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[madmikeracing]

How many Guys do all there own engine stuff heads bores honing ect? I try to do all my own stuff and had a question that I never got answered like so many others on some other Bike Forums. Torque Plates you think people in these expensive engine shops even use them? I have seen evidence they dont and ?? does it even matter? I was about to gnaw away at some huge alloy 7075 slabs and make a set of torque plates for my GS engine Hobby. I wasnt sure even if it was needed? I had access to a aerospace CMM (cocordinate measurement Machine) where i worked and found some mighty poor nmachining done for mighty high cost by so called speed Motorcycle shops. Made me lose My Mothers Milk so to speak since I dont wanna cuss here!! $spent over 2000 for a ??Race Crank that was out over .007 to .014 thou Valve Jobs done on serdis out .036 thou and so on amazing. Thanx Mike

 

[cbxchris]

I can believe that. The issue is that many of the people able to do good work do not have access to the machinery to do so.

 

[rapidray]

Mike, I do all my own work, except the cylinder boring. I am VERY particular about machine work & will only let 2 people do my cylinder boring. One is Kim Barringer at Carolina Cycle & the other is a good machinist in San Diego. They both do EXACTLY what I ask for in clearances & ZERO taper when I get stuff from them. It takes a little more time to do GS sleeves correctly with them sticking out the bottoms of the block to eliminate the taper. Few people will spend the extra time it takes to get them dead on correct. I will spend my money where they WILL do them right! All the head work I do myself for the same reasons. If I had the money & room I would have the machines to do blocks also! Cranks all go to John Pearson, Stan Gardner or Bob Mosher. I wouldn't send a moped crank to Falicon!!! Pearson does my transmission undercutting also.
Ray.

 

[Steve]

... Cranks all go to John Pearson, Stan Gardner or Bob Mosher. I wouldn't send a moped crank to Falicon!!! Pearson does my transmission undercutting also.
Ray.

I have heard this endorsement of Pearson by more than one person on this forum and a few others locally. I had some basic machine work done there, as he is in my virtual "back yard" (less than 25 miles away), and found that he has a "slightly modified" GS sitting in the shop. :encouragement:

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[GregT]

I agree with Ray in that like him I've been doing it long enough to have sorted out who does the best job local to me. Having worked that out, you then ensure they know you're coming to then because they do good work - and you'll be checking it each time to ensure they continue the same standard...
There's one reconditioning shop here who advertises heavily and has good gear...but i wouldn't get them to do a lawnmower engine. I've just pulled down a blown engine which they did for someone else. Comparing what the owner was charged for vs what is actually in the motor, he's got a good case for court action...

 

[Guest]

Hey Ray, i guess you have some history with falicon, but just for the record, i have used their cranks in my bikes at levels up to pro mod & prostock with no problems. i have heard of some bad cranks from them but usually if you dig deeper there are end user issues. i will also qualify that by saying i had work from the old days when tom ran it and from the new owners. same thing, excellent work. Billy Vose runs their cranks extensively in his pro mod gs motors with nothing but excellent results. just saying mate. nick.

 

[Nessism]

Regarding torque plates, the cylinder liners sort of float inside the cylinder block at running temperatures. I don't think there is any liner distortion due to the head clamp load so torque plates wouldn't do much of anything. At least that's what I'm thinking.

 

[madmikeracing]

Thanx Guys I agree, being a Home Shop Guy I try to do all my own stuff, used to get heads sent out but then made the mistake of checking depth cuts done and also concentricity and was apalled!! Now made Fixtures so I can use my Mill a Bridgeport with solid carbide Pilots to do my own stuff, also building a new flowbench but all costs money and it seems moneys tight for me this year again, anyhow what a awesome bunch here, !! Kudos to you for replies, Maybe a home made type posts would intrest people. I tried sending pictures but my new camera wont for some reason downsize pics small enough to email. SHI.. Cheeses me of my old one was simple to change new one no adjustment that I could find 10 megs stuffs to large drat! Anyhow Thanx Mike

 

[Steve]

I tried sending pictures but my new camera wont for some reason downsize pics small enough to email. SHI.. Cheeses me of my old one was simple to change new one no adjustment that I could find 10 megs stuffs to large drat! Anyhow Thanx Mike

I don't bother re-sizing any of my pictures. :-k

I have a Photobucket accout and have the preferences set to automatically re-size any picture I upload to a maximum of 800 on the long side. That way, I keep my full-size originals, I don't have to worry about re-sizing pictures, and it saves space on Photobucket's servers, allowing you to upload more pictures within your free space allotment.

By the way, to post pictures, you can't upload them directly from your camera or computer, you have to use a hosting site of some sort. When you have your pictures uploaded there, go to the IMG link, copy it, then paste it here. You can do up to 10 pictures per post that way.
Click on any of the links in my sig to see what that size picture looks like.

.

 

[Guest]

Falcon might do good work for a few racers but they have screwed so many Florida racers that I don't know of any that use them anymore. I know I will never use Falcon again.
Ray is correct on Kim at Carolina Cycles top notch shop and great guy to deal with.

 

[Guest]

Can't imagine a Serdi valve seat out .036". Our Serdi has a vacuum tester built in, and every head that goes out of here is tested. A seqat that far out, wouldn't pull any vacuum.

As far as the machine work, it takes the right equipment and operator experience. Altho the Busa engine is now the main deal in the performance industry, I am still amazed how many of the older air cooled fours we still do. Always about 20 of them in the shop at any given time. They come in from all over the world.

