I am currently looking to take my project DSM to the next level. It is a 1990 Eagle Talon Tsi AWD. Currently it is a solid 12's performer and is great around town, but has 151,000 on the odometer/stock engine. I am looking to do a full build-up in the next month and here are my thoughts on parts, etc.:

Block:
Ross 8.5:1 0.020 over bore pistons
Eagle Rods (was going to go with Crower, but for the saved $$$ I doubt they will break)
Stock Crank
Balance stuff removal
Block will be over-bored 0.020, decked/finished, etc.
All will be balanced

Head:
HKS 264/272's
Ferrea springs/retainers
Ferrea valves
Full port/polish, 3 angle valve job update

Lots of OEM stuff...update timing components (last timing work done was less than 10k ago)
Oil pump...yadda yadda yadda...I hate this stuff. So minute yet so important/expensive But it must all be done

Electronics:
AEM EMS (yep, the AFC has got to go, ).
Wideband sensor?
Ignition?

And of course it is getting updated suspension, Baer big brakes, and more goodies to make it happy Not to forget it will be fully dyno-tuned so extra money has been set aside for this

Currently the car has:
Shep tranny (same one he had when he was running 9's...this is the premier fully built Shep tranny short of his current custom one he runs 8's with).
4-bolt rear
3" intake
2g MAS
Big ported 16g (snail shell is ported as well...rarely done)
Ported 2g manifold
Ported O2 housing
Spearco FMIC
Apexi 3" downpipe
Apexi 3" exhaust (no cats...this is Idaho, ).
Greddy Profec B boost controller
Greddy turbo timer
Apexi SAFC
550cc injectors
Magnecor 10mm plug wires
Walbro 255
ACT lightweight flywheel
ACT 2600 clutch
Autometer cobalt gauges
Custom lightweight stereo system (example, my two 10" carbon fiber subwoofers are only 7lbs. each!)

There's probably more that I am forgetting, but that is the important stuff.

MY GOAL:
My goal is to drastically improve reliability under extreme boost as well as be able to withstand high RPM's and ultimately make this thing run in the high 10's/low 11's (of course, the BIG 16g will have to go eventually, but I will keep it for break in of the engine. Eventually the car will get some form of a GT30R mutt turbo, innovative technologies turbo header, etc.). The car is also my daily driver (the increased 8.5 compression should improve my gas mileage over stock 7.8 ).

I would love to hear anyone's thoughts on any and all of my plans. If you see a part that you are unsure about and have a better recommendation, let me know. Thanks!

The only thing i might do is use a kevlar timing belt. I think it's from Power Enterprise or something like that. And since you are using the the EMS im curious why you are sticking with the 2g MAS when you could use a MAP set up. other than that sounds like you have everthing else covered.

sounds like you got the whole process down perfect. I just got done basically the same thing in my boys car last month. I would like to mention since you are doing a 3 angle valve job, you might go 1mm oversize for not too much more, also bronze valve guides and seals while you are in there. Also, don't have the intake polished. You should mildly port the intake but not polish, gasket match the exhaust side.

BTW, what head gasket set up are you using. 4 layer metal head gasket has good results with fresh deck surfacesup to 30psi all day. You could also experiment with a copper gasket or even sick stuff like o-ringing it for maximum boost. Just some sugestions....

Good Luck.

Thanks for your replies!

2g MAS will be eliminated with the AEM; sorry I did not mention that.

I'll be going with the 4-layer HG unless I can find some info out there that proves another HG will work better for 30psi without much added cost or work. I am intrigued by 1mm oversized stuff...I have realized that keeping the stock size reduces many problems, but if done right is leaps and bounds beyond stock size. I'll discuss this with my mechanic tomorrow and see what his opinion is and bring that back here for other opinions; it is good to hear that someone has done a similar buildup; do you have a link to the list of mods done to the car you built-up?

