Do it right. The difference, weight, strength, accuracy... The body design of most aluminum rockers cause issue with some spring packages and installed heights of retainers.

 

I definitely want to do this right. No doubt.

Which rockers did you post a photo of there. I've never seen those before. Pretty rad looking!

 

comp 1632-16 is whats pictured

 

Woody in the house!

So is it worth going with the Ultra Pro Magnums or are the Ultra Golds sufficient?

 

It really depends on you. Most are fine for most street builds. The scorpions on occasion have issue with some spring package and retainer install heights. The large aluminum body can contact the retainer edge. People have had roller bearing failure in almost all makes and models, I've seen FMS break at the pivot..

The higher the spring rate, the larger the spring, the higher the RPM intent, the more sense it makes to go with the best. Average street build, idle to 4800 RPM, average light hydraulic lifter springs......... damn near all are fine.

 

What's the best way to compare them?

I know the whole "you get what you pay for" mantra, but at what point does it become silly to spend more money?

From low to high, the pricing I've seen seems to run like this:

Pro-Form > Scorpion > Comp Cams HE > Ford Motorsport > TrickFlow > Comp Cams Ultra Gold

(I know there are more brands I've left out... this is just a basic price comparison).

So is it really worth spending $280 to get the Comp Cams gold rockers versus the $215 for the FMS rockers... or even going down to $185 and getting the Comp Camps HE rockers?

And if anyone is curious or can make a specific recommendation for me... I'm looking for a 1.6 ratio set of 7/16" stud rockers to go on my twisted wedge heads.

In regards to the rocker arms you noted above, personally and from my overall evaluation I'd stay away from the proform, the comp high energy, and the comp golds. And knowing some of the nitty gritty details about scorpion rocker arms, I recommend they be used in hydraulic lifter engines only and do not use them on an engine with valve spring pressures greater than than that of an engine with hydraulic lifters.

In regards to the rocker arms you noted above, the Crane and TFS are a decent rocker arm from a parts & materials quality and structural standpoint.

There are a lot of things to consider when choosing rocker arms. While price is a valid consideration, I've noticed that some people seem to put far too much weight into the price factor compared to other far more important factors. (Incidentally, price can be deceiving/misleading and there are in fact lesser priced rocker arms that are superior to higher priced rocker arms.)

Also, the geometric design between different rocker arms can vary so greatly that--when combined with varying valve train geometry setups--will actually trick your engine into thinking it has a different cam than if you went with different brand rocker arm/geometry setup (the rocker arm acts as a second dynamic to the cam profile).

As far as which rocker arm you should go with, it depends in part with your build combo such as whether this is be a solid roller engine or a hydraulic roller engine, etc.

Other rocker arms I'd consider viable options to choose from (depending on the build needs) are the rockers Kim noted above (Comp Ultra-Pro Magnum), Crower (both aluminum and steel), and Miller.

 

I run the crower steels 1.8 ratio. Miller has been noted as the BEST in quality control and an accurate ratio... all the others... ratio is kinda close.

 

Trick Flow rockers are made by scorpion. I use alot of crane gold, comp gold and K351 rockers which are made by crane for ford. I had some failures on comp golds (3 years ago), since then nothing. I had cracking on scorpions many years ago, but dont use nearly enough to evaluate nowadays. I have used alot of the comp steel 1632's with no issues to speak of as well.

 

Trick Flow SBF rockers are made by Scorpion now? That explains the dramatic price drop. That's a bummer, they used to be made by Crane...whaddya gonna do (sigh).

 

Didn't scorpion buy out crane (or something of that nature) when crane went belly up a few years back? I remember calling scorpion for a warranty issue on a broken rocker, and the guy answered the phone "hello crane..i mean scorpion..old habits.." then he explained to me what had happened with crane cams and scorpion. But I don't remember, it was a few years ago lol

 

My build? Hydraulic roller, spun up to about 6k (street car), with a cam seeing no more than about .525 max lift. Will see boost. Strong motor but nothing too crazy.

