hrpfg2

So yesterday I took the valve cover to do a valve adjustment and discovered wear marks on cam lobe.
are wears like that normal?


below is a picture I took.

zeroptzero

some discoloration might be normal, but I am pretty sure I see at least one circular scuff mark on one of the low lift cam lobes that is typical of a broken retainer, you may have others but it is hard to tell from the picture.

starchland

hard to see from the pic, is the middle of the lobe wearing while you still see the machining marks on the outsides?

hrpfg2

by circular scuff mark, do you mean the wear mark goes around the whole lobe? and which one lobe are you referring to?

well, all the wear mark/discolor are all towards the center of lobe.

zeroptzero

by circular scuff mark, do you mean the wear mark goes around the whole lobe? and which one lobe are you referring to?

yes, to me it looks like you are getting metal to metal wear on the low lift lobe in what appears to be the exhaust side of cylinder two (if I'm seeing the picture correctly). Take that with a grain of salt though because the picture can be deceiving and most cracked retainers are on the intake side from what I've heard.

Try to take some more close up shots of the lobes if you can. Have you checked the valve clearances yet, were any of them overly tight ?.

hrpfg2

I actually didn't do the valve adjustment nor check for valve clearance after all, I was very bummed out after discovering these marks.

here are a couple other pictures I took.

cylinder 4 Intake side.


cylinder 2 Intake side

zeroptzero

the low lift cam lobe on cylinder 4 definitely looks like a broken retainer causing metal to metal wear. The pic of cylinder 2 looks somewhat normal but still hard to tell from the pic, the low lift cam lobe could be just starting to get wear on it, but not nearly as bad as cylinder 4. I think you need to focus on inspecting the retainers for cracking, someone like Billman250 should have a better trained eye for the wear marks, it would be good to get his opinion, take some more pics of each cylinder up close when you have time.

hrpfg2

I won't be able to do anything right now as I am away from home and wont return for 3 weeks.
Thank you for your help, I really appreciate it.

and hopefully Billman250 will see this thread and chime in.

Thanks again!

Billman250

wow.

Seems you have a serverly broken retainer on cylinder 4 AND 2.

The retainer is rubbing on the roller rocker, and the hardened metal powder is etching the camshaft.

hrpfg2

First, I want to thank you for chiming in!

My ultimate goal was to do a valve adjustment because the car was misfiring in every cylinder but then all this be came visible.

What would you suggest I do next?

and also, I am getting low compression numbers all across.
Can retainers cause low compression?