Pressing G Pins into Pistons

Fingers!

Are you talking about an industrial process? Or a small scale, every now and again job?

It's going back a bit in my memory but gudgeon pins are retained either by circlips, in which case they are a light slide fit in the small end, which is bushed OR there are no circlips and they are retained by a friction fit in the small end. There is a tool which is specific to this job, shaped like a section through a round bottomed flask (from a laboratory) with a screw at the other. or you could use a press whilst supporting the piston, or if you are desperate try a hammer with a suitably shaped drift. Check the pin fit in the piston, if the piston needs heating or not. I have assumed that the con-rod is steel and there is no clamping bolt at the small end. A tool IS available, it's up to you whether you buy it.

Does Guest mean the gudgeon pins?

John.

Cool the pins, heat the pistons. Push em in by hand or with a small simple lever press, could even have it treadle operated to leave your hands free..no dangerous motors or suchlike. Failing these suggestions a wooden mallet.

In automotive, there is NO heat the pistons. The pins MUST slide freely with a couple 10ths clearance. If the rods are press fit, then the pins can be pressed through the rod USING the CORRECT equipment. When we used to press them at my machine shop we used specific adapters from a set from Sunnen. We quit doing that about 20 years ago when we bought a Sunnen Rod (eye/the small end where the pin goes) heater for $1200 (back then).

NEVER EVER use a hammer to try to drive a pin through a press fit rod. We have seen people TRY to do that over the years, they BEND the rod or gall the piston or both and have to buy new. DO NOT bang on stuff with a hammer that has to be true/straight. It does NOT work when you are dealing in 10th's of a thousand of an inch.

If you decide to try pressing them yourself, the support on the botton pin hole boss in the piston must be supported all the way around with a guide up through the bottom pin hole that when you press the pin (lubricated with special press fit lube) down through the rod and on out the bottom hole the correct distance. Do not press too far, because then you have to press it back the other way and you are just adding to your chances of galling the rod or the piston, ruining them.

Yes, we see people do that.

Full floating; just lube the piston holes and rod eye with engine oil and the pin SHOULD push right through. You don't want it too tight because no oil will be able to get where it has to get and you will get rapid wear on the bushing. Sometimes a person can use a deadblow hammer to nudge it through, but make sure you hold the piston and rod in your other hand when tapping on it, do not put the rod in the vice to hold it. Too much chance of bending the rod, turning it into junk.

If the pin doesn't slid in the piston freely, take it to your favorite machine shop and they will hone the piston holes to the correct clearance. We use a $6,000 pin machine with a $1,200 micrometer to gauge the hole size.

We have people come in who have tried to hone the hole with a brake cylinder hone. Oops, time to buy a(nother) new piston.

Sometimes customers bring us racing pistons ($600-$1,000+ a set) to have the holes honed to fit the pins since the piston manufacturer doesn't fit them sometimes. I think the last set we took a couple thousands out to make them fit we charged $100 for the job.

It's not expensive, but it HAS to be done correctly...or buying the same parts again.

Since 1974 (I've only been there since 1978), some of the stuff we do: http://home.comcast.net/~kensdms/

Ken

Like you said....

Harley Davidson, as we know always on the sharp end of new technologies, uses tools that look like these.

Hope it is of help.

NO, no tools are required to fit the pins in pistons that do not have circlips to hold the pin. The only way it can be done without scraping th holes in the piston is to warm the piston in hot lubricating oil and then aligh the connecting rod with the piston holes and push the pin gently in the piston and the small end of the connecting rod and the pin will be snug fit in the piston as soon as the piston cools to ambient temperature. This is the only way suggested by automotive engineers and I have done this hundreds of times while overhauling engines. Remember in some countries the pins are called "Wrist pins"

So how do you suggest we should take them out in the first place?

Not wanting to sound pedantic but they are tight in there and warming the thing will not work as it is in an assembled state and the heat will just transfer and heat up everything.

Am I missing something here or.....?

Yes ... you and some others are missing the possibility of using a mallet without f**king every thing up.

If a work piece is correctly mounted or supported a mallet is in skilled hands is fine.

We didn't always use umpteen thousand dolar machines for every damn job... it is still possible to do things by hand.

Sorry guys rant over....ignore me I'll go back to my cat nest on the sofa.

del

Well, we have everything from 8oz to an 8lb sledge at the shop and they are all used at one time or another, a few are used everyday...withOUT f**king everything (use your dictionary Del, "everything" is one word here in the USA, f**king is spelled with "uc" but on CR4 it seems to be spelled with 2 "*'s" instead for some reason )

I get asked that at the shop sometimes by the employees: How did you do that without f**king it up, Boss? Every time I try that, I f**k it up. So, yes, I understand about being able to use a hammer without f**king something up.

