Ernie-
Dist gears for hyd rollers are a non-issue at this point. As Tony noted above, Crane now makes a special hardened steel dist. gear for roller cams which apparently has the same life expectancy of an OEM dist. gear. I believe KC has been installing these gears for some time now without a problem.
See the below link. Even though there is not a part # listed for FEs, if you have the MSD dist. with the .531 shaft diameter, it uses the same dist. gear as the 429s, part # 52971-1
http://www.cranecams.com/pdf/Page536.pdf