[jrgoffin]

What was the low speed throttle response like Joe?

Ed

That was one of the first things I was interested in, Ed, especially since you had mentioned it earlier. I have to admit that I was pleasantly surprised - there really was a decent amount of grunt right from the get-go and it just kept winding. For anyone with any apprehension about an N/A car, this one will still make you happy.

Having driven a '15 GT last year as well as a standard Boss and a Laguna Seca, the GT350 kept improving on all of them. I'm still partial to the Terminator (got to also drive a friend's '03 on Monday), and its low-RPM kick, but if I ever got rid of mine, I'd seriously consider the Shelby.

 

[04DeadShort]

Gonna take me awhile to get used to that flat crank sound, especially coming from a Mustang.

 

[jrgoffin]

Well, I have the FRPP FR-500 (M-58) exhaust in my Terminator, and it gives off a bit more of an "exotic" sound. The FPC engine is right there as well, and perfect in my book.

Man, I need to get this thread back on topic soon!

 

[408Stang]

I have something that's on topic:

I purchased King Bearings for my build. I got the MB5281SI kit for the mains, and the MB5219SI kit to eliminate the thrust washer set up. Lastly I have the CR868SI for the rod bearings.

All of the above bearings are bi-metal, aluminum based bearings. When you look at the technical information on these parts it indicates they are for medium duty applications with nodular iron cranks.

I am using a forged steel crank and billet steel rods... Not to mention I'm a supercharged application. So I called King Bearing (spoke to someone in tech named A. J. Orchowski) and he recommended a tri-metal bearing due to the extra load the supercharger places, and due to my anticipated horsepower level (about 700).

King Bearings recommended their MB5283XP kit for the mains on 2010 Aluminator block. And CR868XPN for the rods. King Bearings also stated that the thrust washer set up is absolutely normal, and they have seen it in use even with 2500HP vehicles (A Nissan GTR he kept referring to).

Any discussion on this?

Also their CR868XPN is a "narrow" rod bearing measuring 19.101mm. I need to measure the bearing surface on my Manley Pro-Billet rods but the overall dimension from their website is .940" / 23.87mm.

Anyone have input about this?

I am actually considering going with Clevite 77's as they seem to have a wider selection and better fitment options.

Clevite MS2259H (mains)
Clevite CB1442HK (rods)

 

[jrgoffin]

Cool, thanks

I avoided those other bearings because they are narrow. A rep at King I talked to a while back said they are planning to "correct" that at some point. Otherwise, your first choice is absolutely correct, but the use of the one-piece thrust bearing is just personal preference.

Expect Ed to chime in since he is the bearing guru (along with so many other areas). The bi-metal bearings are perfect, and the tech paper from King will convince you of that. I think I linked it in post #1, but if not, Ed will definitely provide it.

 

[408Stang]

Thanks Joe,
The link to the bearing document seems to be broken. I would appreciate a re-post, and I'm also going to do some googling.

Another question for everyone about main bearings clearance. You posted that your clearance was . 002. I was wondering if that was the clearance on just one side with a dry bearing (assuming you used plasti-gauge) or is that a calculated clearance based on overall physical dimensions. What I'm asking is if you have .002 clearance on both sides of the crank, or on just one side of the crank?

Here's why this came up in my mind....

Ed recommended to me that I have .0040 piston to wall clearance. However, I found my original build sheet for my CP pistons which state they only have a .0020 piston to wall clearance. Both my old CP pistons and the new Gibtec pistons are 2618 alloy. This prompted me to call Nick at Gibtec and ask. He explained that .0040 is the total piston to wall clearance across the diameter, therefore, only .002 on each side of the piston.

My new found piston information has caused me to doubt all my other clearance information.

So let the discussion begin.

 

[Wicked46]

Gibtec calls for a .0045 PTW clearance according to my tech card. As you've pointed out, thats overall clearance (.0020 on both sides). I believe that was the same with my Manley Platinum series pistons as well.

I'm also interested to hear Ed explain more about the King bearings since I purchased the same sets as Joe. One other point I'd like to make is crank end-play. Correct me if i'm wrong but, that should be in the ballpark of .004-.006.

 

[Edmisten1]

I have something that's on topic:

I purchased King Bearings for my build. I got the MB5281SI kit for the mains, and the MB5219SI kit to eliminate the thrust washer set up. Lastly I have the CR868SI for the rod bearings.

All of the above bearings are bi-metal, aluminum based bearings. When you look at the technical information on these parts it indicates they are for medium duty applications with nodular iron cranks.

I am using a forged steel crank and billet steel rods... Not to mention I'm a supercharged application. So I called King Bearing (spoke to someone in tech named A. J. Orchowski) and he recommended a tri-metal bearing due to the extra load the supercharger places, and due to my anticipated horsepower level (about 700).