NO, we did NOT always use umpteen thousand dollar (here it has 2 "l's") machines for every damn job. Before that it was always free floating with circlips or the end of the rod was a clamp and bolt setup like in the Chevy 6 cylinders or the Ford flatheads.

All of that stuff IS put together by hand.

But when you have modern day stuff, say 1950 or newer, with a press fit between the rod and piston (wrist) pin of 1.5 to 2 thousandths with 2 pieces of steel, more than a little tapping is required.

What do you use to cool a wrist pin to shrink it 3 thousandths or so, so you can slip it through the hole in the rod?

We used to use an acetylene torch before getting the rod eye heater, either way, just heat the end of the rod up to about 500 degrees, have your pin hanging out of the piston, with the piston setting on a fixture you have made that holds the piston and has a stop coming in from the other side to keep the pin from sliding through too far... when you have the rod end hot, pick up the rod, making SURE the tang slots are facing in the correct direction so the piston and rod will be assembled correctly, and QUICKLY, not even taking time to lay the torch down, because if you do, the rod has cooled too much and the pin WILL stick part way through, and then... ah, yeah, and then it has to come back apart and redone. Don't gall it taking it apart, don't bend the rod taking it apart.

Why the rod eye heater? Not being able to be consistant enough with the torch, sticking too many pins. Even with the rod eye heater you have to be on your toes. Even after doing it for YEARS we still get a stuck pin once in a while (even by me) because the rod cooled too fast. We are talking 3-4 seconds to pick up the rod, place it in the middle of the piston and shove the pin through.

And if you gall the piston or rod, then time for a new piston or rod. When you get the new one, is it the same weight? Too heavy, can remove some weight so it weighs the same as the rest, too light? You are f**ked, order another one from the FACTORY warehouse, because our warehouse distributors will not break up a set anymore like they used to in the "old" days. Another week gone by... customer REAL HAPPY by that time.

As an average, we change about 500 PRESS FIT pistons a year, we change maybe a couple sets of FULL FLOATING pins a year, because customers can do that themselves and we encourage them to do that. We are open 6 days a week, 9 hours a day and have a couple thousand customers, so we do get to see the f**ked up stuff people do on a pretty regular basis.

Me being involved one way or the other in 10,000+ piston changes over the years, I think it sorta makes me an expert on piston changing. It is NOT easy, that is why we spend so much $$$$ on that damn expensive equipment, and sh*t STILL gets f**ked up. Seems I remember there were about 16 automotive machine shops in Salem here about 25 years ago, now there are 3 of us in Salem, so I guess it isn't that easy.

In the 29+ years I have been doing automotive machine shop I never realized it was so EASY, what the f**k have I been missing?

Sorry guys/gals, rant over. I'll go back to messing with my (pussy) cat Keli.

Ken

QUOTE:

Yes ... you and some others are missing the possibility of using a mallet without f**king every thing up.

If a work piece is correctly mounted or supported a mallet is in skilled hands is fine.

We didn't always use umpteen thousand dolar machines for every damn job... it is still possible to do things by hand.

Sorry guys rant over....ignore me I'll go back to my cat nest on the sofa.

del

Yup ...nice answer...

I wasn't having a go...note I did use words like possibility at least twice...I wasn't saying it was good standard practice.. I was just a tad miffed that some people seemed to imply it was impossible or madness..

But yes I bow to your vastly greater experience...

del

Thanks Del. It was all in fun. If we can't have fun when we are on the web, what purpose to be? LOL

Yep, I like a hammer too, but get to use it so few times.

Sometimes new pistons have the pins "stuck" in them, from the lube gelling up. Head for the hot water, hold them under the hot water a few seconds and presto! Pin slides easily with a finger pushing on it, slide it back and forth a few times under the running hot water and blow them off with the air hose and even when cool it will slide freely.

After they are installed with the rod eye heater and are cooling, we squirt them with Essential Lube, ummm QuickBooks says we bought 2 gallons on 16 May 2007 for $25.90 a gallon. That stuff will wick into anywhere I think. When it used to be in the cardboard cans with the tin top it would wick through some of them even. We do that to at least give the pins/pistons some protection because engine oil takes way to long to get in there and lube it when first starting an engine with a newly installed piston(s) in it... just about instant galling with that force on it with no lube. Essential Lube really stopped our come backs when we started using it years ago. (about the time I went to work there or a little before).

