Fraser,

I think I know one of those places you are talking about! We have had some stuff I had to have the crank grinder here true back up and essentially take .002 off of and then use some coated bearings to get round journals and teh right bearing clearance. I have seen some crazy Eagle big block Chevy cranks in the past and some SCAT small block Chevy cranks that were not so good. OTOH the good SCAT stuff is usually very nice. I've even seen some bad Lunati stuff even lately where the fillets were messed up right out of the box. It all depends and you always have to check.

 

Thanks for all the info guys........please keep it coming!Traver

 

Ok, i'm leaning towards the Compstar now, what about rods? I know thats a whole 'nother subject, but I mean compatability...

Would the Compstar rods work better with a Compstar crank than Eagle rods would?

 

crankshaft doesn't matter, their interchangable

compstar rods fit nicer then eagle rods.

compstar comes standard with ARP 2000

 

aren't the ARP 2000 a little overkill i thought i read?

and the Eagle has (or can be ordered with) L19 bolts i think? Heard those were pretty strong too.

Is the price difference worth getting the Compstar over the Eagle?

 

We are talking about .050 of an inch correct? No issue.

 

20,000 more psi of clamping load

Whats overkill about something thats not going to break?

and no issues like L19 material has due to its properties, L19 I would consider overkill.

 

There's no difference between the rods as far as how they work and they are both on center. The rest is up to you. Again the people on this site that have rod problems are usually not having them for any reason that is legitimate with any of these behemoth rods and 7/16 bolts. There's probably more overall abuse handed out on this board to Eagle rods than to any and I have never seen any legitimate failures but the Compstars are a little nicer though.

 

.050 can be a huge issue when you are already out of real estate.

 

I like callies

 

From all the builders I spoke to the 4.1 crank is not an issue. In fact it is being used in almost every big cube engine now on this board.


As far the crank, arent they all more or less equal (off shore cranks that is)until they machine them? Yes material comes into play but arent the Callies and Eagle both cast in China? The higher the price the more machining invloved to lighten it up and bring it within tighter specs? Isnt this the real difference? The machining and if your going to have the crank worked over in the first place then why would it matter? Isnt that called balancing the rotating assembly? So what we're talking about here is time to balance the crank right? Please correct me if I'm wrong, it's good education for the board and myself.

 

The 4.100 and up engines are the ones I tend to get to be "fixed" more than the 4.000 inchers probably 4 to 1. Half the ones we have received had issues from incorrectly put together parts. Before Christmas alone we got 4 strokers to fix again and they all had big issues from shops incompetent to know how to build them. Two even had pistons hitting the crank and one has pistons that can not work in it. One had pistons hitting the actual block from another "reputable" shop! This is besides the usual stupid stuff like gapless rings or upside down rings.

I've never gotten one of these engines that I couldn't fix or figure out the problem in once we had the engine apart for at least 5 minutes. I did two more for Vendors on the right that had extreme or mild smoking problems alone right before I left for Seattle and I have two more that will be fixed when I return. Even the 4.000 inch stroke stuff is always being blamed for extreme oil consumption and it's really almost never anything to do with the dimensions whatsoever but rather with the thought (or lack of thought) that went into the parts to make that assembly.

No the different 4.100 and up cranks are different forgings of course not castings but I think you know that. Some are almost the same and some are different. The machining is definitely a lot of what makes it a good crank as far as sizing and stroke indexing and accuracy and the heat treat and the fillet radius's used and the geometry of the journals. The journals need to be round and straight and have no taper etc.

This is all more easier said than done and the Callies stuff is definitely somewhat better in this respect for sure at this point and time. There are also different qualities of 4340 steel and there's also the oiling hole clockings etc. Then you have balance and total weight on any particular crank. There are a lot of differences if you really use these cranks everyday and they all have their applications and uses.

I try to get people to put their money where it will help them the most and not in a crazy overly expensive crank and rods (Lunati) which will do almost nothing to make them faster or more reliable. These parts are always great parts but compared to higher end valve springs of heads or intakes and lifters etc they are almost a total waste of money. I do think the Callies stuff is a good blend of bang for the buck with outstanding quality and I use their stuff in the higher end builds and the Compstar and Eagle in the less expensive builds.

 

Good info!

 

I used to machine cranks for Cummins about 10 years ago. I worked in the Cummins/Chrysler (Gas) division. Of course most companies use CNC equipment now, but we did it the good old fashion way.

You have to dress the face of the cutting wheel regularly to keep it clean and flat. It does not take much taper or out of round to ruin a good crank.

The good companies have good equipment, good quality control, and of course good core material to work with. Most of the cranks we did were cast, but we occasionally woul cut some steel cranks also. I took pride in the cranks I did, but I saw some real junk go through the shop. Needless to say our QC was not good.

 

Yep.

I know of this firsthand......

 

Hahahha believe it or not I wasn't even including yours! You have pistons hitting the block and the crank! Thats a new record for one engine!

It will be apart later here today finally and I will see if those pistons are saveable.

 

Why does this not surprise me.....

I have Hee-Haw luck

 

Yeah I just wanted you to be right there when I checked it out so you could see for yourself if anything crazy was going on and unfortunately there was!

 

racer7088. I read that you don't like the gapless rings. Have you ever tried the C&A zero gapless rings? They are desinged different than the Total Seals. I used Total Seals in my Turbo bike, and wasn't impressed, but I did like the Zero Gapless rings. Its one ring, not two.

 

No gapless rings used by me (or any OEM in the entire world which might tell you something) although I use lots of C and A and Total seal regular rings. They are both great companies which make great products. I just haven't seen any real gains or good come of them especially considering the price.