the builder i was refering to is the owner of pure honda.org. his email is drift@purehonda.org. this guy owns a lude and used forged pistons in his stock sleeve engine.

 

We Todd Id

 

http://www.swaintech.com/swdoes.html -This is the company that you need if you want to use forged slugs w/o resleeving your frm blocks


[Modified by builthatch, 8:54 AM 9/16/2002]

 

...since when was an H22 an "exotic" motor?

 

look up the term "exotic."

ex·ot·ic (eg-zotik)
adj.
1.From another part of the world; foreign: exotic tropical plants in a greenhouse. See Synonyms at foreign.
2.Intriguingly unusual or different; excitingly strange: “If something can be explained simply, in a familiar way, then it is best to avoid more exotic explanations” (Chet Raymo). See Synonyms at fantastic.
3.Of or involving striptease: an exotic dancer.

now, using #2 as a reference (cuz #3 is taken due to inspyral's mom), read this- in comparison to the blocks that are honda's bread and butter (Al blocks with Fe lined cylinders), the h22 indeed has an exotic block, one that uses frm lined cylinders; similar (in that respect atleast) to the honda flagships, the s2k and the nsx...


[Modified by builthatch, 1:16 PM 9/16/2002]

 

as far as i know the cast pistons do not need to be coated... only forged pistons

 

alot of misconceptions in this thread. WOW.

I am amazed at the level of mis-information that goes around on the web to do with what works, and what doesn't and why.

#1 You can run forged pistons in Nikaseal blocks just fine.
#2 You don't need to coat the pistons with any substance to get it to work.
#3 Don't listen to me, don't listen to 1 person on here. Do this:

Call Wiseco at: 1-800-321-1364
Or Je..or any piston company and ask them this:

How many different cars do you have forged pistons running in that have the Nikaseal linings. The first thing your going to learn is that Nikaseal, or however you spell it, is in TONS of cars, from tons of different manufacturers.

And question #2:

"did you put an iron treatment, or any treatment whatsoever on the pistons to run in NikaSeal blocks"??

I will save you the time: Answer is "NO".

Because the pistons they sell for normal blocks are identicle in composition to the pistons they sell for Nikaseal blocks.

I could go on and on.

And for further proof, I have a turbo H22A over here with JE pistons in it, running for a YEAR now on FORGED PISTONS, with 0 treatment whatsoever, with normal XC rings.

And its not smoking, or whatever.

Analysis:

Question #1: What makes people think pistons are making contact with the cylinder wall all the time? If the piston was touching the cylinder wall all the time, or most of the time, either the cylinder wall or the piston is going to get all scratched up. Its the law of physics. 1 material is going to wear.

The rings are making contact all the time, not the piston.

If the piston is going up and down touching the sides all the time, that motor is trash, its not going to last.

Please, don't take my word for it, call ALL the piston manufacturers, and ask them on the phone.

Start at Wiseco.

These are not nec. Fact, merely my findings from experience and research and should be taken as my opinions.

Thank you all.

Also, Ask Wiseco how many people have complained about the Forged pistons for Nikaseal don't work, after they put them in.

Last week, when I asked, yet again, because I am interested in this subject, the answer was:

0

Jeff

 

Jeff, we're talking about the results of untreated aluminum pistons in FRM sleeves, not Nikasil.

For as many people I've heard that don't have problems, I hear of more people that do have problems (like Furry, in this very thread). Not a very good percentage, and one that logically leads one to believe there's more to it than what you're saying.

If a cast or forged aluminum piston is alright to use in an FRM sleeved block, why does Honda go through the bother of iron-coating their pistons? I trust them to know what will allow a good life expectancy from the engine.


[Modified by Daemione, 2:54 PM 9/16/2002]

 

WHO IS TALKING ABOUT NIKASIL???????? Hondas do not use nikasil in any of their automobiles. They use frm in a few blocks, like the h22 (which is what this thread has been about) Frm is completely different in every way possible other than it's a type of cylinder lining; honda uses that in three models and iron to line the cylinders in the rest of their automoblie blocks




[Modified by builthatch, 4:08 PM 9/16/2002]

 

whatever you want to call it.

We got plenty of normal forged pistons running in it.

FRm, Nikaseal, whatever you want to call it.

Jeff

 

Well, you can call it whatever you want, but which is it?

They're quite different, and the validity of your argument kind of hinges on what you're talking about. If you're calling up companies and asking them if you can run their pistons in a Nikasil lined sleeve, you can hardly apply that response to an FRM lined sleeve.

 

frm and nikasil are two COMPLETELY different things. the only thing that they have in common is that they are ways to line a cylinder...THATS IT.

 

which, correct me if I am wrong, don't apply to Hondas, especially H22

bottom line -- better safe than sorry, resleeve ur damn block if u get forged pistons

 

I say don't go turbo on a H22A no matter what.

Thats my stand. Well, unless you have alot of money to fix problems.

The pistons are the last concern. We got some forged pistons running in a few FRM blocks, and they are great. Loose tolerance too.

Which is nice.

I am glad to see some people are paying attention. FRM and nikaseal are different. Cool.