Shove/pound that sucker in there! Yeah, go for it!

Make sure it is lubed up before you do that though, or she may slap you...oops, that was on a different forum.

Are we having fun yet?

Ken

Hi Ken,

that lube stuff sounds good, I have not seen it in Europe.

What I do (better say "did" as I have not done it for about 20 years!) after an engine re-build is (I squirt everything liberally with a top grade engine oil during the rebuild too) is to first turn the engine over, without spark plugs or glow plugs, till I see oil in the top area of the engine (camshaft/Rocker area).

Then I run the starter motor for a few seconds, not more if there is a Catalytic converter, then I install the plugs and start the engine. I let it run using no throttle for at least 10 seconds, as I do with my own cars for each and every start....

I never give gas and start as I feel those extra seconds of low revs give the oil a good chance to get everywhere, before I load the engine up....

As most of my cars have had Turbos, I always give a one minute tick over before switching off too....

Also, as a convinced Synthetic oil person, I feel that also contributes to the extra ordinary high mileages I have clocked up on many engines with no problems!!

Hello Andy,

I have to swing by the shop and pick up the slips (invoices for the day) and will look if I remember and see what the jug says. I sure can't seem to find anything about it on the web, but think it may be a diesel additive. I will look and see what the jug says and let you know. Yep, it is some cool stuff. Just what is needed. Sticky lifter? Add a little Essential Lube to the oil and it may free up and quit ticking. I don't know where we bought it from (the parts store part of us, when we were part of them), but the new owners of the parts store still seem to be able to get it for us. Hummm. If it is a diesel additive, maybe it is pretty common at big diesel repair shops like Cat, Peterbuilt, Kenworth, White/Freightliner, Volvo (semi's) etc here. Maybe ask some of those types of businesses over there?

Ken

Hey Andy, Essential Lube is made by Hydrotex in Dallas Tx. It is a fuel and oil conditioner. It will work with synthetics, so will Lubraclean a oil conditioner. I use it still.

Conditioners are made from petroleum distillates, Additives have abrasives usually metals.

They also make a hydraulic fluid called Hytorque that works in both wet and dry (type A and F) systems. It runs to heat so it causes your systems to run cooler.

My Dad started in sales for them and retired a Tribologists teaching about oil.

Brad

Brad,

You are as bad as me or worse How many years have you been using that stuff that you misspell 3 names out of 4? Makes it really hard to Google them and find anything.

Look at the problems I had, then I spelled it correctly and there is loads of info on the www about Essentialube, and all the rest of Hydrotex's products.

Ken

Andy, stupid me! I had it spelled correctly in QuickBooks. No wonder I couldn't find anything on the www about it. It is:

Essentialube®

...and a QUOTE from their website: Essentialube is a unique blending agent, not a fuel or oil additive.

The deglazing and seating rings item on that page. We have seen it over the years where a customer will bring us a head that has had a burnt valve for a while will cause the rings to get all gummed up in the ring lands. Upon us repairing the head; clean/check everything/replace guides if needed/replace valves that need replaced, which is usually all the exhaust valves/do a valve grind/surface/reassemble with new seals...return to customer. Customer proceeds to install head and start the engine. WOW, smoke covers the whole repair shop parking lot! In one case on a Toyota, 3KC engine I think it was, about 15 years ago, the customer calls up and says we forgot to put the valve stem seals on. I went and looked at the car at his shop, their was so much oil it was actually seeping out from between the head and exhaust manifold! Seen that another time too. Told him: take off the head and bring it back in, and bring the pistons and rods too. Complains he will have to drop the pan to do that. Yep. Do it. He brought in the head, pistons and rods. Education time: I took out a piston from the box and showed him the rings really sticky in the ring lands, wouldn't hardly move. Next one, same. Next one, same. And the one I had been saving for last (from looking at the carbon on the top, knowing it had came from the hole [cylinder] that had been "dead" for a while because of the burnt valve), I said: look at this one, gummed SOLID, rings wouldn't move at all. We put them in our parts washer for a while, [LOVE that Zep soap, Formula 15282, 100lbs for $230.56] and get them loosened up. Use a ring spreader to remove them, clean the pistons some more, reinstalled the rings [he didn't want to buy new rings], ran the head through the washer, hosed it off, blew it dry, used a small light to show him the seals WERE on the valve guides. Sent him back to his shop after he paid us, he put it all back together... well, what do you know, it smoked a while from the oil in the exhaust system, then when everything got warmed up that was gone too. I told him he had probably killed the catalytic converter and it probably should be changed...his choice, being a car lot and all... I said after it was all said and done: Runs good now, doesn't it? He "couldn't believe a burnt valve could cause all those problems." Essentialube may have been able to free the rings without tearing everything apart. Been worth a try.

