Canton Oil Pickup 20-055 failure WARNING !!!

[Kevin Panzino]

Letting all my class racing brother and sisters know of a problem I have now had TWICE over the past 15 years.

Canton oil pump pickup, part # 20-055, the hold down breaks at the bend just next to the oil pump cover bolt. It is bent with too sharp of a radius (very little to no radius, really), and it fatigue fails and the pickup falls off.
Thank GOODNESS in both cases I caught it right away and shut down.


I am going to just weld repair it, and then also go old school and weld the pickup to the pump body.


BEWARE!!!!!!


Kp

[Henrys Toy]

Originally Posted by Kevin Panzino

Letting all my class racing brother and sisters know of a problem I have now had TWICE over the past 15 years.

Canton oil pump pickup, part # 20-055, the hold down breaks at the bend just next to the oil pump cover bolt. It is bent with too sharp of a radius (very little to no radius, really), and it fatigue fails and the pickup falls off.
Thank GOODNESS in both cases I caught it right away and shut down.


I am going to just weld repair it, and then also go old school and weld the pickup to the pump body.


BEWARE!!!!!!


Kp

Good morning to all,
Not to sound like a smart axx but you should always remove the spring and weld the pickup to the pump body. 40 plus years and not one oil pump pickup failure. Also once the pump is cooled off recheck and make sure the pump body is still square. With the newer HD pump castings , we've had less distortion there also. Personally I've never trusted an " interference Fit " on anything that experience's as much vibration as a racing engine goes through, even a Drag Race engine.
We live and we learn.

Respectfully,
Henry Kunz 1534 H/SA

[pmrphil]

It's not just Canton,- Moroso, Milodon, and others all share the same problem. Milodon even offers a "heavy duty" screen, and it will break also. Every engine that leaves my shop has the screen welded on, it's just covering everybody's butt that way.

[Eman]

When you say welded what are you welding the steel pickup to cast iron with?

[Henrys Toy]

Originally Posted by Eman

When you say welded what are you welding the steel pickup to cast iron with?

Good morning Eman and to all,
I've been brazing them. In the past we've tried MiG welding and TiG welding and had problems with the castings cracking during cooling. It seems that MiG and TiG welding processes centralize / localize the heat and the rest of the part is cooler so when the part cools it would crack about an 1/8" to a 1/4 " from the welded area. Now when brazing the pump to pick up the entire casting gets heated and after brazing cooled more uniformly and didn't develop any cracks. I'm sure there are some really good welders out there that can perform this process differently but I've never had a failure to this date.
Like my Dad used to say, there's more then one way to skin a cat !

Respectfully,
Henry Kunz 1534 H/SA

[pmrphil]

Originally Posted by Eman

When you say welded what are you welding the steel pickup to cast iron with?

Bronze nickel filler, the welding supply shop called it "butter rod" because it has a fairly low melting point. Same filler rod used when building headers - it withstands vibration pretty well, and with the low heat, you can weld thick to thin. And just to note, I'm NOT a good welder.

[Shake & Bake]

I ran the Moroso oil pumps back in the 70's. We "always" made our own gusset and welded the screen around the pickup before it was ever installed.

[Eman]

Originally Posted by Henrys Toy

Good morning Eman and to all,
I've been brazing them. In the past we've tried MiG welding and TiG welding and had problems with the castings cracking during cooling. It seems that MiG and TiG welding processes centralize / localize the heat and the rest of the part is cooler so when the part cools it would crack about an 1/8" to a 1/4 " from the welded area. Now when brazing the pump to pick up the entire casting gets heated and after brazing cooled more uniformly and didn't develop any cracks. I'm sure there are some really good welders out there that can perform this process differently but I've never had a failure to this date.
Like my Dad used to say, there's more then one way to skin a cat !

Respectfully,
Henry Kunz 1534 H/SA

I've always brazed which of course isn't welding. I've seen them mig welded and the mig weld sticks to the pickup but breaks away from the cast. Welding dissimilar metals just ain't natural.

[Kevin Panzino]

I’ve had good luck using a freedom alloys stick rod called copperhead. It’s for cast iron. For small detail jobs I knock the flux off and use it as a tig filler rod.

Kp