These retainers had 20,000 miles on them. They has some life left but I replaced them.

https://www.s2ki.com/s2000/gallery/i...3-dsc00026jpg/

https://www.s2ki.com/s2000/gallery/i...4-dsc00027jpg/

 

its the side loading of the block that limits your rpm. NOT the valve train. In fact the OEM valve train on the f22 is already superior to the F20C valve train. So any valve train upgrades on an AP2 2.2 will be fruitless if high rpm is your goal unless you go into the shortblock.

Having said that I have an upgraded valve train and a 2.0 shortblock in my 06 s2000. 10k rpm baby! woot!

 

ap2 springs are nearly the same as ap1, the retainers are what is different.

that being said from what I have seen both ap1 and ap2 springs suffer from valve bounce at anything above about 9300 rpms. Ap2 is not quite so bad seeing as how ap2 cams are smaller than ap1 cams. Its easy to see on the dyno.. look for the dyno graph to be "bouncy" at high rpm.. thats usually a good indication of valve bounce.

If you want more than 9k on an ap2 you'll need to upgrade both the bottom end and the top end. It has been proven many times that ap2 rods cant take 9000+ rpms for very long before making their way out of the block. Ap1 blocks though.. you can spin those about as high as you want so long as you have aftermarket valve train.

 

what retainers are these and what springs/cams did you run with them. The last time I saw damage like that was when a local kid used cheap-o omni-power retainers on stock ITR springs.

 

They are a no name retainer used with factory springs and cams.

 

so seems ill be safe when switching to the supertech dual spring and Ti retainer, just as long as I have it inspected say every 30k? Ive heard alot of the horror stories from stiffer springs and ti retainers, but seems that install has alot to do with the life span, and that the negative things i have heard were not credible.

 

Since were on it, does anyone know the correct spring pressures for OEM springs?

The 2 numbers I hear are 65 or 80 open and no one has been able to answer closed pressure.

I was on supertechs website and it showed that they offer 3 different levels of pressure being 80/215, 95/253 and 100/268 and these numbers are per Supertechs website.

http://www.supertechperformance.com/ivalves.html?id=2

Maybe its 2 different ratos, one set for intake and another for exhaust. You would need the stiffer spring on the intake correct?