Wiseco and JE has the same exact piston for both. So JE and Wiseco thinks, and acts like they are the same. Even though, they are different.

Botton line, your the buyer.

I am the builder.

Buy whatever you want. If you don't feel confortable, don't buy it. If you do, have us, or whoever put it together.

BTW.

Our S2000 project came out great. With a nice 20 Hp at the wheels with some non-coated, normal, forged pistons. Doesn't smoke or have any blowby, and been running to 10,000 RPM great.

18 more lbs of torque in 1 area over stock.

by just changing the pistons.

Jeff

 

Anything else done to the motor first? How much of an increase in static CR with the new pistons? Weight savings vs. stock? Any fuel tuning?
---------------------

I'm going to hypothesize some here . . . . .

In a perfect world (engine), your pistons aren't going to make contact with the cylinder walls. But in a daily-driven engine, I don't think you can rule out the possiblity of it ever happening - especially in a heavily modified engine, producing well more power than stock, & at pretty high piston speeds. Take the H22, which has a considerable amount of side-loading due to it's geometry. Add in 6 or 8 psi of boost & less than ideal tuning . . . . . .

Another factor that comes into play with your forged internals is thermal expansion. A trademark of forged pistons is the difference in thermal expansion compared to typical OEM pistons. So they take a little while to expand to operating sizes, and until that happens, you get piston noise. What else is that, but the piston's having excessive clearance, rocking around, and making contact with the cylinder walls?

Those who've had no problems with untreated forged pistons & FRM may very well be running forged pistons with a higher silicon content, making for stock-like thermal expansion qualities. Or maybe those who've had problems had some relatively severe knock at one point or another, briefly causing piston/wall intereference.

Just some thoughts on the disparity of opinions on the matter. I'm honestly not sure what the answer is. But I know I sure as hell wouldn't risk it with my engine.

 

The S2000 Ib test was done, with nothing changed except for the Ib "dominator" block treatment.

Which included, IB Spec Forged Rods, Ib Spec knifed crank, IB Spec Forged Pistons, raising the compression to about 12.7:1 on 91 octane without any problems.

Clearance on the pistons was .003.

The car even had 10 more lbs of torque BEFORE VTEC at all RPM's.

Car felt great. Very reliable too.

I forgot to mention, this FRM motor, with forged pistons in it...

does 24 hour endurance races. It was built for road racing by us, to be indestructable.

(of course it is) but..

If the motor survives 24 hour road racing, with an average RPM of 8500 at all times or so, I think that forged pistons are ok in FRM and Nikaseal.

Thats my opinion, of course.

I don't really think anyone can proove anything, either way.

You know?

Jeff

 

i have talked with JE several times about this issue and they told me that they do NOT recomend using their forged pistons in stock sleeved h22 blocks. i suggest YOU call them and do some more reasearch. i have seen quite a number of destroyed h22 blocks and severly damaged blocks due to forged pistons in the stock sleeve. i also know a few people that run je forged pistons in the stock sleeves with no problems...... there is a chance that it will work how ever its a chance im NOT willing to take

 

yeah. JE is funny.

Depends who you get on the phone.

Some say no, some say yes.

yet if you ask for the stock bore Prelude piston, and say not sleeved.

They all will sell you their shelf part.

Totally wierd.

Jeff

 

this should clear things up. it states that frm reduces friction in itself. so technically it isnt just aluminum but something else. i would say that it would be safe to do this. also bmw has used forged pistons in frm engines for years.

Reduction of friction and inertia
1. Aluminium pistons and cylinder liner (including Nikasil and FRM)
Whether an engine responsive and high-revving depends very much on the inertia of reciprocating parts, i.e., crankshaft, pistons and connecting rods. While crankshaft material is still bounded to steel for the reason of strength, pistons of high-performance engines are usually made of aluminium. The lighter the pistons, the higher rev and power the engine obtains.

Using alloy pistons is not very costly, what prevent most mass production all-alloy engines from using them is the friction generated between pistons and cylinder walls. It is commonly known that the contact between two aluminium surfaces results in high friction - much higher than between cast-iron and aluminium. Therefore many engines with aluminium block have to employ cast iron pistons.

The most common solution is to insert a thin cast-iron liner to the cylinder, covering the cylinder wall and surround the aluminium piston. Of course, this lift production cost at bit.

An alternative solution was introduced by Chevrolet Vega in the mid-70s. Its Cosworth-designed all-alloy engine employed iron-coated aluminium pistons, thus the block could be linerless. However, it's more expensive than cast-iron liner while not delivering as good performance as Nikasil treatment so that no longer in use today.

Instead of cast iron liner, Nikasil treatment coats a layer of Nickel-silicon carbide, usually by electrolytic deposition, to the inner surface of aluminium cylinders. Since Nikasil layer generates even less friction than cast iron liner, revability and power are both enhanced. Moreover, it is only a few hundreds of a millimetre thick, therefore the spacing between adjacent bores can be reduced considerably, making the engine smaller and lighter. Since the early 70s, Nikasil treatment has been the most favourable solution used by high-performance cars.