And yeah, no polishing of the head; I forgot to edit the polish out of my initial post. I've gone over air turbulance in the intake side and its benefits to fuel flow into the combustion chamber many times with my mechanic. Polishing seems to be a very old-skool thing, eh?

Thanks guys! Keep it coming!

Now is the best time to use Manganese Bronze Guides and Oversized SS Valves sized and fit right. You don't necessarily need to go with Ferrea since they are overpriced and there are other very high quality valves out there at a better price.
A set of Revised Lifters with the wider operating range is highly recommended.
ARP's and Align Hone the mains and of course Bore and Finish Hone with a Torque Plate using ARP Head Studs .
Another option would be Cometic head gasket but make sure it is the HP one.Just make sure you have the right surface finish on both head and block for a MLS type gasket.
Good luck
Mitch.

Wonder Turbo setup are you going with...... the 16g aint doin 30 PSI if thats the boost your planning?

My own thoughts (assuming a large turbo if you are shooting for low 11's -10's):

- Go with the Crower springs and titanium retainers.

- Don't port and polish the head or go with larger valves. Instead go with a good set of stock sized back cut and swirl polished stainless valves, a good multi angle valve job, clean up the valve throats, bowls and ports, port match the exhaust side of the head to the manifold only. The reason being that for the amount of money you are going to spend you could end up losing HP instead of gaining. Porting the 4g63 head is very tricky and should be performed by an expert which is VERY familiar with the head. I've personally seen guys spend big bucks on porting ($2k+) only to have the car go slower. I urge you to live vicariously through others experiences.

- AEM is a great product but not intuiative at all. If the SAFC is a 3 on a 1-10 scale of difficulty then the AEM is a 12. Make sure you have the money and time to pay someone to have them tune it for you. It is VERY easy to destroy a multi thousand dollar project with the thing.

- Go with the 272/272 for the cams, the 264 will be a waste.

- Do not go with oversized anything if you can possibly help it (pistons, valves, etc.) The added weight of the componets slows down the valve train and lower end and doesn't give a much larger increase in HP over the stock size. Remember lighter is always better.

- Do not use the ARP main bolts. A new set of stock bolts are the ticket and will hold up to 8 second passes. With the ARP's you should use a dowel kit to help stabilize the main caps as the studs have no shoulders on them and may allow the caps to move under load. The added cost of machining in dowels is not worth it. Spend your money on something else.

- The 4 layer HG is fine, but be absolutely sure that you have the head and block decked and that you tell the machinist that you are going to be using a metal head gasket. The metal gasket requires a much finer finish than the stock gasket and if both surfaces are not properly prepared you could end up with major head sealing problems.

-Don't waste your money on the Kevlar timing belt. You will need to change out all the other components at the normal intervals kevlar or no kevlar main belt. Spend your money elsewhere.

- Before anything is installed, make sure you check, double check and then triple check everything.

Hey, thanks for all of the info guys.

Boost Deez-no, the 16g will not be used for 30psi. I will keep it on for now for breaking in of the engine and when it is broken in, I will be getting an innovative technologies turbo header/Garrett ball-bearing GT30R hybrid (haven't quite decided on a certain model yet).

Rick-
Thanks for all of the info, especially about the porting of the head; this part is what I am most eery about, but I have a guy in Michigan that does 4g63 and only 4g63 head work. He's not cheap, but he seems to be the best out there. I am glad to hear that stock size valves will be okay; they were actually my first choice (I don't really want to mess with changing so much at once).

I do want to ask why you recommend the Crower springs/retainers over the Ferrea's. I have spoken to quite a few 4g63 tuners and they mention that float problems are more commonly found with the Crowers than with the Ferrea's. I am not too concerned about the extra cost for the springs/retainers.

Yes, the AEM setup will be used by a pro in Redmond, WA to tune the car on an AWD dyno. This is the same shop that does the engine noises for video games such as Project Gotham Racing 2, etc. Kind of cool...

No Kevlar belt for me...OEM all the way.

