Beehives Lost Pressure

[pamotorman]

work a paper clip back and forth and you can feel the heat in your fingers. the more oil on the spring to carry the heat away the better.

[Strange Magic]

Getting a bit "beehive weary" now and seriously thinking on switching up my parts inventory and moving towards a dual spring setup. Everything will be heavier(more mass, harder to control) but I'll just have to toss more pressure at the valvetrain and deal with the extra bit of wear to maintain some of the engines over-rev potential.

My suggestion is to take a close look at PAC high frequency dual springs.

[RW TECH]

I hope nobody here actually believes the OP is having problems because his springs are beehives.

Otherwise the 2017 Mustang GT350R with Voodoo engine couldn't have a 8250 RPM factory redline and a 5 year - 60,000 mile engine warranty. Here's one that is bone-stock with well over 6,000 racing miles on it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDDd0R0-Tfs

This one goes 8.99 ET @ >3200 lbs & runs well above 8,000 RPM with beehive springs..Sounds closer to 8700 through the traps with 8200-8500 RPM shifts but what do I know. Guy in the black jacket in the end of the video looks pretty happy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qItrfYVw-E

This supercharged deal has beehives & you can see the tach rocking right towards 9,000 RPM going trough the traps:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPMa5Y-ABaA

Here's another one that comes with a 5-year warranty & beehives:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1Zc7cpljNU

The beehive is just fine if it's not a POS and not married to a POS cam & valvetrain. Proven & validated. The stock stuff runs for 50 or more hours with the throttle completely pegged. Some of those tests run to 600 hrs with the throttle decked & engine at redline, and all built after about 2001 have beehives in them.

[ptuomov]

I hope nobody here actually believes the OP is having problems because his springs are beehives.

Otherwise the 2017 Mustang GT350R with Voodoo engine couldn't have a 8250 RPM factory redline and a 5 year - 60,000 mile engine warranty. Here's one that is bone-stock with well over 6,000 racing miles on it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDDd0R0-Tfs

This one goes 8.99 ET @ >3200 lbs & runs well above 8,000 RPM with beehive springs..Sounds closer to 8700 through the traps with 8200-8500 RPM shifts but what do I know. Guy in the black jacket in the end of the video looks pretty happy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qItrfYVw-E

This supercharged deal has beehives & you can see the tach rocking right towards 9,000 RPM going trough the traps:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPMa5Y-ABaA

Here's another one that comes with a 5-year warranty & beehives:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1Zc7cpljNU

The beehive is just fine if it's not a POS and not married to a POS cam & valvetrain. Proven & validated. The stock stuff runs for 50 or more hours with the throttle completely pegged. Some of those tests run to 600 hrs with the throttle decked & engine at redline, and all built after about 2001 have beehives in them.

I don't think anyone questions the ability of a car factory to get them to work reliably. The question is whether you can match the cams, springs, and the valvetrain to be reliable without a huge R&D budget spent mostly on computer modeling. So what do we have to do to quality control the springs and prove/validate them for a combo? Maybe that's a naive question, but if it is it's because I'm a noob.

[user-17438]

what was rubbing on the retainer? was that side loading the spring?
as far as the spring pad. take a carbide pilot and use a runout indicator.

[HDBD]

I got the PAC 1220x springs today. Big disappointment when I did a trial fit with the PAC R510 retainers and PAC L8064 10 deg locks. Installed height went from 1.9 to 1.750. A no go. Back to the AV&V retainers, perfect fit. Nice looking springs, all same height and pressures right on their spec.

[Keith Morganstein]

I work on Harley heads and have had some come back for freshening up. I use a lot of Goodson / AV&V springs and I don't want to indicate there is a chronic problem but I have been seeing a drop in pressure seat 1.880 and open @ 1.230, the cam gross lift at the valve is .650, on some with less than 10K miles of street use. Part number is HVS-6500S. I am now looking for a spring that will take the place of these and last. What may be the cause? Thoughts?

The PAC 1220X is working for me in evo heads.
http://www.racingsprings.com/Beehive-Si ... X/Item/785

The riders who like the big burnouts can really beat up the valve train

Hi Keith, more aimed towards your experience with the 1220X's but this might also be relevant to the threads title. I just got a set of 1220X's yesterday and I was shocked at the amount of distortion found in a good portion of the set. You could quite literally see some of the springs severely offset retainer locations at first glance when opening the box.

Are any of the 1220X's, or other beehive designs you're typically using, having any of these types of winding geometry related issues?

