One last thought; valve float will chew up hardened spring shims as well. Your shims look just like the hardened ones on a set of Indy -1s in the shop right now that had valvetrain issues. Might be worth considering.
QUOTE]
This isn't valve float and none of the valves have the tell tale star pattern on the tip. This is most definitely a standard steel shim that is not hardened VA-303 and the dampener has started to slice them up. J.Rob