The last alternative is fiber-reinforced metal (FRM) cylinder sleeve, which is used by Honda NSX 3.2-litre. Its cost and power / space efficiency are both half way between cast-iron liner and Nikasil. A fiber-based material in the form of cylinder sleeve is first inserted to the die of the block. Melted liquid aluminium is poured into the die and integrate with the fiber sleeve. Then the cylinder wall is machined to the desire bore dimension, leaving only 0.5 mm thickness to the fiber sleeve which covers the cylinder wall. It generates lower friction than iron liner, thus improves rev and power. Moreover, the fiber sleeve reinforces the block, allowing the distance between adjacent bores to be reduced yet maintain mechanical strength.

this is from autozine.com

 

THAT WAS THE COMPANY!

BMW

I knew it.

Jeff

 

vtecmissle, I can find no supporting references regarding BMW's use of FRM. Can you provide a reference or a model number or something? I am curious about BMW's process.

Technically, FRM is still aluminum as far as wear is concerned. I spoke to a materials science friend of mine, and he confirmed that for me. Probably not as harsh as all-aluminum as far as wear, but the problem is definitely still there.

Your FRM reference is 100% correct. Glad to see someone post it to try and cut through some of the BS.

Not trying to beat a dead horse here, but we have two threads over on PO.com that cover this subject extensively. I have even contected Swain Tech personally to ask them some questions regarding their coatings (for pistons).

Swain says that they can coat just about everything on the piston except the ring lands, which is where the wear is likely to be most severe. Nobody I know has tried using Swain in a forged piston/H22 setup, so there is no hard data on that. The consensus on PO.com is that Swain coatings will not solve the aluminum on aluminum wear problem, primarily because the rings lands are still exposed.


EDITS: clarificaitons and spelling

[Modified by Silverpike, 3:09 AM 9/17/2002]


[Modified by Silverpike, 3:11 AM 9/17/2002]

 

i posted that sh*t 2 weeks ago and yes, i'd like a cookie!

the greatest amount of Al on Al friction would take place on the skirts, not the lands...the lands do, however, have the heaviest load, after the wrist pin boss, in terms of dealing with cc events, but nonetheless, the lands are not a factor in the friction issues associated with Al in the FRM environment Anyway, this is Swain's response on the issue of Forged pistons in the FRM environment...
"Jared,

Thanks for writing. I have not heard of the iron coating on pistons as much
as tin coating, but I have heard of it. Tin or Babbitt has been used for
years because iron is a nasty material to spray. We have a coating called
PC-9 that we use for forged pistons in FRM. It is very reasonably priced ($18 each piston), very
tough (we use it on IRL pistons and factory S&S motorcycle pistons) and
great for lubrication and wear resistance. We can spray iron on the piston,
but that is difficult to do unless it is set up for production. What you
need to do is under cut the area that is going to be coated, build it up
with metal (in this case it would be iron) and finish machine the coating to
the size you need. Not an easy or inexpensive task. The cost-effective and most practical choice would be PC-9. The PC-9 only adds
about .0015-.002" to the diameter the piston. If they were my pistons, I
would use the PC-9.

Richard
Swain Tech Coatings"





[Modified by builthatch, 8:26 AM 9/18/2002]

 

Jeff,im curious,..Are the IB pistons made by probe?If not..What kind of aluminum alloy forging are the pistons made of????Since they are working so well,It must be the Alloy content the pistons have allowing them to work so well.


[Modified by aeolus, 8:34 AM 9/19/2002]


[Modified by aeolus, 8:38 AM 9/19/2002]

 

there was a link posted up on preludeonline about frm and nakisil......

i would get the link but damn if im payin them ho's to use a damn message board.

anyway it said that all honda frm sleeved blocks had a nakisil coating and as long as you use the proper ring and dont destroy the nakisil coating then you can put what ever the hell you want in there. FRM is inherently soft, nakisil is very hard.

i have been doing alot more reasearch and studying my helms manual and i think the ring, silicone content and piston clearance are the key to puttin a h22 together w/o sleeving it.

the nakisil coating has to be at least 0.25 thick cause honda makes type S pistons in +0.25 and the h22 uses extreamly tight piston clearances..... anyone have any info about the ring material used in the h22?? i know there are several different types of rings out there...

 

frm is one type of liner (what is in the H22, NSX, S2K) and nikasil is another, used in some small displacement Chevys ( i think the vega?) in the 70's and primarily in motorcylces (especially 2-stroke). They are completely different. FRM is solely composed of Al Oxide and a carbon fiber matrix weave. It's aluminum bore surface evidently can be honed and bored slightly, i'm guessing the max is .025.

The frm blocks from honda all come with iron-coated pistons. so, insted of al pistons and iron cyls walls, you now have iron coated pistons and al cyl walls. the problem here is...if you have an al cyl wall, you need something to be applied to the aftermarket forged al piston to werk in the frm environment. so, you call swain tech coatings up and they apply PC-9 to it, which is actually an improvement over said iron-coating, as it has anti-friction properties "built-in".

nikasil, on the other hand, can not be bored at all. that is why on two-stroke dirtbikes, they always have to replace the sleeve when any type of marrs occur to the liner...




[Modified by builthatch, 8:25 AM 9/19/2002]