To line2line coat or not to line2line coat ;-)

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Miszny

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Hi

I am thinking about rebuilding my 471ci this winter.
Pistons in it now are forged Wiseco #6295A35, they are 4.375".

I was planning to bore to 4.382" and was looking around for pistons already when machinist told me about ceramic coating to oversize pistons.
This means I would need to enlarge my pistons by 0.007" which is no problem for Line2line and it would cost me around 350$.

Are there any people here with experience using ceramic coatings on pistons? How is it holding up? Is it long lasting? Does it make any sense or should I forget aboutg it and just get new forged pistons?
Car is 90%, street driven if thats important.

Thanks for your input.
 
I smile when I see antifriction coating on the skirts. I wouldn't thermal-barrier the top unless it was forced induction.
 
I smile when I see antifriction coating on the skirts. I wouldn't thermal-barrier the top unless it was forced induction.
I was not planning to coat the tops of pistons, goal is to be able to re-use my current pistons if it really works.
 
Yes and YES. I didn't do my last set and I'm kicking my *** every day over not doing it. The **** works, worth every penny. The guys who don't know what it is, or why you use it will poo poo anything.

I've seen two sets done with my own eyes and fondled them with my nasty hands. The answer is yes.
 
Line2Line is good stuff. Why does it need the overbore? Why that number? .007? S/F....Ken M
 
Next size piston I found was 4.382", so I assumed I need to bore 0.007 over what I have now.
Frankly I have no idea what piston clearance I need, never bored a block and machine shop always handled this for me.

I discovered I have scratches in all cylinders using inspection camera. It does not need much oil, does not smoke, no blow by, has very even values from compression test, but it just pisses me off. I'm living with this for a while now. Does not seem to worsen but you know, car will be sitting because of winter so I may just do this and sleep a bit better... ;-)
 
OK, I'm going to say this is completely unnecessary, you should just leave it alone and drive it but since it'll make you feel better, it may be worth it, and it's not my money. Here's my advice: Have the shop hone the block a couple thou to clean up the scratches, send the pistons out for L2L and reassemble. I think there's more chance of **** going wrong doing this than with leaving it alone, but it's not my stuff. I assume that this shop has suitable tooling, ie torque plate and a proper hone that can correct taper and out of roundness. If the shop doesn't have a torque plate and/or gives you silly looks when you mention cylinder taper etc, just leave it be. I doesn't need to be a diamond hone, but that'd be nice. I'm trying hard to not be an asshole, but shops using tools from the pre-computer era are not what you want for performance engine building.

I'd rather spend the $ on porting:) S/F....Ken M
 
OK, I'm going to say this is completely unnecessary, you should just leave it alone and drive it but since it'll make you feel better, it may be worth it, and it's not my money. Here's my advice: Have the shop hone the block a couple thou to clean up the scratches, send the pistons out for L2L and reassemble. I think there's more chance of **** going wrong doing this than with leaving it alone, but it's not my stuff. I assume that this shop has suitable tooling, ie torque plate and a proper hone that can correct taper and out of roundness. If the shop doesn't have a torque plate and/or gives you silly looks when you mention cylinder taper etc, just leave it be. I doesn't need to be a diamond hone, but that'd be nice. I'm trying hard to not be an asshole, but shops using tools from the pre-computer era are not what you want for performance engine building.

I'd rather spend the $ on porting:) S/F....Ken M

The shop I use is not taking stuff from random people and they only deal with racing stuff. I am sure they have all they need and more, not too worried about that. The guy that runs it is a total nut case in a good way so it will be fine. Last time I gave him 383 block for bore/hone and did not ask for deck surfacing he contacted me all pissed off and said that he cant let it be like that and demanded me to show up at the shop so he will show me that decking is needed :)
Most people tell me to leave it alone, I am just worried that the scratches will worsen and it will make the block unusable. In my reality importing bare 400 block means spending total of around 1300$ where block is 500$ and rest is shipping/tax. The whole rebuild would cost me less honestly.
I dont know what is the overbore limit of 400 block. I see some ,060 over 440 blocks here pushing 650hp... I wonder if they are just lucky? Seems like a big number to me.
 
Cool, I think you have a good machinist. Machinists who are not obsessive/compulsive kinda scare me.

Have him hone it to whatever cleans up. Have him give you the number, send pistons to L2L to have brought to that dimension, reassemble and rock and roll.

I have a 400 block at 4.402, because some butcher used a ridge reamer like an animal. The thinnest numbers I recall finding using the sonic tester was .12x on the perpendicular to crank axis. Which means nothing unless I send you this block. Worst case, you can sleeve a cylinder or two, or all of them if it comes down to that. S/F....Ken M
 
Cool, I think you have a good machinist. Machinists who are not obsessive/compulsive kinda scare me.

Have him hone it to whatever cleans up. Have him give you the number, send pistons to L2L to have brought to that dimension, reassemble and rock and roll.

I have a 400 block at 4.402, because some butcher used a ridge reamer like an animal. The thinnest numbers I recall finding using the sonic tester was .12x on the perpendicular to crank axis. Which means nothing unless I send you this block. Worst case, you can sleeve a cylinder or two, or all of them if it comes down to that. S/F....Ken M



If you go anywhere and see a ridge reamer turn and RUN and never look back. That junk **** tool ruined more blocks than you can shake a stick at.
 
Thanks guys :)
The shop I am using does engines for professional racing teams. This is really high $$$ stuff.
Normally they would not touch an engine like mine but I go to them from one of their bigger customers so they do my stuff from time to time as low priority ;-)
Never had any issue.
Sleeving is an option but I would like to avoid it.
 
Cool, I think you have a good machinist. Machinists who are not obsessive/compulsive kinda scare me.

Have him hone it to whatever cleans up. Have him give you the number, send pistons to L2L to have brought to that dimension, reassemble and rock and roll.

I have a 400 block at 4.402, because some butcher used a ridge reamer like an animal. The thinnest numbers I recall finding using the sonic tester was .12x on the perpendicular to crank axis. Which means nothing unless I send you this block. Worst case, you can sleeve a cylinder or two, or all of them if it comes down to that. S/F....Ken M

So you are 0.062 over... Whats your engine configuration? What power?
 
If you go anywhere and see a ridge reamer turn and RUN and never look back. That junk **** tool ruined more blocks than you can shake a stick at.

I'm well aware of that, but some goon did use one on this engine I bought complete for $100, which included a Street Dominator intake, so there was no way I could lose. The seller was complaining it made no power...

Engine is iron head endurance motor, 452 heads, avg flow about 275cfm @ .550 lift. 240/246 FT, 10.6:1, 850cfm carb on the SD, makes a little over 525, very tame motor, does exactly what I want it to do; be predictable. S/F....Ken M
 
Interesting. Did not know coatings can be so thick. How many grams per piston might that be? And rings. Available in the new oversize? Enough radial depth to work with the pistons? Thanks
 
Interesting. Did not know coatings can be so thick. How many grams per piston might that be? And rings. Available in the new oversize? Enough radial depth to work with the pistons? Thanks


They just coat the skirt. It's an abradable coating, so it's designed to wear in as the engine runs.

Essentially it allows the piston to run at zero clearance. It keeps the rings square to the bores among other things.

I've still got bruises on my *** for not doing my last set of Pistons.

I'm doing a two stroke deal over the winter and it's getting L2L coatings.
 
So then, you are going to hone this engine as a sleeping aid?

I guess that would work.

I've done some additional welds for people on their projects where the only improvement the additional welds made was they felt better about more weld being there. It didn't improve the strength of the unit. They probably slept better too.
 
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