King Bearings recommended their MB5283XP kit for the mains on 2010 Aluminator block. And CR868XPN for the rods. King Bearings also stated that the thrust washer set up is absolutely normal, and they have seen it in use even with 2500HP vehicles (A Nissan GTR he kept referring to).

Any discussion on this?

Also their CR868XPN is a "narrow" rod bearing measuring 19.101mm. I need to measure the bearing surface on my Manley Pro-Billet rods but the overall dimension from their website is .940" / 23.87mm.

Anyone have input about this?

I am actually considering going with Clevite 77's as they seem to have a wider selection and better fitment options.

Clevite MS2259H (mains)
Clevite CB1442HK (rods)

Here is a comment Ed posted that might address this until he sees your post and comments specifically:

"Jon, apologies I did not mean to ignore your question. I got interrupted on my side and lost track of where I was. I refound your post while scanning old threads. Here is the answer; The HP and XP class bearings are high load race bearings designed for a sustained continuous high loading like an engine in a car on a high banked oval where the engine will operate north of 7000 rpm for hours. In that environment these bearings are unbeatable. For supercharged gas engines you want a bearing with increased embedability and resistance to oil supply interruptions. That bearing is the SI series out of King. I have attached a White Paper from King on bearing materials. It is not long and also quite a good read. Before you read the entire doc got to Acrobat page 7 and look at the graph. Pay particular attention to how the SI class bearings and the hard race type bearings behave when lubrication is interrupted. Initially they are about the same, over time (longer than we would allow) the hard bearing seizes before the SI bearing. The SI bearing provides increased embedability and comparable life under adverse oiling conditions we are likely to encounter. The increased embedability is important to bearing life in a supercharged engine. Ed"

I too noticed King states the application for the SI class bearing was suited for a nodular cast iron crank but didn't think it was a reason not to use the bearing on a steel crank. Maybe when Ed sees this he can give us his .02

 

[eschaider]

I have something that's on topic:

I purchased King Bearings for my build. I got the MB5281SI kit for the mains, and the MB5219SI kit to eliminate the thrust washer set up. Lastly I have the CR868SI for the rod bearings.

All of the above bearings are bi-metal, aluminum based bearings. When you look at the technical information on these parts it indicates they are for medium duty applications with nodular iron cranks.

I am using a forged steel crank and billet steel rods... Not to mention I'm a supercharged application. So I called King Bearing (spoke to someone in tech named A. J. Orchowski) and he recommended a tri-metal bearing due to the extra load the supercharger places, and due to my anticipated horsepower level (about 700).

King Bearings recommended their MB5283XP kit for the mains on 2010 Aluminator block. And CR868XPN for the rods. King Bearings also stated that the thrust washer set up is absolutely normal, and they have seen it in use even with 2500HP vehicles (A Nissan GTR he kept referring to).

Any discussion on this?

Also their CR868XPN is a "narrow" rod bearing measuring 19.101mm. I need to measure the bearing surface on my Manley Pro-Billet rods but the overall dimension from their website is .940" / 23.87mm.

Anyone have input about this?

I am actually considering going with Clevite 77's as they seem to have a wider selection and better fitment options.

Clevite MS2259H (mains)
Clevite CB1442HK (rods)

Cool, thanks

I avoided those other bearings because they are narrow. A rep at King I talked to a while back said they are planning to "correct" that at some point. Otherwise, your first choice is absolutely correct, but the use of the one-piece thrust bearing is just personal preference.

Expect Ed to chime in since he is the bearing guru (along with so many other areas). The bi-metal bearings are perfect, and the tech paper from King will convince you of that. I think I linked it in post #1, but if not, Ed will definitely provide it.

Joe is correct Mike. The SI bearing while not as "strong" as the XP or XPN bearings has greater embedability and conformability. On a supercharged engine the embedability and conformability are very desirable attributes to have. The higher load bearing capabilities of the XP class bearing is a very desirable characteristic for a bearing that is run at high load for extended periods of time in a controlled environment, the obvious application would be a high banked oval.

When the cause of bearing failure is bearing fatigue as in the high banked oval application the fix is the XP class of bearings. In a blown motor application you do not sustain the continuous high load conditions an engine in a high banked oval race car experiences. The supercharged engine, in the configurations we run them, can not sustain 500 miles of wide open throttle operation. That said we still load the bearings very heavily for short periods of time and at very low engine speeds especially with PD blowers. To both perform and survive our bearings need to be able to sustain exceptionally high low speed loadings while surviving unintentional whoopses like detonation. The SI class bearings provide the best performance and protection and in fact excel in these types of operating environments/conditions for our supercharged engines.

