Rocker arms loose on new motor?

im having about the same problem...I primed with drill until oil pumped out of the top of the pushrods but now when I turn motor over with starter the rockers never move to close or open valves..

You have to torque em when the pushrods are @ there lowest location, meening you have to torque each rocker arm one by one & you have to turn the motor over by hand one by one, you can not just through em on & torque, there is a precedure that you have to follow.

have your lifters been sitting for a long time? or are they new?

they are most likely not pumped up all way...once you start your car...the pushrod will be tight, so dont overtighted your rocker arms now...

Dumb question but: Are the rockers and pushrods stock parts or are they replacements like roller rockers and aftermarket pushrods?

same prob

i have a 69 302 and i had the same problem with the pushrods i torqued the rocker arms down on number one cylinder with the valves closed lifters down. all the rocker arms on the exhaust side was lose but that's because all the exhaust seats were cut out and new seats where put in. and when i cut the seats they were not cut enough and the valve was in the combustion chamber more then the intake valve is and so the rocker with the pushrod is loss. the only way to adjust that is to buy longer pushrods or take the heads apart and cut the seats deeper. on another note since the intake seats are original and not replaced if they were cut deeper and i had a adjustment problem they would probably sit farther into the lifter to deep and unsafe and i would have to buy shorter pushrods to adjust that. Ford should sell a .060 longer or shorter pushrods but i haven't found them other companies sell pushrods it different increments.with the valves closed and lifters down when u torque your rocker arms down the pushrods should go almost halfway thru it's depth into the lifters a lifter will have up to maybe .150 of depth that the pushrod can go in. not sure if that will help u but we need more info like if original cams. parts what did u change.

Here's the procedure copied from a similar thread on the "other" forum:

Be sure the pair you're installing have the lifters on the base circle of the cam - in other words, both valves would be closed if the rockers were on. Hand tighten them to zero lash - with one hand rock the rocker while tightening with the other hand. Once it barely stops rocking (no gap on the pushrod end or the valve stem end) you've reached zero lash. From that point, torque to 18-20 ft-lbs while counting the number of times the bolt turns. It should reach that torque somewhere between 1/4 turn and 1 turn. If it takes more than 1 turn to hit the torque when starting from zero lash, then shim the rocker higher. One .030" shim will reduce the number of turns by about 1/4. If it hits the torque in less than 1/4 turn - you'll likely have a hard time getting it to zero lash by hand, or to zero lash at all - you'll likely need longer pushrods. If it hits the torque just short of a 1/4 turn, you may be able to 'shorten' the rocker by evenly removing some material from the bottom of that rocker's fulcrum. Unless you've replaced the cam with a different one (sometimes replacement's have a slightly smaller base circle) you probably won't run into needing new pushrods.

Once you've installed each pair this way (you'll have to turn the motor over by hand to get each pair of lifters on the cam's base circle - follow the firing order to minimize hand cranking) and cranked the car, if they're noisy, you may have to go back through with everything good and hot (or at least warm) and re-install. The clearances change slightly when things are warm, and I've found that any noisy ones I've had generally quiet down when I do the install procedure warm.

Note that the rockers aren't really adjustable. The install procedure is there to tell you if things are dimensionally the way the should be in the engine. You can just torque them down - but then you won't find out about any potential dimensional issues until you crank it. And then, occasionally, you can find out about them the hard way.

Look up, we've already explained this order twice