Obviously they're going back because I won't take the chance on my Kasse heads with even just one single mis-shapen spring such as this, but just curious of the cross section of quality you're running into with this particular spring #.

Getting a bit "beehive weary" now and seriously thinking on switching up my parts inventory and moving towards a dual spring setup. Everything will be heavier(more mass, harder to control) but I'll just have to toss more pressure at the valvetrain and deal with the extra bit of wear to maintain some of the engines over-rev potential. Beehive's are really great in many ways.. but no safety net whatsoever. These are intended for my "good heads".. not sure if I want to walk that same familiar old tightrope this time around.

For the record here.. this is by no means an attempt to bash PAC. They have been great at remedying any and all issues through the years, none to speak of really aside from minor ordering/production wait time issues, and also as of late when dealing with these latest quality issues.

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I use 1220x and other PAC beehives in a bunch of applications, including many competition engines. I don't spend a lot of time looking them before installation. It seems you folks have a lot more expertise at looking at springs and know way more about them than I do. I can only relate what has worked for me and maybe it's just dumb luck with PAC beehives.

I would just say that if you don't like beehives or like the way they look, it's probably best that you don't use them.

[jsachs1]

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[/quote]

I don't usually push beehive springs for some of the above reasons. Unfortunately some customers( must be googlemeisters) insist on them , and I have to go with them. At that point we talk about what if.
If the customer is a hammer, I absolutely won't use them.
John

[RW TECH]

I hope nobody here actually believes the OP is having problems because his springs are beehives.

Otherwise the 2017 Mustang GT350R with Voodoo engine couldn't have a 8250 RPM factory redline and a 5 year - 60,000 mile engine warranty. Here's one that is bone-stock with well over 6,000 racing miles on it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDDd0R0-Tfs

This one goes 8.99 ET @ >3200 lbs & runs well above 8,000 RPM with beehive springs..Sounds closer to 8700 through the traps with 8200-8500 RPM shifts but what do I know. Guy in the black jacket in the end of the video looks pretty happy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qItrfYVw-E

This supercharged deal has beehives & you can see the tach rocking right towards 9,000 RPM going trough the traps:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPMa5Y-ABaA

Here's another one that comes with a 5-year warranty & beehives:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1Zc7cpljNU

The beehive is just fine if it's not a POS and not married to a POS cam & valvetrain. Proven & validated. The stock stuff runs for 50 or more hours with the throttle completely pegged. Some of those tests run to 600 hrs with the throttle decked & engine at redline, and all built after about 2001 have beehives in them.

I don't think anyone questions the ability of a car factory to get them to work reliably. The question is whether you can match the cams, springs, and the valvetrain to be reliable without a huge R&D budget spent mostly on computer modeling. So what do we have to do to quality control the springs and prove/validate them for a combo? Maybe that's a naive question, but if it is it's because I'm a noob.

Your first 2 statements are dead-on with a zero except the part where you say "huge R&D budget".

Are you saying that you believe having your valvetrain measured & getting it right requires a huge OEM-level R&D budget? If yes, then I would challenge you by saying I will make a confident wager with you that some if not all of the factory drag race package cars did NOT use all the marvelous methods & endless resources to get right like you think they did.

I'll raise you double & say if the guys who are selling this stuff are actually providing good kits, they should be able to prove it to you by spending no more than $3,000 of their own money to test a full set of parts that make up their kit. Seems like a fair deal that they would put tested, validated packages together & charge $250.00 more per kit to pay themselves back. If a customer wants to piecemeal his own deal together instead of buying a validated system then tough sh!t if it blows up. Plain & simple.

As I have stated in other posts, it requires actual validation by testing & measurement to predetermined standards to say with 100% confidence that "It's going to work". This is an indisputable fact, not a feeling or an opinion.

Because most buying customers are expecting 100% satisfaction, the people who sell valvetrain parts & kits need to position themselves to where they offer complete kits with valves that were proven in testing to work well together. By proof I mean not only testing 1 system, but proving it again on a same but separate system with parts that were made on different days. No rocket science in that.

[Kevin Johnson]

http://www.camaro5.com/forums/showthread.php?t=327814

Will Racing Void the GM warranty?

Worth reading.

[RW TECH]

http://www.camaro5.com/forums/showthread.php?t=327814

Will Racing Void the GM warranty?

Worth reading.

In today's climate with today's products, you are not going to get dinged in warranty if you're doing things the car was designed to do......Even if it's "track day".

If you are not exceeding control limits of the ECU, BCM, etc. etc. etc. they are not going to say "screw you.....Your beehive springs fell apart because you went to track day".

