I recently got an EA81 hydro motor thats missing the pushrods. The guy I bought it from had a near complete set of solid lifter pushrods(aluminum) he gave me for free and I'm working out a deal for a partial set of hydro pushrods(steel) right now. 

 

Can you mix and match the two in the same motor?

 

If mixing and matching won't work, can I run a complete set of solid lifter pushrods in a hydro motor? I'm not sure which set will be easier to complete..

 

Josh

 

Solid vs Hydro EA81 pushrods are completely different. You will need to find the correct set.

You can run the solid lifter push-rods, so long as you run solid lifters.

 

DO NOT mix and match.

Huh, the guy I bought the motor from said the solid lifter pushrods he included for free came out of the motor that the hydro lifter ended up going...so to me it sounded like he was running hydro pushrods on solid lifters...I asked if he had valve noise when it warmed up and he said no, but maybe he started with hydro lifters and tried running solid lifter pushrods on the , hence the bent pushrod in the free set. I was hoping they were similair enough to work, but I'll keep a look out for one more hydro pushrod. 

 

Just out of curiosity, why wouldn't it work? I know the aluminum ones expand as the motor warms up to keep the lash the same when the block also expands, but considering the steel ones expand differently and the lifter compensates, I'm not seeing why it wouldn't work...not that I'm disagreeing, I'm just curious. 

 

Josh

Anybody have more info on this??

 

Is it a length issue, or is it that no one has tried it yet?

 

Josh

Since nobody seems to know why it willn't work, I'll just give it a try and run 6 hydro pushrods and 2 solid lifter push rods. I'll report back how it goes, unless someone can offer some experience here.

 

Josh

How did it go? I will be replacing a bent pushrod on a hydro engine,but all I can find are solid lifter engines at the moment.I don't see why you couldn't run the solid pushrod along as you pair it with the lifter too. Any thoughts? Thankyou.

Check the last post date...  OP hasn't visited the site since 2017...

I knew it was an old post, I figured someone may chime in though. Thank you.

I have run hydraulic pushrods on a solid lifter motor but you can't do it the other way around.    We used to do it as the caps wouldn't pop off like solid lifter pushrods at high rpm.