Lifter Failure / Hot Oil / Better Cooling etc.

Black1500Ram said:

Update, I went under the truck with intentions of installing the donut gaskets and to my surprise the collector bolts were loose!?

I cranked down on them as tight as I could before with a stubby ratchet so this time I tried tightening them with my 1/2” ratchet long extension and a universal joint.

Going to see if this cures the leaks if so I’ll return the gaskets otherwise that’s the next step. If it does I’ll probably apply locktite to the threads as well.

tightened while cold

Also noticed I have a pinhole leak by the y pipe (my mid pipe is welded directly to the Y cause it used to always leak no matter what)

*update - passenger side leak sound is gone, but driver leak is still there.
Who decided to put an o2 sensor right in the path of the bolt!

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Loctite won't do much on the exhaust bolts,as the way you remove loctite is to heat it,so on an exhaust system,every time it gets hot,the loctite is basically null

Yup. Loctite is a glue. Not for heat apps.

HEMIMANN said:

Yup. Loctite is a glue. Not for heat apps.

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Thanks for the info guys.

I’ll try cranking the drivers side down and leave it alone then. So far after a brief drive the passenger side (previously loudest) is quiet as a mouse.

So after my first trip towing she held up well.

Oil pressure is between 60-65psi up at 3800rpm.

Temps still climbing into the 240°s going up the same grade at 55mph towing the camper, or on flats at 70 also getting to the high 230°s at 2900rpm

With the pressure and temp I’m thinking about adding a thermostatic oil cooler.

Put the OEM muffler back on and boy what a difference while towing… ugh I’m getting old.

Still have an exhaust leak at the collectors. It got worse after the trip.

Those bolts are as tight as I could get them, tighter than I’m comfortable with honestly so those donut gaskets will be going on.

So today was the first day back working on the truck since I towed the camper to the “in-laws” for Thanksgiving.

Put the carven muffler back on and tried to tighten up the collectors since I’ve had an exhaust leak with my AFE shorties ever since I put them on.

I immediately noticed that the bolts were loose again so I got some split lock washers on them to hopefully help with that.

The gaskets that I bought were too small so they’re no help so I still have this annoying exhaust leak that makes my truck sound like a beater.

I guess I’ll try to find bigger gaskets I dunno what else to do.

The bolts are as tight as I can get them with a 3/8” ratchet. I undid the mid pipe and adjusted the y pipe / cats up and down, side to side to get the best line up on the headers that I could see.

Ok I’m still going through it with these afe shorty headers leaking at the collector ball socket connection.

I had bolts initially rattling loose but have since change to 10.9 bolts and that doesn’t seem to be a concern.

However now they’re just not sealing at all.

I’ve bout probably 5 sets of different donut graphite gaskets trying to get something to work. Everything is too thick since it’s not designed to have one there.

I saw on some forums people mentioned copper as a gasket material.

Think some sheets like this would work? Cut a strip same width as the collector ball and bend it around into a gasket.


I don’t want to use cement since it’s semi-perminanet and would have to be ground off the headers.

Also don’t want to buy new mid pipes since they’re like $700+ catted.


Any other thoughts?

Sooo I bought a small sheet of 0.025” copper that I’m just going to cut into strips the make a donut gasket out of.
I’ll hammer the ends a little thinner and then over lap so there’s no gap.

If that doesn’t work it’s getting a healthy application of this. I can’t deal with my truck sounding like an 02 beater work truck anymore.

Black1500Ram said:

Sooo I bought a small sheet of 0.25” copper that I’m just going to cut into strips the make a donut gasket out of.
I’ll hammer the ends a little thinner and then over lap so there’s no gap.

If that doesn’t work it’s getting a healthy application of this. I can’t deal with my truck sounding like an 02 beater work truck anymore.

View attachment 513041

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Welp ended up going with the sealer… still ticking / leaking away.

Starting to think the drivers side header has a leak in the welds.

I’m tired of these things; honestly wish I had just kept my oem logs.
Went from Lifter tick to exhaust tick and not my steering column in groaning away making noise on every turn.

So update the afe headers I bought used have a big crack in them on the rear runner. It was not this visable when I first got them.

However my exhaust is welded at the mid pipe collector after the cats since it would always leak there before. I think it’s not perfectly aligned and inducing stress.