The most powerful supercharged piston engines producing over 500 HP per cylinder and more use an even softer bearing material than the SI bearings again because of its improved embedability and performance in the event of detonation. The bearing material of choice in this case is babbitt. King does impressive and continuing research into bearing design, composition, manufacturing and importantly performance.

This is a chart from one of their test sessions where they were attempting to find the limits of performance and operation for bearings in worst case scenarios. The testing process ran the bearing to failure in what they call a mixed lubrication test.

The two different bearing materials performed similarly while there was lubrication. When lubrication was terminated the tri-metal bearing temperature rose much higher than the bi-metal bearing temperature with the tri-metal bearing spiked to 245˚ seizing as the load was increased to 8700 psi which was slightly higher than the 7200 psi standard operating load for the test. The bi-metal bearing on the other hand had an operating temperature that never exceeded 165˚ and despite the load being increased to 13,000 lbs did not seize.

The following are King's comments about the materials and the test;

Mixed lubrication regime is characterized by intermittent metal-to-metal contacts between the rubbing surfaces. In real engines mixed lubrication occurs at high loads, low rotation speed, insufficient oil supply, rough crank surface or misalignments and other geometry irregularities. The test was performed in the King Test Rig, which simulates conditions of real engines. The bearings were tested under a controlled cycling load. The bearing back temperature was continuously monitored. Seizure was detected by a sharp temperature increase. The tested bearings worked with insufficient oil supply, which was achieved by disconnecting the oil from the tested bearing. The blue curve refers to the tri-metal bearing, the red one - to the bi-metal bearing.

It is seen that for the first few minutes after the oil disconnection the tri-metal bearing temperature was rising at a low rate due to the effect of the soft overlay. However, the overlay wore out fast and the temperature increased sharply because of the direct contact between the shaft surface and the exposed surface of the intermediate layer. Then the temperature stabilized at the level of 180 F with a few peaks indicating pre seizure of the materials, but the next increase of load caused actual seizure.

The behavior of the bi-metal AlSi bearing was quite different.

At the initial load the bearing temperature stabilized at 160 F and after each load increase, the temperature rose by only 5-10 F and then stabilized. Seizure did not occur, even at the high load of 13000 psi.

The test has demonstrated that bi-metal bearings offer more protection compared to tri-metal bearings under mixed lubrication conditions.

King does offer a specialty bearing material for rod bearings that approximates the best of both worlds. It is their GP (Gold Performance) offering and has a tri-metal structure with a King proprietary overlay composed of two materials one of which provides his resistance to seizure and the other which provides lubricating qualities.

The GP rod bearings are very good but cost about 2X the price of the SI bearings. The SI rod bearings are close so you can get almost as good and a lot less expensive. For a main bearing selection, both because of bearing material performance and the availability of the fully flanged upper available in the 5219 set I believe the better choice is the SI material main sets.

For those interested in reading the entire report you can download it from the King site here => Bearing Materials it is too big to attach to this post or I would.

Ed

 

[Edmisten1]

Excellent info once again Ed. Can you comment on King's recommendation for the SI series bearing being suited to cast iron cranks? And, is there a limitation to using this bearing for our factory Kellogg steel cranks?

 

[eschaider]

Excellent info once again Ed. Can you comment on King's recommendation for the SI series bearing being suited to cast iron cranks? And, is there a limitation to using this bearing for our factory Kellogg steel cranks?

I am not sure of the exact reason they say what they do about cast cranks, Jeff. I have asked them and the answers took a little effort to get and did not make as much sense as I would like. I think the belief may have been that the cast cranks were not finished as precisley as the forged cranks and the softer bearing was more 'forgiving', which it is. However in our engines at least, the cast crank has to be as finely finished and as straight as a forging or you have immediate engine failure.

Bottom line I can't provide a rational explanation. I can tell you the SI bearings are real sweethearts for our engines and we get an extra bonus free for nothing so to speak - the SI's are less expensive by a significant margin!

Ed

 

[Edmisten1]

I am not sure of the exact reason they say what they do about cast cranks, Jeff. I have asked them and the answers took a little effort to get and did not make as much sense as I would like. I think the belief may have been that the cast cranks were not finished as precisley as the forged cranks and the softer bearing was more 'forgiving', which it is. However in our engines at least, the cast crank has to be a finely finished and as straight as a forging or you have immediate engine failure.

Bottom line I can't provide a rational explanation. I can tell you the SI bearings are real sweethearts for our engines and we get an extra bonus free for nothing so to speak - the SI's are less expensive by a significant margin!

Ed

Works for me.

 

[408Stang]

Thanks for the reply Ed.

What about bearing clearances... . 002 total? (.001 on each side)... Or just put my plasti-gauge on top and look for .002 crush.

Also, can we chat about ring end gap.. I've read a lot of stuff and I know there are calculations based on bore diameter. For example : bore Dia. x .0045 for the top ring and bore Dia. x .0055 for the second ring. For my application that would be 3.557 x .0045 = .016 ring end gap for the top ring and .019 for the second ring. But I would like to hear what others are doing and what Ed's input is.

