Camshaft Followers

Our more vigorous cam profiles subject the cam follower to heavier spring loads and faster rates of valve acceleration than they were originally designed to withstand. This typically leads to two problems:

• ‘Pumping up’ – when the valve hardly makes contact with it’s seat, or may even remain partly open.
• Loss of imparted movement – the valve is not moved its desired distance due to entrapped gases being compressed, and imparting a spring like property to the follower.

We offer two solutions to these problems:

• Solid Insert – An insert for the standard follower which in effect makes it solid. Cost effective and simple to fit.
• Steel Follower – A much lighter one-piece steel cam follower made of high alloy steel, plasma nitrided and with a lapped contact face. The weight saving helps to reduce the amount of loading on the valve springs which can become important for high speed race engines.

In either of these cases the valve clearance must be set. As the simplest way to achieve this we supply ‘top hat’ shims, which sit on the valve tip. These are made of through hardened carbon steel, requiring no after treatment, and are stocked in a range of sizes.