#307 finally back up

[blackheart]

Just in time for lows in the teens I finally got things up & running again.  Had a slight detour when my employer decided to ship me to Malaysia.

I don't recall what I reported but the first time I just plain screwed up the honing of the cylinders and for the first time ever I found you can really botch up a simple rering job when using specialty rings.  Long story short I did not look up all the cryptic sunnen letters and numbers and ended up honing with a 150 grit the first time followed by a plateau bristle set up for an AN rigid hone.  I also did not use a dry film lubricant on cylinder walls as advised by ring manufacturer.  Result was metal transfer from cylinder to chromium nitride faced ring.  Never have I witnessed such smoke in such a short time of running.

I basically rehoned, which ended up opening up bore to absolute maximum but finished with a 280 grit as I should have the first time.
I was able to pull both cylinders without pulling engine as I just dropped engine in frame to access various fasteners sometimes rocking to side for access.  Cylinder bore finished out at 3.6645, about 0.002" over the stock finish bore on the spare 27 mile engine I have.  I'm amazed how round and straight these cylinders are.  HD's I've messed with are not very round or straight,  but I've never had a set in torque plates.  I do know the vrod I have was not round and it doesn't call for torque plates.  So hats off to EH!

Fired it up today and hope to test drive on Sunday when its dry and mid 40's.  Will need to allow to warm up for sure. 

The more I've learned about the X the more I can see they didn't completely blow the design other than I think head cooling was a major issue that would have had to be addressed eventually.

[Donkey Hotey]

That’s awesome news that she’s back online. Did I understand you correctly? You think the hones knocked 0.002” off the bore? Or that’s the final clearance? I realize that’s only a thou per side but that still sounds like a lot of removal from a honing process.

How did you find / select these rings? I may be making some custom Harley cylinders in the not too distant future. I’m thinking aluminum with nikasil lining and JE pistons specd for the build. Didn’t know I could pick special rings too.

[wytfut]

Rich...
WOW... Malasia?....   Parts of that sounds interesting and then I'm glad I'm not you. Anyway about it...   Your life is interesting.

Very happy to hear you got her up and running, even with an mishap. Very cool. Hope she runs out good...

[blackheart]

Greg:

I had my dial bore gauge set up for 3.6600".  93mm works out to 3.6614", normally the clearance is in the piston.  What I found were the cylinders as stock were finished to 3.6620 or 3.6625".  I ended up at 3.6645"-3.6650", way more than I liked, but it was the only way to clean them up after the mishap.  With a rigid hone I had intended to add just 0.0005" to bore since the stock ones were scuffed just a bit.

Rings were a gapless top ring set from total seal.  I always wanted to try some.  JE pistons also has sets available in single cylinder sets which are CrN faced steel top ring which fit our pistons.  Not sure if the early Northstar V8 has the same radial depth, plus you gotta get those 8 at a time, but it appears Mahle uses a Napier 2nd ring for the Northstar.

If I could have bought 0.010" over Northstar pistons I'd have put them in but to do so its 8 at a time and I have no idea if they could be weight matched to ours in the X.  I'm just not a fan of 2618 pistons from a longevity standpoint and that's what 90% of custom pistons are made from.

If I'd just bought rings from Atlantic & bottle brush honed them it would have went without a hitch! 

Bruce, I need to write all this stuff down for your alternate parts list.

[wytfut]

The Xover list definitely needs these...