Fly cutting pistons - block in car?
Thanks,
Chris Gelineau
Diamond Pistons
877-552-2112 toll free
<strong> Larry - When cutting the valve notch's in the pistons like these guy's are. They are only removing a couple of grams. So the balance will not be effected that much. Nothing you will ever feel at least. Plus making the same notch on all of the pistons will keep it pretty darn close to a even balance. The only thing that you will have is your crank will be over balanced now, bt the weight difference is so small this is really a moot point. </strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Chris, I am sure a little piston removal is not going to have much effect on balance but I do disagree that keeping all pistons the same will keep it close to an even balance. It will be closer to all pistons being out of balance the same amount perhaps. Each piston is balanced to it own counter weight. Any time you take a balanced engine apart you mark each piston to be sure it goes back to the same journal/bearing.
Individual piston/rod combos are balanced to each individual journal.... kinda. heh
Larry when a rotating assembly is "balanced" only 1 assembly is weighed... then this "bob weight" is used to balance the crank... the ONLY reason EACH piston and EACH rod are weighed is to assure they are within a couple of grams of each other.
as far as Notching the pistons in the block there is an easier ( and cleaner) way.. use Duct tape.
2 pieces vertically 2 pieces Horizontally over the piston ( including the gap to the cylinder wall) THEN while cutting stick the nozzle of the shop vac into the exhaust port of the head you are cutting with and turn it on. No shavings in the motor no grease on everything and no scratches except where the cutter ate thru the tape. once you do this you just tap the cutter down till it makes contact with the piston... use a Feeler guage between the top of the guide the cutter is in and the collar on the cutter to determine the depth of the notch you wanna cut and then use the drill on it... that simple.
Many race engine builders such as Bill Grumpy Jenkins believe in over balance as best method to keep bearings in tact at hi horsepower levels.
No problem in our scenario IMHO, if you want to get nervous about balance issues you should look into how well these aftermarket reduction pulleys(crank balancer) work! They make me nervous! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="gr_images/icons/wink.gif" />