As for cranks, all the roller bearing stuff goes to Gardner unless it is just for pin welding. Stan refers all of his plain bearing customers to us.

 

[madmikeracing]

Jay I never said Runout on the serdi, Runout was quite bad also, I dont know how that guy did it but ...anyhow too late now, So what type of measurable CONCENTRICITY DO YOU GET FROM HEADS YOU DO? Just curious, ive seen some hideous work, Dont worry Jay I havent checked any of youre stuff yet ha ha alls good man, Later Mike

 

[Guest]

We get it pretty much dead nuts. Everything laps in perfectly and pulls max vacuum. One of the reason so many shops use us is they don't have to worry about "come backs" from cylinder head and block work.

 

[madmikeracing]

Big Jay
The .036 was depth cut way too deep, the runout was .017 at the worst seat!! What measurable runout do yo uachieve with you're Heads yo udo? As a Machinist im Wondering what is actually acceptable? I do know a couple thou may not seem much but .017 seems high to myself, I ended up repairing it as well as I could, Thankyou Mike

 

[madmikeracing]

GS Head from Garage shop, made all the tooling and fixtures worked out surprisingly well, also just did couple crankshafts, lots of fun, Mike

 

[madmikeracing]

Interesting Measurments on block!!
I am not sure anyone measures like this but heres some results . Mike I finally have the proof I was hoping NOT to have. I didn't want to believe a hone or torque plate was really necessary when having these blocks honed/bored out. In my case I didn't need to have the case bolted together - but I sure as hell would've benefited from a hone plate.

Today my motor builder measured the bores of my freshly bored block. The case was split and each side was bored withOUT a hone plate. The machine shop bored to CP's specs, .0030" clearance. Pistons matched to bores. The builder torqued the case together and measured - ZERO bore distortion with the cases bolted together. Next he torqued the BHJ hone plate to the block following Ron's (Axis) ARP stud procedure. The result was .0025" piston to cylinder wall clearance towards the top 2" or so and no longer round.. lower bore stayed true. My motor builder will be doing his best to fix this.

Have your block machined with a hone plate. It costs about $300 to buy the hone plate from BHJ. Just interesting now probably doesnt matter but I feel a Torque Plate on the Bottom and the Top of a GS Block is necessary to do nuice work.. Just my 2 cents worth!! Mike

 

[Nessism]

Not so sure about this "hone plate" business. If you take a GS cylinder block and heat it up to 300F or so the liners will slide right out. This suggests to me that when the engine is at running temperature the cylinder expands more than the liner and thus, the cylinder itself is not compressing and distorting the bore roundness. The liners are not compressed in any way from the bottom either. They are held in place by the lip at the top of the liner, and then basically allowed to float inside the cylinder, which acts as a loose guide of sorts. I don't see what a hone plate would do other than hold the liner tight at the top. Maybe you could use this plate and then heat the cylinder to 300F before honing? That might work since it will expand the cylinder itself and allow the cylinder liners to float like they will at running temps. Just thinking out loud but that sounds like it may work.

 

[gs11ezrydr]

I have done quit a few GS 4 cylinder blocks over the years with no problems up to 3mm's over on the 1100's with them not changing clearances after being bolted down to the blocks. I have not tried any big blocks so can not say anything about the 80mm and up stuff. Been doing it for about 25 years now. And my boring bar is about 35 years old now. I have also done Triumph twins, XS 650 twins, with iron blocks, lots of singles up to 101 mm's and they stayed straight after being bolted to the blocks. I use all Sunnen hones and keep my stones straight and true by using truing sleeves to keep them at 100%. I also have a couple sets of stones with different grits that have four stones and four cutters each so they themselves keep the bores straight. Never done any Harleys and I know they recommend torque plates I believe because the bores are so large with iron blocks, just my guess. I also use two eight inch parallel bars on each side of the sleeves top and bottom and clamp them with sleeves that stick out of the block pointing up while boring them. Since I agree with the earlier reply of the cast iron bores floating in the aluminum blocks. I think keeping them aligned is more important that a torque plate so you don't have the cylinders staggered towards the front and to the back. A torque plate would make that a lot easier for sure by keeping them aligned. I also let all my tools stay at the same (room) temperature, pistons, blocks, micrometers, bore gauges etc. so every thing measures the same. Hone, measure, then cool, and repeat until my bores are straight and round top to bottom. Also do all my own valve seat cutting by hand three to 5 angles if needed, solid pilots and neway cutters, Install all my own guides and ream and hone them also. Built rubber plugs to fit the ports to vacuum test them also. Old school defiantly. Time consuming for sure. But usually get excellent results.

 

[madmikeracing]

Excellent Replies Guys! Thanks, That convinces me regarding the Torque Plate thing. What started all this was a call to a engine shop and they told me YES WE ALWAYS USE TORQUE PLATES ON ALL MOTORCYCLE BORES WE DO!!! Yeah more Bullishness I'm not surprised. I think also reading far too much on the Internet is actually Harmful ha ha there's so much misinformation on it . Anyhow thanx Guys Much appreciated This has unfortunately given me a new Idea on the Ultimate boring setup for my GS engines, Mike

 

[GregT]

From what my local machinist tells me, gs1100ezyrydr has hit the nail on the head, hone, COOL, measure etc...
Too many shops don't allow cooling time after a cut and frequently the unsupported sleeve ends finish up smaller than the end in the block. Surprising amount of heat generated doing a big overbore.