[Vwdiesel] PD Cam

[Travis Gottschalk]

The BRM cars have cam with slightly taller lobes is the biggest reason why they fail more. More stress with taller lobes but it gives it a little more torque. There is many BRMs with BEW cams in them and are running just fine. Also in talking over the phone with a couple head rebuilders (Frank06 and Kerma) both who are making or are trying to make stage 2 cams they each have there thoughts on why they fail. No one knows 100% for sure. Frank seems to notice a higher amount of cars down south and the further north the less issues. He thinks that it is an oil issue in a different way. The cam oil is put on the jurnals on the wrong side and they all seem to have a higher amount of wear on the cam bearings. Several have either drilled or re-done the new bearings to get oil where it is needed on the cam bearings and have helped with the wear in that area. The thought is not enough oil is flowing through the bearings and the lifters which are ran off oil as well is getting to hot as not enought cooler oil is getting to the lifters. With the cam bearings flowing more oil out of them the oil in the lifters is then cooler. Frank and a couple others think the oil might actually be boiling to an extent and causing the lifters to rub the whole way around and not just on the lob-making it get hotter yet. But there hasn't been enough cars with the bearing mods and replacement cams have been questionable so far as their quality as well. 
 
Yes if you have a bad cam it is best to do the oil pump as the cam metal flakes are really hard and will destroy your oil pump. You can check for flakes in your oil filter at oil change time. Cut a chunk out, press the oil out in a vise (with a rag on it) and then pull apart to look for metal. That and inspecting the lobes once in a while. Brother and I also run the dieselgeek bypass oil filter kit on our cars so we would like to think that helps some with cleaning the abrasive materials out of the oil. I know when I do my cam some day (we all know someday I will have to). I am hoping the stage 2 cams are perfected as they are getting a little better MPG and HP. That along with the modded bearings and the black lifters and non-torque to yeild bolts. I keep watching my cam and keep watching for new information on the cams. I do have to say I am happy to not own a BRM as not only do they have a worse cam but the EGR is more complicated and very few parts can transfer to other cars so you are stuck with OEM things only (no bigge turbo, crank is different, block is different, etc). 
Travis 
 
 
> Since I have one of these cars (2004) I have spent literally hours on TDI club trying to sift through the tons of crap to get to the truth of the PD "cam problem". After lots of reading and questions on how many failures people have actually had, this is what I have determined. First of all the problem occurs because the cam has a bit of side load from the timing belt end that is not present on the pump end and the injector lobs also push on the cam in strange directions. This causes wear on one side of the cam lobes. This wear is then transferred to the top of the hydraulic lifters. This wear flattens the lifter and it stops spinning in it socket. This allows the cam to wear into the top of the lifter. The lifter fails, valves cease to open properly and the car stumbles, stutters and generally runs like crap. Now, the BEW engine in the 2004-5.5 seems to be less prone to this failure IF the proper oil has been used since new. (505.01 5W40, yes 5W30 was originally recom
> mended but VW changed that). BTW you don't even want to go there on TDI club, oil flame wars still break out from time to time amongst all those "experts" that reside there. The 5.5-06 BRM engines tend to have a much bigger problem with this and it seems to be a parts problem, maybe even a manufacturing problem with the cam materials because the replacement cams and lifters are made of a completely different kind of metal. There are extensive arguments about whether oil is the problem or parts in both but there is a direct correlation in the BEW between oil and failure. I happen to have all the service papers on my car that I bought used. Every oil change was done with the right 505.01 oil and I have used the 5W40 oil since I got it. At about 130000 miles, I had the cold start solutions done (new injectors, reprogramed ECU new glow plugs). At that time I had the mechanic carefully inspect the cam lobes for wear and show me the results. There was no unusual wear. I s
> imply will not spend all my time worrying about a failure that may or may not happen. I will use good oil, continue to use B50 homebrew and IF somewhere down the road I have to spend $700 to fix a bad cam and lifters, then so be it. I will still have gotten my monies worth out of this car. BTW the car currently has 133000 miles on it and is running great.
> 
> BTW the new diesel oils don't have the large amounts of Zinc and Phosphorous in them either. These two things will gum up the pollution control devices, in particular the cat and the particulate filter. So it isn't a good idea to use these in a TDI built after 2000 at least.
> 
> Hayden
> On Sep 26, 2011, at 8:20 PM, brian gochnauer wrote:
>