Do you need cam bearings??

[GTDannyGT]

I’m in the middle of rebuilding my heads on 4.6 3v and I’m gonna install hot rod cams. I realized there’s no cam bearings.. long story short I already bought some but is it necessary? Would it be better to install the bearings or just install cam without? Here’s the bearings I got

 

[Dino Dino Bambino]

The 4.6 3V heads never had cam bearings.
However if there's obvious wear or scoring of the journal mating surfaces on the cam towers, they'll need to be machined in order to accommodate cam bearings. Definitely worth doing if the heads are otherwise good to save them from being scrapped.
If the surfaces look near pristine, there's no need to use the bearings and you can install the cams as per normal.

 

[GTDannyGT]

The 4.6 3V heads never had cam bearings.
However if there's obvious wear or scoring of the journal mating surfaces on the cam towers, they'll need to be machined in order to accommodate cam bearings. Definitely worth doing if the heads are otherwise good to save them from being scrapped.
If the surfaces look near pristine, there's no need to use the bearings and you can install the cams as per normal.

The cam towers look great, but I’m worried it will cause premature wear on the towers if I were to install the bearings due to that fact that they don’t normally run bearings.

 

[86GT351]

The cam towers look great, but I’m worried it will cause premature wear on the towers if I were to install the bearings due to that fact that they don’t normally run bearings.

If installed properly by a machine shop there should be no issue. From the factory the cam just rides on the journals. If damaged then the journal needs to be machined to allow for the nearing. This IS NOT a home repair. You will need a Machine Shop involved in this.

 

[GTDannyGT]

If installed properly by a machine shop there should be no issue. From the factory the cam just rides on the journals. If damaged then the journal needs to be machined to allow for the nearing. This IS NOT a home repair. You will need a Machine Shop involved in this.

Ohhhh okay thank you for you help! I’ll just send them back I don’t wanna cause unnecessary damage

 

[lwarrior1016]

Holy crap! You actually found the correct bearings?

There aren’t many shops that still do this repair. They have to line hone the journals to a larger size to fit the bearings correctly. If you don’t need them, don’t use them.

 

[GTDannyGT]

Holy crap! You actually found the correct bearings?

There aren’t many shops that still do this repair. They have to line hone the journals to a larger size to fit the bearings correctly. If you don’t need them, don’t use them.

Yea they are on summit took a lot of research to find them all just to find out it’s not even worth it lol