The dude promised me it was absolutely perfect, when In fact it had "trashy" oil pass through and score all of the journals. I had them all polished out and it sits on a shelf now. Still pretty lame.

Ah. Maybe the pic is not the best, but the "scoring" I can see in that one pics is very normal/not a problem whatsoever. Are the cam journals really bad or something?

Considering this but, upon closer inspection of this manifold, it already has one Helicoil installed in one of the holes. So I guess I'd have to battle that too.

Most of the used parts I have purchased, have had problems that were not disclosed during the sale. No more used parts. None.

Can you post a pic of the manifold threads?

That sucks about the used parts. I kinda agree, I try not to buy used stuff unless it's something I can't really buy new (a head, an intake manifold, an engine....) Looks like you're building a street car, if so I'd just buy some 3/8" studs and nuts, wire them together and move on.

I'm in no position to say what is ok and what isnt. What I do know is that when comparing it to my 180,000 mile head, it looked bad. Like i said, it's all poilseed and good now. It just needs a new home.

Not necessarily a street car. I was planning on the track mostly. I'll post more of my build soon. I have had some major life changes going on that have slowed progress significantly. And it ain't a baby. Not a human one anyway.

If it helps, I put 2,000 and wayyyy to many hours into a VVT head, and then dropped the head gasket on upside down and idled the motor till it locked up/died. Turns out a VVT head will idle for about 8 minutes with no oil, only Lucas assembly lube before one of the cams welds itself to the head. It messed up one of the cam journals pretty bad.

I spent about 1 hour getting the aluminum off the cam journal (easy) and then about 3 hours knocking down all the high spots off the cam journal. There's a lot of voids in that journal now where oil will be instead of aluminum.

I've run that head to 8,800 and not a lick of trouble from it. It saw 8,400 yesterday. It's fine. I've pulled that cam 3 times now to inspect to see if it's getting worse, it's not, it's ok. So I wouldn't sweat it, a little scoring is ok and "normal" too in my experience.

That's actually nice to know.

So after a few shots of tequila, I'm thinking. .....just drill out all the holes, re tap with 10 x 1.5, good by sweet ceramic coating, hello new threads.

There's an easy way to do it. Place the two open ends into the piston, grab a spare wrist pin from the junk pile, and push. Pop, it's in.

--Ian

<p>Shouldn't the threads not be ceramic coated anyways?</p>

Tap drill size is too big if you already have 3/8 threads. Some of your existing threads will still be there. Also you just said there's a helicoil in one of them. I promise you won't cut new threads into a helicoil. :)

They are not ceramic coated threads. The manifold is. The coating will most likely be damaged while welding all of the holes closed, along with the giant hole from when I remove the existing helicoil.

<p>Ahhh, I missed the welding holes shut bit.</p>

Also if you think you're going to drill and tap a weld, you might want to practice that on some scrap. Depending on how you weld it, the weld is going to have a very high strength and drilling/tapping it will be....... it's gonna suck/you're going to break shit.

I have considered this. I have access to a mill, so I can get it all straight. I have plenty of cobalt equipment as well. All of this doesn't make me any less nervous though. I have decided that worst case, I cut the flange off and start over.:fael:

Have you actually done this with the supertech pistons? I have installed lots of circlips, these by a large Marge were the most difficult.

I found them pretty easy to put in and I used a probe and a small flat head screw driver. I was expecting them to be more difficult from the word on the forum.

I put the edge of the clip in and held it in place with a probe. then following that same side of the clip with the flat head i went around the edge a little at a time pressing it in till you get to the end and they clip right in.

Admission on my part though is I don't practice it full time but am a 3rd generation locksmith and am quite experienced with small clips and lock bits.

The wrist pin way sounds easier though.

Not on mine. No way. These circlips were crazy stiff. I tried every method on the interweb. I got them finally. Similar to the wrist in method.

Yeah, I did it last year when building my motor, Supertech 9:1 pistons. I struggled a lot with the first couple using a pair of bent needle nose pliers, then happened to glance at the box of parts from tearing down the old bottom end and a lightbulb came on. It literally made it into a 10 second job per clip.

--Ian