I’ve been meaning to cut out the crushed cross over pipe and move it forward so it’s not directly in the way of the teams drain plug and put on a real y and flex pipe… guess I’ll be doing that sooner rather than later.

You'd think they'd post weld bake to stress relieve weird angle joints.

Then again, that costs mo' money to prevent a failure way off in the future from thermal cycling.

So welded at muffler shop they did a decent job but I had to Dremel the inside to get it back smooth.

Sounds 90% better but it still sounds like there’s some small leak. Could be the collector since I haven’t fixed the rest of the exhaust yet and need to put some more sealant.

Couple questions

How did you prime the oil pump ?

Also what is the spring you reference with the hellcat oil pump ? Should I just put a new factory one in or def upgrade to hellcat pump ?

My 2018 was dealer bought back after taking it their 10+ times with fault codes (8 months in shop combined time!!!)...last time engine failure light came on than engine completely shut down while pulling a 2horse trailer(10K LBS -less) !...42,000 miles still in warrenty WHEW!
Oil pan FULL of metal....
Bought a 22 8 speed flatbed...man this things outpulls the 6 speed hands down.

fadetoblack188 said:

Couple questions

How did you prime the oil pump ?

Also what is the spring you reference with the hellcat oil pump ? Should I just put a new factory one in or def upgrade to hellcat pump ?

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I know we chatted, response for thread integrity.

How to prime Hemi engine

The spring is the bypass valve spring in the oil pump. It's what regulates the oil pressure. Hellcat oem pump will cause 75+psi pressures on the 5.7 engine. By replacing that spring with the one from the oem pump, which is a 60 psi spring, eliminates the over pressurizing of the oil in the 5.7.

If i were to do this again i'd just buy the new melling high flow pump and tune to raise idle speed.

Black1500Ram said:

I know we chatted, response for thread integrity.

How to prime Hemi engine

The spring is the bypass valve spring in oil the pump. It's what regulates the oil pressure. Hellcat oem pump will cause 75+psi pressures on the 5.7 engine. By replacing that spring with the one from the oem pump, which is a 50 psi spring, eliminates the over pressurizing of the oil in the 5.7.

If i were to do this again i'd just buy the new melling high flow pump and tune to raise idle speed.

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I think the stock spring is rated at 60 psi,not 50 psi.

Ok the lifter issue has been my main point of discussion since joining the forum.

I'll grab a pic of the entire cam shortly, but here you can see major pitting and material wear on multiple cam lobes, with one major one.

When I replaced the lifters, one was stuck (corresponding with the worst cam lobe). I later found out the center pin had walked out slightly and was hitting the side of the lifter bore.
video in post #270, pictures of lifter in post #272.

This lifter came out of cylinder 5 (drivers side, 2nd from rear) which is a non MDS cylinder.... part number 53021572AF which i believe is a non MDS lifter (link?)

Everything I've read online regarding cam pitting and spalling has pointed to manufacturing defects in the hardening process.
Hertzian stresses was brought up - "localized stresses that develop as two curved surfaces come in contact and deform slightly under the imposed loads."
Link to youtube lecture on the contact stress subject for any engineering heads who are interested. Cylinder on cylinder would be applicable.

Spitballing and adding pics here, no point being made yet

Black1500Ram said:

Ok the lifter issue has been my main point of discussion since joining the forum.
I documented my expereience in this thread, but upon further investingation I have some major quandries...

I'll grab a pic of the entire cam shortly, but here you can see major pitting and material wear on multiple cam lobes, with one major one.

When I replaced the lifters, one was stuck (corresponding with the worst cam lobe). I later found out the center pin had walked out slightly and was hitting the side of the lifter bore.
video in post #270, pictures of lifter in post #272.

This lifter came out of cylinder 5 (drivers side, 2nd from rear) which is a non MDS cylinder.... part number 53021572AF which i believe is a non MDS lifter (link?)

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Have you thought about replacing the valve springs while you have it apart.If it's not gonna break the budget,it might not be a bad idea.The springs get weak,and start to allow the lifters to skid more then roll over the lobe.

Wild one said:

Have you thought about replacing the valve springs while you have it apart.If it's not gonna break the budget,it might not be a bad idea.The springs get weak,and start to allow the lifters to skid more then roll over the lobe.

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This is old... I did this back in '22 and did replace with performance springs =)