Custom 4032 pistons

[dom9]

This thread makes me want custom pistons!

[Boosted LS1]

westwood35 said:

The best piston manufacturer is Omega Pistons in the West Midlands, and you deal direct with them!!

I once waited over a year for pistons from them, never again. The product is good and the alloys good though but fast freddie's not really all that fast.

[hoffman900]

FordPrefect56 said:

You are being vastly over optimistic if you think the makers of pistons know much, or indeed anything at all, about chamber shapes, burn speed, crevice volumes. They acquire a working knowledge of what might or might not break under a given loading (but no guarantees of course) and that's about as far as it goes. You give them a shape to make - they make the shape. End of.

Disagree 100%.

Also I'm not talking about Omega or Wossner, only the ones I recommended.

[FordPrefect56]

hoffman900 said:

FordPrefect56 said:

You are being vastly over optimistic if you think the makers of pistons know much, or indeed anything at all, about chamber shapes, burn speed, crevice volumes. They acquire a working knowledge of what might or might not break under a given loading (but no guarantees of course) and that's about as far as it goes. You give them a shape to make - they make the shape. End of.

Disagree 100%.

Also I'm not talking about Omega or Wossner, only the ones I recommended.

Really? Do you think you could get any piston maker you know of to put in writing any specifics about what different crown shapes they suggest would achieve in terms of bhp, emissions, flame speed, ignition timing requirement and then stand by it?

[Evoluzione]

FordPrefect56 said:

You are being vastly over optimistic if you think the makers of pistons know much, or indeed anything at all, about chamber shapes, burn speed, crevice volumes. They acquire a working knowledge of what might or might not break under a given loading (but no guarantees of course) and that's about as far as it goes. You give them a shape to make - they make the shape. End of.

Some CAD programs will apply pressure to the piston crowns. We put one on and did this, you can see the piston flex in front of you so can stiffen it up accordingly.
I also noticed JE have started making one skirt smaller than the other to save weight which is a useful feature.

[hoffman900]

dom9 said:

This thread makes me want custom pistons!

[hoffman900]

FordPrefect56 said:

Really? Do you think you could get any piston maker you know of to put in writing any specifics about what different crown shapes they suggest would achieve in terms of bhp, emissions, flame speed, ignition timing requirement and then stand by it?

Well your assumption is that is all contigent on the piston only which is far from the truth. It's just one bit of the puzzle.

How many engines can you even answer the above about?

The big ones that work with multi million dollar professional racing programs, like CP, Mahle, and Gibtec - where the engines are fully instrumented and have several dynos going full time of R&D, have a lot of engineering chops to draw from. CP and Mahle also do some high end OEM work.

Edited by hoffman900 on Tuesday 31st May 12:37

Edited by hoffman900 on Tuesday 31st May 12:38

Edited by hoffman900 on Tuesday 31st May 12:40

[westwood35]

Just had a delivery of Pistons from Omega, 3 months after I ordered them. They were aware we had stock so did not need them quickly. As normal, they are perfect and exactly as required. If you want to talk to the best person in the business, then arrange an appointment with Fred. He knows more than the rest, by far!

Ducati Moto GP piston is the fastest moving piston in motorsport, apparently. Omega have supplied them for years.

[Inline__engine]

hoffman900 said:

The big ones that work with multi million dollar professional racing programs, like CP, Mahle, and Gibtec - where the engines are fully instrumented and have several dynos going full time of R&D, have a lot of engineering chops to draw from. CP and Mahle also do some high end OEM work.

i agree that they can do it, but for the average guy off the street buying a single set i cant see them doing much other than adhering to some basic principles....

[blade7]

227bhp said:

hoffman900 said:

Inline__engine said:

are you saying you can go direct to all companies except Mahle?

Yep. You can work directly with the piston designer with any of them.

Wossner won't in my experience.

I emailed Wossner a couple of times and got no response. I found the custom pistons I wanted at a Wossner dealer in the US, but Wossner had told them not to supply to Europe. It also turned out that if I had ordered from and paid the US dealer Wossner wouldn't ship the pistons direct to me, they had to go to the US first so I would get shipping charges and may have been hammered for import duty too.

[hoffman900]

westwood35 said:

Just had a delivery of Pistons from Omega, 3 months after I ordered them. They were aware we had stock so did not need them quickly. As normal, they are perfect and exactly as required. If you want to talk to the best person in the business, then arrange an appointment with Fred. He knows more than the rest, by far!

Ducati Moto GP piston is the fastest moving piston in motorsport, apparently. Omega have supplied them for years.

NHRA, IHRA, and likely NASCAR engines typically have them beat with much heavier pistons.

IHRA Pro-Stock engines have typically seen the highest peak pisto speeds. 815ci+, ~8500rpm, 2000bhp+ Naturally Aspirated.

