Don Terrill’s Speed-Talk

I've been disgusted with speedmaster and procomp for years. We used to fix their junk cylinder heads for people but now we won't touch anything they make and we can all help by not buying any of their poorly made copied parts.

Sold.

There are many piston options. I would select a piston with 2 valve reliefs, a compression distance that is 1.560" (assuming a 3.48" stroke/5.7" rod), a 1/16" or 1.5mm ring pack. With those pistons, those 70's era heads are going to limit compression to about 8.6 to 1 but could b...

Set of 8 brand new Diamond forged pistons and trend wristpins for 383 small block Chevy engine.
6" rods, 4.030" bore and 3.750" stroke. No piston rings included but the oil spacer rings are there. $750. Located in the Minneapolis area 55420.

Brand new JE SRP dome pistons for 540 BBC engine. 4.500" bore 4.25" stroke. $750 located in Minneapolis area 55420

If you do not have a magnetic particle inspection system you can check them with a less effective way. Start by scraping the gasket surfaces and cleaning the chambers with a wire wheel in a drill. Next clean the chambers with carb clean and then blow everything off with compressed air. Lastly spray ...

I would start over with new springs. They are cheap and you want something that will match your replacement camshaft. Different valve tip heights mean you probably have some valve seats that are sunk to some degree. If the exhaust seats are sunk, you could have seat inserts installed by a competent ...

I have used several of them. I think the quality is pretty good for the money. I like the .005" oversize for aluminum LS blocks.

I had a customer bring me a set of engine tech sbc flat top pistons earlier this year. I pulled them out of the box to mic the skirts and noticed they felt heavy. They weighed 801 grams. Much heavier than I would have expected. The machining quality seemed fine though.

I straightened out the cylinders with the honing machine. It ended up with just a light shadow at the very top of the cylinders at the ring ridge if I recall.

I believe the issue is not the rings or a lack of plate honing. I suspect that you are drawing oil in from a vacuum source. Could be a intake gasket, loose/cracked guide etc....Are all of the exhaust ports full of oil? Factory 1972 heads or aftermarket?

I was at a swap meet last year and saw a few sets of these pistons for sale. Today I was reading through my old Hot Rod magazine collections and saw the article on the single ring piston concept. I am not going to try and use one but I am curious if anyone before my time had used these and what kind...

https://www.jegs.com/i/Schoenfeld/649/162LS1/100. This is pretty close to what I need although I would like it to exit a little further back so I can go out the fender side. It is a Monza so the fender is narrow.

I'm building a LS engine for my drag car. It is a 2x3 frame with struts. The engine is set back and it sits low. There are no off the shelf side fender exit headers that I can find that will fit this combination but I don't mind modifying something that's close. I am also considering building my own...

I do a good quality final block rinse for my customers. It includes running a rifle bore brush through all the oil passages before I install the oil galley plugs. I have seen a few of my customers trying to do their own block cleaning after I have done it and sometimes it doesn't turn out good. They...