And would probably make pushing slip fit piston/rods with circlips go together pretty easy. Hummm.

I sure haven't been taking advantage of what they say it will do. Maybe time to change that?
and
Hy-Torque or Hy-Torque Gold or Hy-Torque Z
and
LubraKleen

Hydrotex®
1825 Monetary Lane
Carrollton, TX 75010
800/527-9439 S www.hydrotexlube.com

Ken

Del, all due respect -- -- But as a person with over 40 years mechanical experience I have learned that a hammer is a tool of last resort when dealing with close fit or negative fit tolerances. ( Edit) Your other suggestions were good.

I have seen more expensive damage done with a hammer than any other tool. They are fine for bridge building -- or driving old shafts, bearings, and stuff that is throw away out of a machine. There are many ways of installing new parts without hitting them --

Of course someone will come up with an exception, as there is always one or two exceptions to every good process or rule -- but, my comments are generally true.

The original questioner is correct in trying to fine the right tool for the job.

JEEZ with all due respect I'd think someone with over 40 years of mecanical experience would know the difference between a F****** MALLET and a HAMMER!

Jeez get off my case and snipe at Blink if your hard enough! He seems to think a drift isn't the work of the devil too!!!

(This is to be read with tongue firmly in cheek)

Del

WATCH OUT EVERYONE... Del is just getting warmed up!

I'll have to go and sit in some liquid nitrogen....

(oooh that could be the way to cool down a G pin)

Next thing you know, he will be getting out that dang repeating crossbow

OK -- Gee, I didn't know that -- Thank you for the enlightenment. Call it what you want -- it is still a tool of last resort in my book -- Thanks especially for the expletive -- I didn't mean to anger you.

With all due respect from me was meant in all sincerity --- But your response was very disrespectful --- if you really don't think that the OBVIOUS between a hammer and a Mallet escaped me you are a fool -- 75 % of your posts are nonsense -- I enjoy your humor - but not your egoitism as the same with STL engineer who thinks his s---- doesn't stink --- I am out of CR4 too many self important experts here.;

Yeah 40+ years you'll catch up some day.

NEVER HIT A PRECISION OR SEMI PRECISION PART WITH A STRIKING INSTRUMENT ___ CALL IT WHAT YOU WANT __ HAMMER, MALLET, JACK HAMMER ETC ETC you have a lot to offer but --- 2900 posts most of which are non-sense

Most posts are the same as yours not all.

I've always found that the gudgeon pin is a slide fit and easily fitted by hand... no tools involved!! Except for the circlip pliers.

John.

I have had some that press fitted into the connecting rod. The fit on the piston was slipfit and the piston held the pin with 2 clips.

I have never had them fit tight into the piston itself but I think the original poster may have meant installation of the pin while rebuilding or something, which means he would need to fit the pin in the connecting rod as well.

The former wooden mallet suggestion is not such a good idea and generally regarded as bush engineering by back street mechanics. While you push or pull the pin, you will need to keep the lot alligned so you don't score the inside surface of the holes or bend the rod. These have tolerances on them that need to be kept as they are.

The cool and heat suggestion however is a very good way to install but not very useful when disassembling.

Owwwwww maybe we should have a thread for astronomers?

I have a small Meade telescope plus a few other cheaper types...

Trouble is here in Dunstable the light pollution makes anything better or bigger is unrealistic!

John.

I would like such a thread, the only problem being it will show me up for the rank amateur that I am......but who cares?

This will sound like a travesty: Look In The Manual.

The fact is that piston pins can be a (usually light) press fit, and occasionally are if the pin rides in needle bearings in the connecting rod top end. Sometimes the wrist pin (as uhmercans would say) is clamped in the rod top end with a hex head screw applying the clamping force (weird). So posts that say the pins are always a sliding fit or always are not etc, are simply wrong. Some engines use wrist pin clips, some do not. When in doubt look it up. If you are careful, you can indeed tap many wrist pins into place, using a shouldered drift, and in fact, doing so is the preferred method on some engines, and the particular drift is a factory tool. Obviously if they go in by hand, so much the better. Usually on used pistons, and very rarely on brand new ones, the circlip grove has a tiny burr on the edge that can be removed with a scraper -- if not removed, this little edge can turn what should be a sliding fit into a seeming press fit.

