Engineer, with a degree, then you would be, at the very least, a Lieutenant. Anybody who enters the armed forces of Australia with a degree, goes in at this rank or above. So, looking into your qualifications further, it seems you do not have a degree, but the equivalent of a Diploma or Certificate in Engineering. Is this how it works in the UK? A person with that level of qualification, in Australia, would be called a "technician". Nothing more. They would certainly be stretching the bounds of truth calling themselves an engineer.

Therefore, you have rejected the findings of a man, fully qualified in his profession, when you are lesser qualified, in a different profession! Really?

All that I say here, I can back up with e-mails, to and from.
 
Oldmikew, thanks, this is consistent with what I have found, long term suppliers may have started making items one way but as prices, lack of skills, materails etc the production changes without letting their customers know. It would not be problem if the customer is told, sometimes it can be an improvement.
As you can imagine, I will not release all findings in their entirety - that will enable competition to catch up rapidly, possibly affect UK jobs, and allow the market to be flooded with cheap junk (just like Triumph parts these days) likewise we don't publish the full results of the testing I have done on competitors products - they need to find out themselves.
The findings you mention from the bad old days are no surprise, the MK3 (the tipex bike) is a typical example, it could have been so much better, the electric start for instance, ignition system etc. Even Ciba managed to get a spark arriving at the correct time with the engine turning the correct direction many years before. They might have had competent engineers then, but what I see suggests that they were either in the pub all day or playing golf.
I ride what I get made, and if for one moment I thought it could let go at a critical time on the congested roads in the south of England, then I would not fit it. I have had some wins, Omega forged 850 std piston with rings, pin and clips is lighter than the original STD AE item, sometimes I am constrained by envelope, and on occasion what we have is the best there is so we stick with it.
During my years of service I was often reminded that air engineers were superior to all others - total crap, as I use to remind them I can remember on more than one occasion in the years I served that helicopters had fallen out of the air with deadly results, but, being a weapon engineer I could not remember when a gun system, anything from side arm to medium range guns or torpedo tubes had killed their operators.
I had many many visits to the US, Canaveral, Norfolk, Kings Bay, the best was 5 weeks at Point Loma where I was based as part of the trials and assessment team that accepted Tomahawk into the UK submarine service. It was a joy to be part of a team of UK / US contractors that managed to get the system fitted, tested on time and under budget, boy, we had some laughs on the way though.
 
My mistake. And the rest?

Not for me to say really is it?

But, as you ask, I personally think it is a very valid point that the lifters should be analysed. The cam doesn’t act alone, it acts on the lifters, so the possibility of a compatibility issue should be investigated, even if only to reject the possibility.

That said, I think it important to remember that whatever the findings regarding compatibility, it’s only relevant to the materials under analysis, ie a cast iron cam and AN lifters, it won’t be relevant to your new hard welded cam at all.

Many suppliers would just ignore this issue Ken, just as they have in the past. AN seem to be taking the matter far more serious than most. We cannot expect them to share / publish all of their findings, but hopefully they will share the summary, and most importantly, actions.
 
Not for me to say really is it?

But, as you ask, I personally think it is a very valid point that the lifters should be analysed. The cam doesn’t act alone, it acts on the lifters, so the possibility of a compatibility issue should be investigated, even if only to reject the possibility.

That said, I think it important to remember that whatever the findings regarding compatibility, it’s only relevant to the materials under analysis, ie a cast iron cam and AN lifters, it won’t be relevant to your new hard welded cam at all.

Many suppliers would just ignore this issue Ken, just as they have in the past. AN seem to be taking the matter far more serious than most. We cannot expect them to share / publish all of their findings, but hopefully they will share the summary, and most importantly, actions.

Nigel, it's not about my rebuild. That will go ahead anyway with bits that I think will cure the problem. It's about making sure that people can build an engine with confidence that the parts they are using are compatible with each other. Otherwise, what's the point?
 
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