Doing the 272's. I thought they would limit the car's idling for street use, but I have been able to witness firsthand that they don't hinder it all that much for the added benefit that you get (not to mention at no extra cost).

So no on the ARP main bolts? Hmmm...interesting...I like saving $$$

Thanks everyone!

Originally posted by !^3
Hey, thanks for all of the info guys.
I do want to ask why you recommend the Crower springs/retainers over the Ferrea's. I have spoken to quite a few 4g63 tuners and they mention that float problems are more commonly found with the Crowers than with the Ferrea's. I am not too concerned about the extra cost for the springs/retainers.

Click to expand...

A couple of reasons:

The Crower setup is good to at least 9500rpm (In fact, new stock parts are capable of 8500 without valve float, though I wouldn't trust it for an extended period of time at that rate-years). The Ferrea's will allow you a slightly higher redline but I can see no reason to push the engine that far since 95% of the turbo's out there for the DSM's are most efficent under the 9500rpm threshold which is where the Crowers can take you.

The Ferrea double springs have a much higher spring rate than the Crowers. This means that the engine must now work that much harder to overcome the extra spring pressure which results in a loss of HP. It also increases cam journal wear as well.

So with all of this said, you end up paying more money for something that will cause higher parasitic losses and not improve your redline by any usable means.

I'd run a stock headgasket, decked block and shaved heads. Squeeze it together with ARPs...

For me it's either the stock headgasket or a full o-ring job..

What Rick is saying about the crower springs and ti retainers is well... think of the retainer, valve and keeper as unsprung weight like on a suspension. You get to many bumps too fast with a heavy tire and wheel and it hops... Well rev too fast with stock valves and springs and your valves float... Lighten the retainer (titanium), use a lighter valve a slightly stiffer spring and it wont float. If you go really stiff with the valve springs it will also prevent float but at the expense of parasitic HP loss since they are harder to compress.. It is also harder on the rest of the valve train.

I would get the bronze guides on the head... You can run alot tighter valve to guide clearances. They also stay in spec and last longer.

With the valve sizes he is right. Unless a head shop with alot of DSM experience is doing the head stay stock size. Unless they know how to make the bowl and port actually utilize the larger valve you just wasted money...

As for the AEM... Dyno tuning is the best...

Alot of people have figured it out on the AEM forums for help.. You can download calibrations from those who have dynotuned nearly the same or the exact same setup.

I have like 1/100th that support in setting up my pro-efi and well it is running nicely feeding 98% ethyl alcohol thru 1680cc injectors.

One thing not to overlook... A WB o2.. They are priceless...

Where people get into trouble with the AEM is in timing setup-- CAS and going all out for power without figuring out how to really setup timing and fuel maps.

With a wideband o2 you can set it up to adjust air fuel ratios at all throttle positions not just idle and cruise..

Like he said it is like a 12 on a dificulty scale... But if you do your homework and plan out every step of the ECU setup it is'nt impossible...

You guys like to read a lot but I think you only remember what you like to hear and then give advices based on others experiences. I measure first , get my hands dirty and open my mouth after I see the results.

You would like to hear what guys with real hands-on experience would have to say about things that concern you but they got chased away by "knowledgeable" persons who read or heard about the subject and know better. Probably the next guy that will be chased away by guys who know better is Brian Nutter (there are already guys out there who talk shit about him; then everybody is wondering why is it that he doesn't post any more).

This forum should be about helping guys out but some keep spreading false rumors just because they read something somewhere and it looks like it makes sense. Please do not repeat the same mistakes over and over again and
pay attention to what is being said in replies to your own posts.

OS valves have all the advantages over stock size except one: the machinist have to know what he does. When will you understand that the factory did not design these engines with 600HP goals in mind. We are just lucky to love a car that has a platform with a lot of potential. That doesn't mean that we cannot improve things to make our life easier when we try to reach certain HP levels. OS valves allow us to reshape the bowls and runners while taking full advantage of the good stock seats. Will that get us easier where we want , with performance gains all across the RPM range and huge gains up top, all these with increased reliability? I think so!