In a previous life as a mechanic I worked on cars that were built in quantities of 5 or ten per model, and manuals were often hard to find. Then, just do what seems most reasonable and with considerable care, because goofing up could someone's tears to flow. I can think of no engine in which it would have been considered good form to place any significant side load on the top of the connecting rod -- therefore if you are dealing with a press fit into the rod, you need to make some fixturing. Be certain you don't scratch anything. Be certain any press fit gizmo goes perfectly straight into its hole. Heat sometimes is a requirement -- but be very careful. But otherwise, with no manual to guide you, just do what seems reasonable.

Oh yeah -- don't drop the wrist pin clips into the crankcase. Appropriately stuffed rags can be your best friend.

Oh, another thing: once the rod and piston are joined either in or out of the engine, there is an irresistible urge to knock the piston skirt against the rod. Only do that when no one is looking -- it's bad form.

My 2 cents, while an Engineer and Production Manager for Generac Power Systems making v-twin engines for our generators, we used needle nose pliers. I'm assuming we're talking apples to apples with the G pins (retaining ring that keeps the wrist pin from sliding out) If I'm wrong just tell me to shut up and go away.

If it's the same "pin", I had operators that could do 200+ pistons an hour.

Nope -- not the same pin: G pin is short for gudgeon pin, which is what wrist pins are called in other parts of the world. As you may know, the retaining clips, depending on design, are sometimes called "jesus clips" because that's what is said when they go flying.

Never heard them called that. Jesus clips were always, for me, and everyone I knew/know, the little wire clips bent in a long u shape that are used on carburetors, Ken. Those itty-bitty ba*tards a 1/4" to 3/8" long. I have several of the spring loaded jesus clip holders from Snap-On in various places, 1 down at the shop, 1 here in the garage and I think another out in the rototiller shed in the back yard.

Jesus Clip Tool

Ford and Dodge used the c-clips that just used needle nose pliers most of the time and somehow we just call circlip pliers snapring pliers.

Don't forget the spirolocs (depends on the manufacturer on how it is spelled, I guess). Stretch them out, roll them in... and then a customer wants the rods rebushed and resized... makes a persons fingers sore as hell. Their are people making tools to make it easier to remove them now, guess I should get one of those for the guys, but we don't do many of them in a year.

Gudgeon pin, wrist pin, piston pin (when you buy them from someone like TRW or SpeedPro, they ARE piston pins... but when we check them or talk about them they are wrist pins... hummmm.

And one time we sent a woman across the street for an EXHAUST valve... she asked Mikey (parts guy) for a valve for her head. He said: Intake valve? He said she thought a minute and then said:

No, an OUTtake valve!

Ken

We usually called any circlip-like-thing a Jesus clip if it had a real propensity for going flying. The easiest to use clips (and least likely to earn the name) are the wrist pin clips (used with many pistons) that turn inward at the ends to be easily grasped by needle nose pliers. Then there are the ones that are similar, but with only one end available to grab with pliers, and which have to be twisted and walked out. The ones that can be a little irritating are yet another version of the same basic clip, but with neither end turned in, and just a flat spot maybe 180 degrees around from one wire end. You'd pry these out with a small screwdriver, a process that always struck me as mickey mouse. With the first type you could remove and reinstall the clip 50 times and never leave a trace. With the last type, inevitably one end of the wire would scrape the outer end of the bore for the wrist pin -- of no real consequence, but disturbing to obsessive-compulsive types.

Never heard them called that. Jesus clips were always, for me, and everyone I knew/know, the little wire clips bent in a long u shape that are used on carburetors, Ken. Those itty-bitty ba*tards a 1/4" to 3/8" long.

Those, and even the flat steel circlips, (C shaped with internal bumps at ends and center) also used on carb linkages, etc. which fit in a groove on a shaft, and which are removed by prying. Ordinarily, they are cooperative if you can fit a finger tip in to restrain their flight. These only rarely go flying if you happen to work in a dealership which stocks 100 of that part. If, on the other hand, you are working on something made in Italy 40 years ago in which the groove is 4.273 mm in dia, and .666... mm wide, and you know that nothing common will fit, and you also know that the only vendor, (located in Modena, Italy) has had these on back order for 5 years... then you can be sure that your finger won't fit, and the clip will fly with sufficient force to travel all the way across the shop and right out under the garage door, only to be picked up by the tire of a passing truck.

