Rocker Decision

We tried some of the rockers with needles exactly like those shown. The shafts were probably wrong and not hardened properly, so that may have been the real issue, but regardless, the needles wore some deep grooves in the shafts in 1 k miles. I was pretty careful with the oiling, and valve spring pressures are under 300 lbs full open so nothing out of line there. Needles bearings put a lot of pressure on a few needles at a time, on a much, much smaller area than a bushed rocker.

We changed to Hughes AL rockers.

IMHO, the stock 273 rockers are probably near their useful lift limit at .507". Also, I have read reports of them not being really 1.5 ratio, so you may lose lift IF that is true.