Is the middle lifter in the pic below collapsed?

What can I do to fix the existing lifter?

There are three cylinders in each lifter, in the lifter that looks different the center cylinder is at what looks like the bottom and the center cylinder rises and falls with gravity.

Thanks

Broken spring (like brad said) galled ,dirt ?? Take the snap ring off and carefully rap it on a hardwood block ,see whats insideTom

Lifters are cheap, buy a whole new set.

Yeah , make sure they are solid lifters too so that dont happen again. 

-beerjet-

My plan is to buy a new lifter and swap the guts so that the wear pattern isn't changed.

Opinion's?

It's an Olds 455. Almost everything in the engine looks like it's got less than ? say 20 hours. The cam's lobes are mostly all black, there is no discoloration on the bottoms of the pistons or on the rods and crank. The combustion chambers are black but there are no built up deposits. The intake looked brand new in it's runners. The cylinders show a fresh honing. The piston tops are mostly a dark brown looking color.

Found one collapsed lifter and the bearings were trashed.  ?  Ran out of oil at high RPM's due to the Olds not allowing the oil to return to the pan quick enough is my guess but I have no idea what I'm doing in the first place soooo... BTW, I bought the engine as it is and I don't know it's history.

Is it a mild cam? I would just buy a new set for $30 and use all new, unless like SpeedyMopar said the spring pressure might be too high?

Would be niced to check your installed height and find your seat pressure from that one lifter, might be too stiff possibly

I don't know anything about the cam (mild, 3/4 race, etc...). Anyone know how lifters are adjusted on an Olds, it's got this funny aluminum pivot thing joining every 2 rocker arms together.

It's an Olds 455. Almost everything in the engine looks like it's got less than ? say 20 hours. The cam's lobes are mostly all black, there is no discoloration on the bottoms of the pistons or on the rods and crank. The combustion chambers are black but there are no built up deposits. The intake looked brand new in it's runners. The cylinders show a fresh honing. The piston tops are mostly a dark brown looking color.

Found one collapsed lifter and the bearings were trashed.  ?  Ran out of oil at high RPM's due to the Olds not allowing the oil to return to the pan quick enough is my guess but I have no idea what I'm doing in the first place soooo... BTW, I bought the engine as it is and I don't know it's history.

I don't know anything about the cam (mild, 3/4 race, etc...). Anyone know how lifters are adjusted on an Olds, it's got this funny aluminum pivot thing joining every 2 rocker arms together.

If it ran out of oil at high RPM's and wiped out one lifter - do you think that that one lifter was the only one that ran out of oil? Replace them all....my $.02

Does the scenerio I described cause this type of damage to a hyd. lifter?

Lack of oil could collapse a lifter I suppose, to be honest not sure though, but they do need oil to stay pumped up

i dissagree, when they are new they are not collapsed

that is correct right, thanks. What do you think Ralph? Would a lifter starving for oil make it collapse?

Anyone know how lifters are adjusted on an Olds, it's got this funny aluminum pivot thing joining every 2 rocker arms together.

HotRod,
From what I was told, you torque the rockers down to factory specs and you are done 

25 ft lbs
KonaCole is correct; no adjusting valves on 455; I torqued each gradually, switching from 1 to the other, until reach 25.

The lifter just had some gunk in it , we took it apart sprayed it with some carb cleaner and put it back togeather. Now it works fine and the spring was fine also.