[Kevin Johnson]

http://www.smokinvette.com/corvetteforu ... post181479

Last June, Project Manger Juriga assured us that the critical problem had been solved; however,we learned afterwards that the anomaly will still occur in extreme situations of high-rpm, sustained, max. lat. operation. An example might be abusive skid pad testing done by some of the less-experienced automotive media.

Not so sure this would be covered even if the ECU is now expected to counteract it.

Porsche would not warranty Boxsters on slicks, I have read.

[RW TECH]

http://www.smokinvette.com/corvetteforu ... post181479

Last June, Project Manger Juriga assured us that the critical problem had been solved; however,we learned afterwards that the anomaly will still occur in extreme situations of high-rpm, sustained, max. lat. operation. An example might be abusive skid pad testing done by some of the less-experienced automotive media.

Not so sure this would be covered even if the ECU is now expected to counteract it.

Porsche would not warranty Boxsters on slicks, I have read.

Did the guy's beehive springs break?

[Kevin Johnson]

http://www.smokinvette.com/corvetteforu ... post181479

Last June, Project Manger Juriga assured us that the critical problem had been solved; however,we learned afterwards that the anomaly will still occur in extreme situations of high-rpm, sustained, max. lat. operation. An example might be abusive skid pad testing done by some of the less-experienced automotive media.

Not so sure this would be covered even if the ECU is now expected to counteract it.

Porsche would not warranty Boxsters on slicks, I have read.

Did the guy's beehive springs break?

No, that's just an example of unanticipated failure modes even after a factory fix.

My, I cannot imagine OEM beehive springs failing. Being facetious, of course, and it does not sound like the owners here were abusing the cars. However, I think it is difficult to imagine how products might be abused to cause failures. I suspect this is why marine applications of automotive engines are not even considered for warranty coverage by GM.

http://www.corvetteforum.com/forums/c5- ... cs-10.html

[ptuomov]

I don't think anyone questions the ability of a car factory to get them to work reliably. The question is whether you can match the cams, springs, and the valvetrain to be reliable without a huge R&D budget spent mostly on computer modeling. So what do we have to do to quality control the springs and prove/validate them for a combo? Maybe that's a naive question, but if it is it's because I'm a noob.

Your first 2 statements are dead-on with a zero except the part where you say "huge R&D budget".

Are you saying that you believe having your valvetrain measured & getting it right requires a huge OEM-level R&D budget? If yes, then I would challenge you by saying I will make a confident wager with you that some if not all of the factory drag race package cars did NOT use all the marvelous methods & endless resources to get right like you think they did.

I'll raise you double & say if the guys who are selling this stuff are actually providing good kits, they should be able to prove it to you by spending no more than $3,000 of their own money to test a full set of parts that make up their kit. Seems like a fair deal that they would put tested, validated packages together & charge $250.00 more per kit to pay themselves back. If a customer wants to piecemeal his own deal together instead of buying a validated system then tough sh!t if it blows up. Plain & simple.

As I have stated in other posts, it requires actual validation by testing & measurement to predetermined standards to say with 100% confidence that "It's going to work". This is an indisputable fact, not a feeling or an opinion.

Because most buying customers are expecting 100% satisfaction, the people who sell valvetrain parts & kits need to position themselves to where they offer complete kits with valves that were proven in testing to work well together. By proof I mean not only testing 1 system, but proving it again on a same but separate system with parts that were made on different days. No rocket science in that.

I'm not telling anything, I am asking. What do I need to do to make sure that my beehive valve springs will work reliably? Sure, it all needs to be tested, but what can I do before testing it to improve the chances of success? How do I, for example, do quality control checks on the beehive springs themselves before installing them to make sure that I don't have a bad batch?

As background, I have pretty much the simplest valvetrain that one can imagine. Simple in terms of modeling, of course, four cams and 32 valves is not simple from the manufacturing or cost perspective. It's a direct acting camshaft on top of a flat hydraulic bucket lifter, cam lobe offset 2mm to rotate the 35mm lifter. The lift desired and used is under 12mm and the lobe profile has proven to be reliable in similar applications. The components are lighter with beehives, so in principle the system should be even more reliable with them. So I worked it out with a spreadsheet to come up with the seated load and load on the nose and added a factor of safety there, and had PAC reset me some springs to lengths that produce about those loads. So far, it seems to be running fine. But a lingering question in my mind is what else should I have done to make sure that it's reliable? I feel that there's a chance that I'm just a fool who lucked out this time.