The harley tool that I posted further up here is for those pins. You don't need to do them with a screwdriver as that is a bit mickey mouse. Neither do I like to pay harley money for their solution so I use the mickey mouse one too

QUOTE:...are the wrist pin clips (used with many pistons) that turn inward at the ends to be easily grasped by needle nose pliers.

-----------

We change on the average 500+ pistons a year, and this is the middle of November and I'm not sure that we have even changed 1 set this whole year with clips like that, with 1 or 2 bent ends.

Your definition of "many" must be a little different than mine? How many hundred have you seen/changed this year? We (at my shop) find them to be few and far between anymore. Of course we are out here in Oregon, and 20 years behind the east coast and maybe there has been a large surge of comeback of those types of clips back there vs out here? Do you have a phone number for the shop back there you have been talking to? I wouldn't mind touching bases with them, sorta jaw a little about machine work east vs west, what the mix of engines is like vs here. Sounds like they must do a lot of old stuff, whomever you talked to.

Of course we just do it for a living, so we probably don't know what is going on or how piston pins are held in these days.

Yeah, on the oddball stuff. It doesn't matter if a keeper hits the floor at the shop from Chevy/Dodge/Ford 10-20 year old stuff because we have a "keeper" box full of hundreds of different keepers we have saved over the years. But this new metric stuff... DAMN... I hate it when I look around and the guys are looking around with stunned looks on their faces or moving things... and see me looking and say: Honest, Boss, I don't know where it went... sometimes HOURS looking for a (valve) keeper. Sometimes have to pay 10$ to have one overnighted from the dealer (if the closest one isn't in Japan) and maybe 5 minutes before the delivery rig shows up the next or whenever... Hey Boss!! I FOUND it. ... way the hell across the shop, back down behind the ... The shop does get cleaned in spots it normally doesn't get cleaned though... I guess that is a plus?

Ken

Make them work under a shower curtain!! Just for this job only.

Heehehe,

Yeah, have done things like cover them with parts baskets and/or shop clothes when we think there is going to be a problem... everything goes fine, until OOOOooops. Happens maybe once a year.

But KNOWING which one is going to be that "once" a year .... ah, that is the trick!

You may have overlooked the tense in the paragraph in which I mentioned "many" of my old favorite piston pin clips. That paragraph starts "We usually called..."

It's been 25 years since I was working in a moderately high volume shop, and 15 years since I've done anything on cars or bikes owned by others for money. And even back then, I avoided working on American cars or bikes, because their engines seemed just one step away from lawnmower engines, and their suspensions were better suited to trucks. The fact that you say "But this new metric stuff..." suggests that maybe you have been working on mainly American engines, as does your screen name. Therefore, our experiences and perceptions have no doubt been different.

In the intervening years, American engines have come a long way, and now, things like overhead cams, aluminum heads and blocks, multiport fuel injection often seen in European cars even in the 60's are routinely seen in American cars. Unfortunately, the move to modern technology has been too slow, with Toyota (which had a very small presence in the US in the 70's) now out-selling GM.

Of course, now the whole car world has become homogenized, with even arch rivals like Maserati and Ferrari merged, and with Lamborghini being, in essence, a German car, as is the Mini. Saturn is now a rebadged Opel, and a Honda Accord now has more American content than a Saturn or Chevy Aveo... Cars might as well be refrigerators. Porsche is about the only company with real brand continuity -- but now they sell SUVs!

Excellent, never heard outtake valve. Is that like "plug in" and "plug out"? Any Canadians out there??

If this is high volume manufaturing, I'm quite surprised it's not a clearance or slip fit... Maybe I missed something above - my wife says I have a tendency to not listen....

Again, not to dwell on Generac, but they can get 3K hrs on there generator engines with slip fit tolerances on their G pins/wrist pins.

Lots of them are press fit anymore... they have the "cracked" rods now that are made out of powdered metal, only thing we can do on them is take the big end out .002 over, IF there are oversized on the OD bearings available. We get maybe one set of Ford FE rods a year to resize (big&small end= $240 labor for the set of 8)

A large portion of the "foreign" stuff has slip fit pins yet, held in with clips. Once in a while we do some rod work for big rig diesel shops. Those ^*(*((#$()** tapered bushings for 1.250+" pins! Gotta make special adapters to hold the rod, to push the bushing with and seems like every set that comes in is different than the last set, so gotta make another adapter... but we are getting quicker at that!

Ken