DeTomaso Mailing List: April 99, Message #16

Okay, pick your brains time....


I just got my tax refund.  Woohooo!!!, now I can start progressing on my
351C rebuild.  So I just get off the phone with my friend who is a
machinist at a local engine shop.  The shop is one of those large
throughput shops, a veritable engine rebuilding production line.  I'm not
feeling real good about it at the moment.

He can't special order anything.  In other words, I can't get 10, 15 or 20
overs for my block through him, so I'll go through a Pantera Vendor, not a
problem.  Or is there....

I mic'd the cyclinders and came out with .009 max at the top of ring travel
on one cylinder, all the rest were well under .007 over.  This is all old
news.  So I figured I'd bore 10 over and hand hone to fit each piston.  My
machinist friend starts talking about cylinder true, straightness and stuff
like that.  Whoa, back that truck up for me.  I guess what he's saying is
that even if I bore 10 over, I could still have some shadowing  in the
cylinders, if the cylinder is not 'true' to the boring bar.  Okay, so now
I'm scared again.  He figures I should just go 30 over and be done with it.
 The pistons are cheaper and I'm garanteed the cylinder will clean up at
that bore.  Personally, I'd rather go the 10, but how do I make sure I get
a good bore without the shadowing?  Argh... confused, lost, don't know
exactly which way to go.  Initially, I was inclinded to go 30 over, 'cause
that's all I knew, the parts were cheap and I was resigned to it.  Now that
I've mic'd the block, I'd like to maybe keep it  good for another rebuild.

Maybe I should just Hone it by hand to fit each piston from the point it is
now, without boring.



Thoughts needed, advice requested.  Please help.

Asa Jay