I gotta go with Nordie on this. Yeah, roller cams are all the shizzle, I'm an old schooler and am running a solid lifter flat tappet Comp Cam in the Moo. Prolly will stick with that combination on future builds as it works well!
Key is in break in, true, but so is the rest of the engine. My personal viewpoint is everyone skimps on the oil, which is
No, You cannot build a performance engine, particularly the way we beat and thrash them in a boat screaming pretty regularly at 5000 + rpm and use off the shelf stuff from Circle K! Use common sense.
I get a lil ribbing about using the Joe Gibbs stuff at a buck and a quarter a case, but you know what? I've got probably 20 or 30 times that , or more, in these engines. Flat tappets need zinc and quite a bit of other stuff missing from most off the shelf stuff. After a few emails and phone calls around, Lake Speed, yeah, that's his REAL name, at Joe Gibbs convinced me to try it. He was right, even though he has never even been on a jet boat in his life. Only problem I have is a poorly installed oil pan (My own fault,
will be fixed this winter), that leaks a lot of the expensive stuff (About a half a quart a trip on long weekends like Big River).
I guess to make a long story short, which is too late, don't be afraid of flat tappet cams. They are just fine for what we do with proper maintenance.
Ray
