'68 318 to carbed Magnum 5.2: Check my checklist

Have plumbed the fuel line to stock 340 specs, but butting up against the lifter tick again.

I went ahead and pulled the driver's side valve cover and inspected the rockers. The lifter at the farthest back of the engine (exhaust valve, cylinder #7) caught my attention, as it won't compress when I put pressure on it with the pushrod. Zero play.

Even though this thing is non-adjustable, I chose to pull every rocker and pushrod, inspecting everything, then reinstalling it back together.

Well, I did that, and the whole thing clattered like HELL when I restarted it. Opened it up again and found some of the rockers super loose. From what I can tell, the lifters lost preload - but why didn't they pump up the second time around?

Going to close it up now and run it a bit with it clattering (at idle) to see if they finally pump up. At any rate, I foresee the intake coming off to replace the lifter on cylinder #7 (probably all of them so I don't have to rip everything apart again).

The only other thing of note that I remember is that the driver's side bank of lifters on this engine were completely different than the passenger's side. All appeared factory.

-Kurt