I'm trying to prime my engine oiling system and i don't know if i have a problem our not. Lifters are all new. I know for a fact all pushrods are clean.
I have spun the oil pump driveshaft for about 10 minutes and turned it over about a hundred times 1/4 turn at a time and only 1 rocker arm is oiling.
I took 1 rocker arm off and spun the tool and no oil ever came out the pushrod.
I would think they all should be oiling or none should be.
They all seamed to be pumped up now though as they were not before.
1. Very common for "new" lifters to have contamination inside; and if not actual contamination, they can be "stuck" with old anti-corrosion "protectant" applied during manufacture to prevent rusting while in transport and storage before sale.
2. I've gotten to the point where I disassemble every hydraulic lifter ONE AT A TIME before use, for cleaning and inspection. This became a part of engine building for me when I put an Olds 455 together, and had a defective lifter that was missing it's check-ball. Could never "pump up" so it knocked really loudly. I always pre-fill the lifters with ATF (thin at room temperature) using a pump-style oil can. This assures that the lifter can pump-up, and that it can pass oil through the internal passages. Having done this, there's no need to obsess over "priming". However, I do need to be cautious about setting lifter preload, being sure to allow enough time for the lifter to bleed-down so that the valve doesn't hit the piston.
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3. IF (big IF) an engine is assembled properly, there is ZERO need to "prime" the oiling system long enough to squirt oil out of the pushrods. EVERY part of the engine has been inspected, cleaned, and prelubed with some form of "assembly lube". That "assembly lube" may vary depending on the part--oil or ATF for cylinder walls and wrist-pins, white grease or dedicated "assembly lube" (thick oil) for bearings, pushrods, rocker arms, moly-based paste for flat-tappet cam lobes and lifter bottoms--you get the idea. NOTHING is put together "dry", and so there's no need to churn the oil pump to put oil on the various parts. "Priming" the oiling system should take less than one minute, generally less than thirty seconds on any engine having a submerged oil pump--Chevy small- and big-blocks, Pontiac, Olds, Mopar small blocks, Ford small-blocks, FE, MEL, Clevelands, and 385-series, etc.
Buicks, Cadillac "big block", Mopar B and RB, American motors, and LS-series engines don't have submerged pumps, so they'll often churn awhile before sucking any oil.
4. It's often necessary to have the lifters "bumped" by the camshaft before they'll properly fill. I don't really know why--I kinda suspect it's that they're stuck with the anti-corrosion crap--I just know that often you won't see oil at the rocker arms until sometime after the engine starts and runs. You can manually turn the crank, prime, turn the crank, prime...until you're sick of the process and your drill motor has burned-up, and still not get oil at the rocker arms.
5. When I prime an oil pump, I use an old distributor with the gear teeth ground off, and a machine screw crammed into the advance mechanism as a "handle", then turn it BY HAND about 1--1 1/2 rotations per second (60--90 RPM) which is plenty fast enough to see oil pressure on the gauge in just a few seconds. At that point, I'M DONE PRIMING.
(Pontiac priming tool pictured, Chevy similar.)
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There are 3 oil gallery plugs behind the cam gear with .020 holes in them to oil the gear/chain and bleed off trapped oil in the top of the oil gallery
I'd expect two not three. At least, that's what my "crate engine" had, a service-replacement engine for a '91 Caprice. They're intended to bleed-out the
air in the oil gallery at start-up, reducing or eliminating lifter clatter when cold. There's plenty of oil for the timing chain even without those bleed-holes.
Many core-plug kits have the wrong-sized (too small) plugs, or if they have the right sized oil-gallery plugs, they're not drilled. Melling sells the correct plugs as MPC-54V. I just drill vent holes in the plugs that come with the kit.