[patrickt]

Usually, when you think of FEs, that have been running ok for a while, and then start bending push rods, you think of stuck valves, or something obvious breaking on the valve train, springs binding up, or a really unusual misfire. But you had it all apart, and then put it back together, and ate a tooth on the distributor gear and bent two rods. I don't know. Maybe the distributor gear caused a funky misfire that created too much pressure for the push rods to go up against. Surely if there was obvious binding/rubbing/etc., or the lash was way out of line, you would have seen that. But that wouldn't eat the distributor gear....