Piston and pin questions

[devilbrad]

OK, getting ready to go through a 318 Magnum fuel injected motor. Crank has been lightened and knife edged, I have Eagle SIR rods for full floating pins, the old stock pistons have light weight tapered wrist pins, but they are for press fit. I have a friend with a set of forged pistons that will fit, but unsure if they are full floating or not. How can I check used pistons to make sure they are usefull and not damaged from being in a supercharged motor? Also, are wrist pins the same for full floating and press fit, differences being the rods and psitons only? Or are the wrist pins different as well? On a budget here!! LOL Also Don, or whomever else would like to respond, what do you recommend for piston to wall clearance on a .030 over 318 and ring end gaps? They will be Diamond forged pistons, cam in the .550 range and Edelbrock aluminum heads.

[Don]

Piston clearance is determined by the piston manufacturer as are the ring end gaps....call RON at Diamond and order them from me I'll be able to save you some money.

Don

got to run now

[devilbrad]

OK, heres the deal, I had $500 credit at Kammer & Kammer, they use Diamonds as well and I have known Bob Kammer for a while now. I went ahead and used my credit with him and ordered my pistons through him. I have decided to ditch the Eagle SIR rods and am looking at either the Eagle H- Beams or H-beam rods made by a company called CAT. Here they are: www.mopartsracing.com/parts/cat.html Been told these rods are excellent. Don, do you have any other suggestions for rods? What do you guys use. I dont have a supplier for rods, so I may finally be buying from you instead of getting your free advice!! He he!! This wwill be a nitrous motor, probably end up with a 200hp shot on it. Any tips and tricks for bulletproof (without me being stupid!!) bottem end build ups? Thanks all!!!

[Don]

In my opinion here is the best to worst list of all those Chinese rods:
Eagle H beam
Scat
CAT...the absolute worst

Stock FORGED Mopar 340 rods are tougher than all of them combined.

I run STOCK 273, 1966 vintage 100,000 mile rods in my race engine, I have twisted it to 7000 RPM way more times than I'd like to admit and it's pushing 500 HARD HARD passes.

If you want an aftermarket rod, cut the crank throws to 2.100 and run a Callais Forged 6.125 rod and you won't have to worry about scattering your guts all over the race track and embarrassing us Mopar guy's in front of all those 350/350 350 geared Chebby's in the staging lanes.

$250.00 more money but you won't have to buy a new motor every week.

Your dreaming if you think that any Chinese rod or any Chinese parts are going to hold up to what your trying to do.

You do have a forged crank ...right?

If not I have a nice one at 10/10 that only needs a quick polish...$150.00

"You can never exceed the speed of your wallet"

[devilbrad]

Interesting. Since my last post I have learned that CAT makes the Eagle rods. I know of plenty of Dakotas with blowers and/or nitrous (5-600rwhp) running the Eagle and CAT rods with no failures. Not disagreeing with you at all, just posting my observations. The crank I have is stock cast (also in these same trucks) that has been lightened and knife edged by Kammer & Kammer, if I were to change cranks I would just go stroker, but I have already ordered my pistons. I do like the idea of turning down the journals and maybe getting a little more stroke out of it, do you think the stock stroke pistons will work with that little of a stroke?

[Don]

I hear this all the time...."I know of a guy that's doing Blah blah with Eagle or CAT rods and he has no problem" I've seem them, lot's of them, a 440 let go this weekend....CAT rods ventilated the block, pan, broke the cam...trashed the entire engine. Rod just pulled apart at the beam and took a $5000 bill with it.

Read My article on the website "Chinese CopyCAT SCAT pack"

I don't care if they make the best rod in world, I will not send my money to a communist country, using slave labor and converting our US dollars to Nuclear weapons and pointing them back at us.

Why do we have so many unemployed people in the USA? Could it possibly be that 100's of 1'000's of jobs have been lost to Corporate Greed and the need for us to buy Cheap Products?....

"Increase profits....send it to China to be built, the hell with the millions of layoffs and our destitute economy, we need profits for our shareholders"

It's your money...... me, I'll keep mine in the USA, My Home, My Grandsons's Home, where I have the freedom to work hard and earn a decent living and still have the Freedom to express my opinion without being thrown in Jail....and I don't get a ration of fish head soup and rice twice a day.