Jay Honeck wrote:

Does anyone *really* know what causes a camshaft to fail like this? I read
about it happening with alarming regularity, and it's never attributed to
anything in particular.

In the absence of some catastrophe, such as a bent pushrod, this is generally
caused by not flying enough. The layer of hardened steel on a camshaft is fairly
thin. Let the plane sit long enough, and rust will form. When the engine starts
again, the rust is worn away, making the thin layer of hardened steel thinner.
The worst wear points, of course, are the tips of the lobes. Once the hardened
steel wears through, the softer steel underneath goes pretty rapidly.

"So why not build the shaft entirely of hardened steel?", I hear you cry. That's
because the harder steel is, the more brittle it becomes. The best strength
comes from this sort of lamination of hard and soft steels.

George Patterson
Coffee is only a way of stealing time that should by rights belong to
your slightly older self.