Just want to "buy once, cry once", but don't want to have to cry more than is required.

 

My build? Hydraulic roller, spun up to about 6k (street car), with a cam seeing no more than about .525 max lift. Will see boost. Strong motor but nothing too crazy.

Most any quality constructed rocker arm will suit such a build combo as yours, just stick with the quality rocker arms.
_______________________________________

Didn't scorpion buy out crane (or something of that nature) when crane went belly up a few years back? I remember calling scorpion for a warranty issue on a broken rocker, and the guy answered the phone "hello crane..i mean scorpion..old habits.." then he explained to me what had happened with crane cams and scorpion. But I don't remember, it was a few years ago lol

Scorpion and Crane did not merge. Perhaps the employee who answered the phone used to work for Crane (they were both based out of Florida).

CRANE: When Crane dissolved 6 years ago, the various departments were broken up and auctioned off independently. The death of Crane horrified the performance automotive industry as Crane was the major supplier of billet steel cam cores and everyone wondered what would become of the billet steel cam core availability.

As I understand it, S&S Cycle swooped in and grabbed the rocker arm division, then started with reviving the motorcycle portion of it first, followed by the automotive rockers and components. A good friend of mine who is a longtime camshaft grinder grabbed the entire Crane master lobe library. Other people got the machinery. And some of the Crane stuff has changed hands since the original auctions. In fact I believe it's CompCams who owns the Crane camshaft division today (not including the lobe library) and is the secret parent company that offers Crane cams for sale. I think it might be a good thing that another major camshaft supplier (Comp) is now in control of these steel billet cam cores. Someone such as Mark O' might have some more info on this or possibly even make a few corrections.

SCORPION: A good friend of mine helped Scorpion get going, as a consultant on their initial rocker arm design and development. The new rocker arm company was started by a popular offshore boat engine builder in south Florida, wasn't even named Scorpion Performance yet, and later evolved into Scorpion (all the same owner). Today they have a very flashy website which, in my opinion, campaign's a fair amount of minutia for the purposes of mis-directing the readers away from some key factors in rocker arm design that is inherently missing from their products and certainly not mentioned on their website. And when I've called and ask about some of these conveniently omitted factors, they tech advisors become very tight-lipped (although I already know the answers to my questions), and have actually said to me, "I'm sorry but we're not allowed to answer that question." I feel their rocker arms are not that great (due to some key features), and while it's bad enough that I feel they they are subpar, my opinion of the company only worsens based on how I feel they mislead their customers and how they conduct business. Suffice it to say that (as I stated earlier in this thread) I do not recommend their rocker arms on big-springed engines, and my guess is that anyone else who knew the nitty-gritty on their rocker arms would never use one on their engine either.

 

"Buy once, cry once" This is a good one, hahahaha!

 

I bought the ones posted above (Ultra Pro Magnums) I almost wished I had clear valve covers, lol.

I don't know though. I did a bunch of research before deciding what to spend my cash on, and that's what seemed like the best fit for me.

 

Better!!!

 

300 seat 800 over the nose.. Some of them high end ones are 1200 over the nose..

Ide say for most big is anything that would exceed typical hydraulic lifter spec, so north of 350 is a bigger spring.

 

Im still interested in the "Key Features" that are missing, and not talked about.
So whats the deal with Scorpion Rockers?

 

I have been running Harland Sharp for years now and will probably never go back to anything else.

 

Pretty much what I was told...

...as for the automotive side and those investors.

(is this Chase?)

 

Sooooo, are the Crane Energizers (aka '93 Cobra) any good for .560ish lift with 135# on the seat/350# open ?

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQ_w644Emss

Don't need masters when you have these...

 

Good old Landis grinders. 20 years ago I used to write firmware for their custom cam and crank grinders that were made for automobile OEMs all over the world. I got to see cam and crank designs years before the engines were available to the public.

 

I don't have the wikipedia version like the previous posts, but here is a quick pic of older FMS vs newer TFS