I'm trying to find out what cam I have in my pinto. The pulley seems to be a vernier pulley which mad me think it may be a fast road cam. I took the rocker cover off to take a look but there isn't much to identify it. Cast into it is the number 149306 and on the end is JD87 and 1416 110. it also has JD2 cast into it. I've googled these numbers but come up with very little.

Can anyone offer any help?

its normally stamped into the rear end of the cam. are any of the numbers you have quoted from this area?

Yep, here's a pic if you can make it out:



There's also JD87 on it which is fient and you can't make it out.

[Edited on 22/2/12 by gunman]

And here's a pic of the pulley.

I took a pic of the back end, transcribed the numbers and sent them to Piper, asking if it was one of theirs. They identified it as standard by return the same day. Excellent service. One of the reasons I then bought a piper 285 to replace the cam with.

All the performance cams I have had have codes and numbers that relate to the cam manafacturer and the duration.
Mainly Kent which has for instance KC RL31
Or Burton BLF 40/41. GP 1
Have seen HT1
But random sets of numbers that don't Google tend to be standard
It would be worth measuring the lobe and comparing it to standard, next would be lobe seperation this will tell you lift and LCA

One suggestion is that the cam could be a comp cam? the 1416 is a valid lobe number for them and te 110 could be the seperation angle.

I have a DTI gauge lying in a drawer in the garage so I'll try and take a reading of the lift this evening.

Well, I'm pretty sure this is a standard cam, i did a quick measure when I got home and the lift is about 8.??mm, nowhere near a high lift. Although the comp cams 1416 lobe gives a lift of 8.87mm anyway.

Ignore my last post, I was getting confused between lobe and valve lift. Time for some metalwork to get an accurate lobe lift reading with the DTI gauge (after dinner of course).

Ok, I made up a basic but solid way of holding the gauge and took 2 readings.



Both gave a lobe lift of 7.92mm. I will admit that I don't fully understand what this will equate to but that's a higher lobe lift than a Kent race cam for the pinto.

Using the same lobe to valve lift ratio I would have a valve lift of over 13mm??

Are there any cam experts in the house that wouldn't mind explaining this to a numpty?.

I tested again with the gauge on the valve cap, got a reading of 12.18mm. This gives a rocker ratio of 1.54. From researching online I think that a standard pinto cam has a valve lift of 9.9mm. This cam is about in line with a Kent or Piper fast road cam (assuming my thinking is correct)