I bought a cam bolt and washer from Precision Automotive a few months ago. Last month I installed it, confirmed that I had 0.006" of end play on the cam (it's a torrington bearing setup from BOP Engineering), and then shortly after that I installed the timing cover using a paper gasket and ultra blue RTV (because that's all I had on hand). Today I decided to re-seal it because the blue RTV bugged me and I finally had some black on hand. When I removed the timing cover, I noticed some aluminum shavings on the cam timing gear. So I checked the inside of the timing cover and found this:
I'm not sure what the issue is. It could be the cam bolt head being too tall, or the washer being too thick, or the timing cover being too shallow (I really doubt this last one). This is what the bolt and washer look like, fully torqued with the eccentric sitting flush on the timing gear and the tang engaged in its slot:
Anybody know what might be wrong here? I'm really glad I found this before trying to run the engine. There was no indication of any issue when I tried turning the engine over by hand.