Exactly as the title says, how exactly do you fill an old hydraulic lifter with epoxy to make it like a solid lifter to check pushrod length? I've seen people say to do this, but I don't know where you are supposed to put the epoxy or anything. Any help is much appreciated.

 

It's much easier to remove the inners and replace them with a stack of washers to the same height of the inners.

Then you just drop the top of the lifter back in, on top of the washers, and replace the retainer clip.

The height of the inners need to be the same so you'll get an accurate length, but also so the top of the lifter doesn't shift around (side-to-side) and screw up your readings.

Surprisingly it's not too difficult to find washers that will work. Just take an empty lifter to the store with you and play.

 

When I made one, I shimmed it such that the cup the pushrod sits in was .030" lower in the hole to simulate the height of the lifter when adjusted. I just pulled some old junk out of my "magic bolt box" and played with it to get the correct height.

 

I tried the epoxy method, and it was trickier than I thought it would be.
If you put too much in there, you can't get it back together.
And if you don't use enough, then it breaks loose while you're checking and throws your measurement off.
I like the washer idea better.

 

It's even easier to just buy a couple of solid lifters.

 

This is probably a dumb question, but does it work just the same if I used a press to pump up the hydraulic ones?

 

I dunno...but I'd guess the cost of a single solid lifter would be less than epoxy...or so close it'd take all the guesswork out of it.

What's a no-name solid run these days? 6-8 bucks?

 

I was talking about factory roller lifters...I haven't seen a solid replacement for those.....

 

There is, it's not cheap though. Comp Cams @ Summit, about $400+ for a set of 16. I'm sure you could buy a pair separately, but it's not inexpensive for a one time use item.