 

[eschaider]

Thanks for the reply Ed.

What about bearing clearances... . 002 total? (.001 on each side)... Or just put my plasti-gauge on top and look for .002 crush.

Also, can we chat about ring end gap.. I've read a lot of stuff and I know there are calculations based on bore diameter. But I would like to hear what others are doing and what Ed's input is.

The rods like to be right at or as close as you can get to 0.002", Mike. The rod manufacturers, especially Manley because of their tier 1 Ford status, usually hit the housing bore dimensions right on the money and the bearing manufacturers are comparably precise. If you have concerns the easiest thing to do is use a little plastigauge and it will put your mind at ease in a NY minute. I would bet you dollars to donuts you will hit 0.002" within a cat's whisker.

Basically the same story for the mains except the numbers change a little bit. There is a low side limit of 0.0008" and a high limit of 0.0018" for mains. Essentially the same story as the rods in terms of reliably reproducing those numbers. Both Ford as the crank manufacturer and the bearing companies are very fastidious about their sizing technology and technique (temp controlled environments etc). When you assemble it, it will easily fall within their limits. Don't worry about being on the high side or low side. As long as you are inside the limits you are good to go.

Rings will bring all kinds of opinions. What I am about to tell you will work, will not butt ring ends and will produce very good reliable power. For a street driven car you want to be between 0.023" and 0.025" for your top ring. Shoot for the low limit without going below 0.023". For your second ring you want to be 0.020" to 0.023" and your oil ring requires no gapping they are good to go right out of the box.

A race only engine can go a whisker tighter but in my opinion there is a better way than a "whisker tighter." My preference for a race only engine especially on the top, is to use a steel or tool steel top ring and a TotalSeal second ring. The top ring is gapped at, you guessed it, 0.023"! That is all you need! your second ring is a gapless TotalSeal. The engine will leak to zero percent. On a bad day it may get to 1 or 2 percent. You will not butt ring ends, your engine will be happy and you will be even happier.

Ed

 

[jrgoffin]

Thanks for adding all that, Ed. I didn't think too much about expanding on that stuff, but I suppose it is never too late!

I also had to look again at the first post, and it actually was the first page where I attached the King document (bottom of Post #4), but thanks for adding it again here - makes it easy to find while perusing. The other one you sent me on bearing geometry is also a good read, so it would be appropriate to add that as well. Hopefully I won't screw up the attachment...

View attachment King Bearing Geometry.pdf

Thanks for the reply Ed.

What about bearing clearances... . 002 total? (.001 on each side)... Or just put my plasti-gauge on top and look for .002 crush.

Also, can we chat about ring end gap.. I've read a lot of stuff and I know there are calculations based on bore diameter. For example : bore Dia. x .0045 for the top ring and bore Dia. x .0055 for the second ring. For my application that would be 3.557 x .0045 = .016 ring end gap for the top ring and .019 for the second ring. But I would like to hear what others are doing and what Ed's input is.

As for the ring gap, and specifically pertaining to Gibtec, they include a document from Total Seal that gives you the formula(s) for setting them. It essentially involves a multiplier of the bore size, and Ed's numbers above are spot on. When I get the chance, I'll check my file, but I seem to recall mine at 0.024". I'll also scan it at some point, but anyone ordering their rings will have it included. Overall, it's pretty straightforward.

With regards to the bearings, those dimensions are across the bores as well (Ed, as usual, had those figures exact - probably off the top of his head!). The King specs are easy enough to figure out, although a glance at the page with all the numbers will probably give anyone a headache at first. Below is a picture of the dimensions for mine, along with the calculations (I actually hashed this out with Ed just to make sure we got the same numbers, which we did). You take the housing diameter and subtract the journal diameter and twice the bearing thickness (each side of the bore since you are using diameter) to get your numbers. This is done using the largest bore minus the smallest journal, as well as the smallest bore minus the largest journal - again, both including the bearing thickness twice.

 

[408Stang]

Got my Gibtec Pistons today... Here's the 3-valve version.

 

[Wicked46]

Nice! I didn't get any stickers with my Gibtecs but I did get a t-shirt

 

[Edmisten1]

Nice! I didn't get any stickers with my Gibtecs but I did get a t-shirt

I got stickers and the shirt

...Good looking parts for sure!

 

[408Stang]

They are VERY nice... The pins I'm a little worried about... They have a .200 wall! They are ridiculously thick for my application. I think these pins would handle 2000 HP... Maybe more. I'm worried about the added weight. However, I'm not turning high RPM so it shouldn't be a big deal.... Right?

 

[04DeadShort]

Wow, those are some beautiful slugs.