ARP's are "thinner" and "allow for caps shits". Another example of things heard somewhere and proven wrong by
Facts . No they are not smaller in size than the stock ones, in fact they are a thou and a half or more bigger in diameter than the shoulder on the stock ones and the stock ones are loose as a goose in the main caps bores. The only thing is that you will have to Align Hone the mains but you should probably do that anyway( STOP ! Don't try to tell me that I'm wrong when I say that you should have the mains Align Honed with stock fasteners too! Go torque the caps down, measure the bores and check for straightness and then tell me that you don't need to).

!^3
You can choose to do what ever you want with your money but , unless you are a millionaire and like to change engine setups every year, remember you will probably do this one time only so choose wisely.
Mitch.

P.S "pay attention..." link fixed I hope.

Originally posted by Suparata
OS valves have all the advantages over stock size except one: the machinist have to know what he does. When will you understand that the factory did not design these engines with 600HP goals in mind. We are just lucky to love a car that has a platform with a lot of potential. That doesn't mean that we cannot improve things to make our life easier when we try to reach certain HP levels. OS valves allow us to reshape the bowls and runners while taking full advantage of the good stock seats. Will that get us easier where we want , with performance gains all across the RPM range and huge gains up top, all these with increased reliability? I think so!

Click to expand...

I agree... It's just that every domestic or other local machine shop that has done alot of engines but few of them 4g63's probably can't pull it off.

Originally posted by Suparata
The only thing is that you will have to Align Hone the mains but you should probably do that anyway( STOP ! Don't try to tell me that I'm wrong when I say that you should have the mains Align Honed with stock fasteners too! Go torque the caps down, measure the bores and check for straightness and then tell me that you don't need to).

Click to expand...

Yes production blocks vary. Believe it or not the best proceedure if you are'nt align honing with stock bolts is to mark the bolts and make sure they go back to where they came from. The best proceedure of all is to always align hone no matter what.

Originally posted by Suparata
OS valves have all the advantages over stock size except one: the machinist have to know what he does. When will you understand that the factory did not design these engines with 600HP goals in mind. We are just lucky to love a car that has a platform with a lot of potential. That doesn't mean that we cannot improve things to make our life easier when we try to reach certain HP levels. OS valves allow us to reshape the bowls and runners while taking full advantage of the good stock seats. Will that get us easier where we want , with performance gains all across the RPM range and huge gains up top, all these with increased reliability? I think so!

Click to expand...

Use the stock seats huh? That's an extremely smart thing to do with oversized valves. So your going to place a man hole cover on a coke bottle? If the seat size stays the stock size how do you expect to get more air out of the port without a valve seat becoming larger also. If you are using a 1mm oversized valve, common sense tells you that the seat size isn't going to be the same a valve that's 1mm smaller. Sure my machinist can cut new seats to fit the 1mm oversized valves with the stock seats but how smart would that be?

Bigger is better, right? Make things easier with a larger valve? Sure you do. I mean it only cause the valves to be more shrouded, which means you now have to pay more money for bowl work. You'll also need to enlarge the throat area as well, because no matter what size the end opening is it's not going to flow any more than the throat of the valve will allow. You can have a valve head the size of Kansas on a straw sized throat and its not going to move any more air than what the diameter of the straw will allow. Since your larger valve is also heavier that means that its going to add extra weight on the valvetrain, so now those extra grams of weight make the spring work that much harder to close so now you have to think about increasing the spring pressure which causes parasitic losses on the engine because now the engine has to work that much harder to compress the stronger spring. Oh, I almost forgot that extra weight caused by the oversized valve that you think is so necessary also causes the valve head to bounce that much more on the seat which could cause premature seat wear which leads to a bad seal along with increasing the potential of valve float, not to mention what its doing to the cam lobes becaused you increased the spring pressure. Reliabilty going up, I think not.

So now that you spent all that extra money to fix all the inherent problems with going with a larger valve what did you gain? Maybe 50hp, maybe you lost hp, who knows. Mitsubishi stock head will support 500+HP in its stock configuration with minor mods. So what's smarter, spending +$2000 dollars to eek out maybe less HP or possibly 10% more or sticking with something that already works?

After going through at least 8 different head setups of my own from a stock head to something as radical as a DPR Stage 5+ with clover leaf combustion chambers and moddifed valve angles, I have a pretty damn good idea about what works and at what level it will work. Obviously at the HP level that he is at and the levels that he is trying to obtain, massive head reworking isn't what he needs.

In the words of an old professor, K.I.S.S. - keep it simple stupid.

ARP's are "thinner" and "allow for caps shits". Another example of things heard somewhere and proven wrong by
Facts . No they are not smaller in size than the stock ones, in fact they are a thou and a half or more bigger in diameter than the shoulder on the stock ones and the stock ones are loose as a goose in the main caps bores. The only thing is that you will have to Align Hone the mains but you should probably do that anyway( STOP ! Don't try to tell me that I'm wrong when I say that you should have the mains Align Honed with stock fasteners too! Go torque the caps down, measure the bores and check for straightness and then tell me that you don't need to).

Click to expand...

How extremely funny it is that you chose that particular thread to try to prove a point. Obviously you did not take the time to throughly read it. Mike (Paradox), my friend whom I gave that information to, clearly states some facts in that thread that somehow you seemed to miss. So I'll visually show you the things that I showed and explained to him.

Ok, 1st pic. Going left to right, here you can see a CRCO dowel, ARP stud, and a stock stud bolt.


Next we have a demonstration of the ARP stud, with some oil, snugly sliding through the CRCO dowel and the main cap FROM ONE END TO THE OTHER.


(Next pics) With a heavy amount of oil and literally screwing the stock stud in through the same cap, it bearly clears the CRCO dowels. My friend Mike wanted to switch from ARP studs to stock bolts and it was a bi*** to get the stock bolts to fit through the dowels.


However as you can see in this pic the shoulders of the stock bolts WILL NOT FIT through the CRCO dowel and stops at the shoulders. The only possible way to make it fit would be to deform the dowel.


In fact, I was able to turn the cap upside down and rest it squarely on the shoulders of the bolts.


So what does this tell you? The ARP stud has a SMALLER body than the shoulders of the stock bolts.

If the stock bolts, which have shoulders that are larger than the entire body length of the ARP studs, are loose in the caps, what do you think the ARP's are going be....tighter? In case you guessed wrong, they are more LOOSE in the caps than the stock studs.

So now you spend $50 on the CRCO kit to tighten up the slack between the cap and studs, another $50-$75 to have the caps reamed, $150-$175 for an align hone, plus the cost of the studs $85, to get a end results that at the 600hp level isn't better than align honing the block and putting in stock studs (which guys are running 10's and better reliably on) Real freaking smart....

You guys like to read a lot but I think you only remember what you like to hear and then give advices based on others experiences. I measure first , get my hands dirty and open my mouth after I see the results.

You would like to hear what guys with real hands-on experience would have to say about things that concern you but they got chased away by "knowledgeable" persons who read or heard about the subject and know better. Probably the next guy that will be chased away by guys who know better is Brian Nutter (there are already guys out there who talk shit about him; then everybody is wondering why is it that he doesn't post any more).

This forum should be about helping guys out but some keep spreading false rumors just because they read something somewhere and it looks like it makes sense. Please do not repeat the same mistakes over and over again and
pay attention to what is being said in replies to your own posts.

Click to expand...

Don't worry about Brian Nutter, I wonder why probably more than anyone why I even bother with trying to pass on anything. Obviously you didn't follow your own advice. You tried to prove my advice wrong without actually, as someone in this thread stated "measure first , get my hands dirty and open my mouth after I see the results". For a supposed "wiseman" that's just freaking brainless.

If you want to argue something with me, fine. I don't mind being wrong, but don't go after me like I'm some freaking noob that just stepped on the scene. I've been on the block for more than 12 years and have built up more 4g63 in those years then I would guess 99% of the people on this board. When my friend Mike spoke about a guy that's built more than a handful of stroker motors, one with a GT35R, I'll give you three guesses as to whom he was refering to, and the first two don't count. Your little condesending attitude and made up title doesn't move me. If you want to disagree with me, fine. I don't claim to know everything, and will even be man enough to admit when I'm wrong, but you better bring something better than some BS thread on NABR and your little attitude.

If you want to continue to argue these points you can do so by yourself, because frankly I don't care anymore. Before you posted this crap, and decided to having a little pissing contest with me, I had a good deal of respect for your opinions, but you have managed to put that squarely down the drain.:thumbdown

If you're putting a standalone on a 1g, why not go with Autronic? It is MUCH MUCH easier to use, and if I'm not mistaken, AEM doesn't make a 1g plug and play, so you're going to be stuck re-wiring your engine harness either way.

Originally posted by Mirage2LTurbo
If you're putting a standalone on a 1g, why not go with Autronic? It is MUCH MUCH easier to use, and if I'm not mistaken, AEM doesn't make a 1g plug and play, so you're going to be stuck re-wiring your engine harness either way.

Click to expand...

Um, , you have a Mirage so you must be out of the loop. AEM makes a plug'n'play EMS for the 1G...it's pretty much the only one out there and has more support than any other 1g compatible EMS. Thanks anyway.

Rick, its late, I'll try to digest your post tomorrow Thanks for the run-through.

Don't bother digesting much of the last post.

Stick with the orignal post of the items I suggested and you should be well on your way to something that works well with a min. outlay of cash.

On a completely different topic, yes, I know I put the stock bolts in through the wrong side of the cap. The point was to demonstrate the size of the bolts vs. the ARP studs, not the correct installation method for installing caps or bolts.

No, I sold my Mirage, now I have a 91 AWD. I've downloaded and looked at the AEM software a number of times, and it it extremely confusing. It took me a good while just to figure out how to load a map, and I still have yet to find any timing or fuel maps.

With the Autronic, it took me and a friend a solid day to wire it up, but when I looked at the software, it made sense. I loaded the base map from the US distributor, had the overall fuel cal set, fuel map loaded, and autotuning on the fuel within 5 minutes - NO JOKE.

-Colin

Rick would make an excellent candidate as an executive in any company's sales department because he can make believers out of people.
Unfortunately he was misinformed and/or he misinterpreted the information he had so I will give him a chance to look over some things and make his decision.
Stay tuned, we'll be right back.
Mitch.

Like I stated, I'm not going to agrue the points anymore and I'm not going to have a pissing contest to make anyone believe anything. If someone believes differently than me, fine you have your own opinion and I respect that. I've stated the facts based upon my own observations, experiences, etc. and I'll stick by them. I agree to disagree.

So in other words, the show is over, move on, there is nothing left to see here.

The studs are not designed to locate the caps. The dowel kit locates the caps.

The studs just clamp the cap in place and the dowels are what aligns everything. They may be thinner than OE but made from better materials. Also since the stud has no contact with the cap down it's side and also does'nt have to fight any side loads makes it even stronger.

OS vs.Stock: Intake 55.9g vs. 54.9g, Exhaust 51.6g vs. 52.6g.
" Believe it or not the 1mm over ones we are using are 1g heavier than stock for the intake (1.8% MORE) and 1g lighter for the exhaust(1.8% LESS), they are Forged SS and a Hydraulic Press was only able to bend them not break them". This is what I've posted in a reply to a previous post a while back that I'm not sure it has been read.
So we are talking 1g difference in weight plus or minus.
Now let's think about the roughly 7g lighter Ti Retainers that some argue can raise the "safe rev limit" with 500-700RPM. Let's take 700 for comparison: if 7g LESS Weight equates 700RPM MORE than the 1g HEAVIER OS Intake would equate 100RPM LESS. Is that 1g significant?

Stock seats.
When I say that you can really take advantage of the "good stock seats" I mean the very good quality of the stock seats . 1MM over valves can be installed in a 4G63 without replacing the stock seats inserts like I had to do on a 240SX . That does not mean that the ID of the seats stay the same :now you can have the ID machined , seat angles and bowl area improved and all the same/right size.
So the "straw" size gets modified too.
OS Valves installed right will give improved performance overall with any setup but let's face it :how many guys stop at a 16g level? The sky is the limit after that. Up-ing the boost may not be the answer to all problems:High quality OS Valves makes easier to reach certain HP levels with more reliability.

ARP vs. Stock.
Let's start with facts.
Stock studs shoulder .3914" thick
ARP Studs .3917" thick
Main caps bolt holes bore .4100" which gives a clearance of at least .0183 . That is MORE THAN EIGHTEEN THOUSANDS "loose as a goose" . So does it really matter the difference in size between the two when it comes to keeping the caps in place? It doesn't because caps are not aligned by how "tight" fit the fasteners have in the bolt holes. The difference is the clamping which holds stuff in place but I'll get back to this.

Alignment Dowels are used most of the time in Aluminum heads and blocks where high load is encountered. While clamping forces usually keep things in place there is only so much Torque that can be pulled on aluminum threads so Dowels are used to compensate and to align the caps. A good example of why some heads like the 4G63's have Dowels and a Subaru or a 5S-FE Toyota do not is because of less load on cams as a result of ,among other things, much softer springs. So the 15 ft/lbs will do it .
But in our case we are talking about cast iron caps machined to fit snugly in place and clamped down with 50 ft/lbs stock and 60 ft/lbs w/ARP Molly which means around 97 ft/lbs with oil. Now who is going to hold that damned cap in place better: Stock Bolts or Arp's? Now if you can generate such a high load on the caps to have them stretch an ARP you don't have to worry about so called "caps shifting" because your crank and main bearings are already ####ed at that point and it didn't happen because the caps "misaligned" themselves.

I can make mistakes too but I believe I did my homework before I opened my mouth this time.
Mitch.

Originally posted by MNGSX
The studs are not designed to locate the caps. The dowel kit locates the caps.

The studs just clamp the cap in place and the dowels are what aligns everything. They may be thinner than OE but made from better materials. Also since the stud has no contact with the cap down it's side and also does'nt have to fight any side loads makes it even stronger.

Click to expand...

This is dead on!

The bolts/studs do nothing more than apply clamping force and crush on the bearings, not to locate the caps. The main reason for switching to ARP studs is for the better material which is more resistant to deformation, stretching, etc., not for increasing the clamping force on the caps. If you wanted to do that you could simply torque down the stock bolts more. However, putting to much force on the caps can cause increased bearing wear and failure.

I think you two guys should keep going at it!!!!!!!!!!!! it is fun, plus you learn something new!!

Originally posted by percyo
I think you two guys should keep going at it!!!!!!!!!!!! it is fun, plus you learn something new!!

Click to expand...

Percy do you want me to put some steel shots or something in your engine or what ? I'm not done with your engine so watch it
Mitch.

Originally posted by Rick@AP
This is dead on!

The bolts/studs do nothing more than apply clamping force and crush on the bearings, not to locate the caps. The main reason for switching to ARP studs is for the better material which is more resistant to deformation, stretching, etc., not for increasing the clamping force on the caps. If you wanted to do that you could simply torque down the stock bolts more. However, putting to much force on the caps can cause increased bearing wear and failure.

Click to expand...

You can put alot of force on the caps... The key is to have it align honed and the cylinders bored at that tq. When you run ARP's in any engine go by the tq for maximum yeild strength that ARP recomends for that fastener... The block was produced with oe fasteners tightened at stock specs then the crank journals were honed... In order to get the most out of the ARP's you need to duplicate that with the new fasteners at ARP's rec tq.