In excess of a 4.75" bore, 5.750" stroke, 7.750" rod c-c- length. Peak piston speed is 13,200fpm+ . Blowby may be 1cfm or so with .6mm rings.

CP and Gibtec have the Pro Stock (NHRA and IHRA) market cornered.

Edited by hoffman900 on Thursday 2nd June 01:11

[Evoluzione]

blade7 said:

227bhp said:

hoffman900 said:

Inline__engine said:

are you saying you can go direct to all companies except Mahle?

Yep. You can work directly with the piston designer with any of them.

Wossner won't in my experience.

I emailed Wossner a couple of times and got no response. I found the custom pistons I wanted at a Wossner dealer in the US, but Wossner had told them not to supply to Europe. It also turned out that if I had ordered from and paid the US dealer Wossner wouldn't ship the pistons direct to me, they had to go to the US first so I would get shipping charges and may have been hammered for import duty too.

Wossner are very protective of their dealer network and from a trade perspective, rightly so. I believe there are just two outlets in the UK and everything gets channelled through them, even custom design.
If you do still need them then maybe I could help, I do have good contacts in the US as I buy from there a few times a year.

[blade7]

Evoluzione said:

Wossner are very protective of their dealer network and from a trade perspective, rightly so. I believe there are just two outlets in the UK and everything gets channelled through them, even custom design.
If you do still need them then maybe I could help, I do have good contacts in the US as I buy from there a few times a year.

Thanks for the offer, I'll bear it in mind. The engine I was planning to build has been mothballed for the time being as we're looking to move house. I've been advised as the Wossner pistons originated from within the EU if the US dealer supplies the correct paperwork UK customs won't charge import duty ?

[Evoluzione]

blade7 said:

Evoluzione said:

Wossner are very protective of their dealer network and from a trade perspective, rightly so. I believe there are just two outlets in the UK and everything gets channelled through them, even custom design.
If you do still need them then maybe I could help, I do have good contacts in the US as I buy from there a few times a year.

Thanks for the offer, I'll bear it in mind. The engine I was planning to build has been mothballed for the time being as we're looking to move house. I've been advised as the Wossner pistons originated from within the EU if the US dealer supplies the correct paperwork UK customs won't charge import duty ?

And therein lies the problem (touched on earlier in the thread), you don't know the country of origin and I doubt Wossner will tell you.

[blade7]

Evoluzione said:

And therein lies the problem (touched on earlier in the thread), you don't know the country of origin and I doubt Wossner will tell you.

I see what you mean, perceived quality is higher from Germany than the far east.

[Inline__engine]

Is it worth giving up being able to use a fancy Box shape, X-forging or FSR style piston over a full round skirt shape ? One manufacturer i've been discussing with only does 2618 in the X-forging style.

It’s a street engine so longevity, quietness, etc matter so 4032 is the best bet, but it is a high performance engine all the same and as best I can tell the piston might weight a little more due to not being able to use metal as efficiently and using a slightly longer pin and there might be some added skirt friction. Is this a good tradeoff?

So the question is a full round skirt going to give up performance or should I look for find a different manufacturer….? how much difference would these aspects typically make ?

Edited by Inline__engine on Monday 17th October 22:14

[Inline__engine]

hoffman900 said:

CP-Carrillo and Mahle are the two premier piston manufacturers. Not sure about getting Mahle to design you something, but CP can design what you want.

CP is Calvert (Calvert brothers) and P is for Pankl. They have also since bought Carrillo rods a couple years ago.

CP was formed when Wayne Brooks and the Calverts sold JE (they were the owners). The Calverts linked up with Pankl and Wayne retired. He has since opened up Racetec pistons. They're not really in the market your looking for however (beautiful Pistons though).

CP:
http://www.cp-carrillo.com
Racetec:
http://racetecpistons.com
Diamond:
http://www.diamondracing.net

Diamond would be another source.

JE is good, but not what it was.

The Wossner stuff while I'm sure is high quality always looked unfinished to me.

For a girder / box style piston, for sure go with CP.

I've also attached a piston I've had Racetec do for me for an air cooled application

Edited by hoffman900 on Monday 30th May 15:01

I sent them a ton of pertinent information, picked out my ring pack from Total Seal, send them a chmsber mold, and sent them a Wiseco piston and basically said "make me something better".

Edited by hoffman900 on Monday 30th May 15:31

CP and JE cant do box/X style in 4032 only 2618

[Boosted LS1]

Crikey, haven't you bought pistons yet.

[Inline__engine]

things got put on hold for a bit....last piece to the puzzle

[stevesingo]

I wouldn't be to worried with regard to 2618/4032 alloys. I have JE 2618 FSR forging (small skirt) pistons in my 2.5lt 4 cyl engine. There is no noise I would attribute to piston slap when cold and they have been reliable for the last 21k miles.

It is more important that they are correctly sized for the alloy.