James & Son
Veteran Member
3 years ago I bought the cheapest Febi cam I could find on the internet. It was going to be my 3rd cam.
The first Oem cam was replaced under warranty and had a dubious history of oil changes although 5w-40 505.01 was used.
The second Oem cam was showing wear on both #1 and #2 exhaust follower at 21000 miles and I kept that cam going to 87000 miles by replacing followers on #1 and #2 exhaust 3 times and 3 and 4 exhaust twice. The key was to replace the followers before the black coating wore thru on the follower or the cam lobe would gall and tear metal from the exposed follower metal.
From my experiance with the followers and other members observations in the cam debate years mostly between 2009 and 2015, I decided that if the black coating was key to getting the cam to 100,000 miles and if it was worn through to quickly it would create a surface that the cam lobe oil film would not form on( fracturing from lobe contact stress). This is where the theory of the wear dot as developed by eddif comes in.
I decided it was absolutely critical to get the cam to pass through this center black wear thru unscathed and the new steel wear surface exposed would now work with any oil since it would be steel follower on steel lobe which all oils are designed for.
Here is my #1 exh. lobe at 45000 miles. I took 4 pictures, 2 with flash 2 without and slightly different angles to show the oval contact. It is very hard to get a quality picture of the lobe due to glare.
https://imgur.com/a/WS9hX44
I really don't know how to use imgur. This link is of a post i started accidently i guess. Anyways I hope you can see the pictures
The first Oem cam was replaced under warranty and had a dubious history of oil changes although 5w-40 505.01 was used.
The second Oem cam was showing wear on both #1 and #2 exhaust follower at 21000 miles and I kept that cam going to 87000 miles by replacing followers on #1 and #2 exhaust 3 times and 3 and 4 exhaust twice. The key was to replace the followers before the black coating wore thru on the follower or the cam lobe would gall and tear metal from the exposed follower metal.
From my experiance with the followers and other members observations in the cam debate years mostly between 2009 and 2015, I decided that if the black coating was key to getting the cam to 100,000 miles and if it was worn through to quickly it would create a surface that the cam lobe oil film would not form on( fracturing from lobe contact stress). This is where the theory of the wear dot as developed by eddif comes in.
I decided it was absolutely critical to get the cam to pass through this center black wear thru unscathed and the new steel wear surface exposed would now work with any oil since it would be steel follower on steel lobe which all oils are designed for.
Here is my #1 exh. lobe at 45000 miles. I took 4 pictures, 2 with flash 2 without and slightly different angles to show the oval contact. It is very hard to get a quality picture of the lobe due to glare.
https://imgur.com/a/WS9hX44
I really don't know how to use imgur. This link is of a post i started accidently i guess. Anyways I hope you can see the pictures
Last edited: