Honing the cylinder

[3000 FPS]

I just finished putting together a Poulan 3450 that I got off of Ebay. It looked like it had been straight gassed. So any ways I put in a new piston and ring and did the acid thing to the cylinder. But I wanted to try a hone on this to see what the results were. I ordered a 240 grit ball hone because 320 did not seem to rough the surface enough for me. I only ran it 4 times up down in forward direction and 4 times up down reverse direction. The one thing I noticed was all the edges for the ports and transfers have a much smoother edge. I consider this an added bonus due to the ring coming in contact with those edges and making the transition much smoother. Just my opinion.

 

[Brian VT]

You got lucky. Often a ball hone will chip away the Nikasil at the ports (= ruined cylinder).
It's generally best to not hone a plated cylinder.

 

[3000 FPS]

Well there is something I do not understand. If Nikasil is never to be honed then why do manufactures make ball hones specficaly designed to hone Nikasil cylinders such as in chain saws?

 

[blsnelling]

I have never seen a hone chip the NiSi. So many people seem to have wrong ideas about honing. No, not every cylinder should be honed, but it certainly isn't destructive like some of you think.

 

[3000 FPS]

I have never seen a hone chip the NiSi. So many people seem to have wrong ideas about honing. No, not every cylinder should be honed, but it certainly isn't destructive like some of you think.

Personly I happen to think that the people who make these hones that are designed for Nikasil use have done alittle R&D on the subject and are not going to sell something that can be destructive to the cylinder. Yes I agree they can be over used but the description I gave is far from over use and the out come was very good. Before even starting the engine I did a compression check and stopped at a 150 PSI and it was still climbing.

 

[Johny Utah]

Well there is something I do not understand. If Nikasil is never to be honed then why do manufactures make ball hones specficaly designed to hone Nikasil cylinders such as in chain saws?

There is nothing wrong with honing nickel cylinders. Ball hone is for deglazing of a cylinder. Stone hone is for removing minute material and to bring a cylinder back into concentricity after a mild piston scuff. A cylinder is usually always stone honed after being bored to take it to final size. My .02

 

[3000 FPS]

My point is not to debate if I should hone or not, but to simply state that the sharp edges in the cylinder were smoother when honed which I believe is better for the ring.

 

[hamish]

A little reading material.

 

[Lignator]

good sales flyer by sunnen. they are a leader in the honing world.

one thing to keep in mind. when a cylinder is new at the factory they are working with an over plated bore. The cylinder starts life off too small and is then brought to size through a process such as honing. they have applied enough plating to allow them to size the cylinder properly and still leave enough plating to protect the bore during use. if they are really good, they can created a matched pair between the piston and cylinder.

if you now re hone a cylinder it is possible to create a bore that is over sized as you are starting with a cylinder which is already the proper diameter.

the other advantage the factory has is that honing stations use a huge amount of coolant which flushes cut material out of the part. this is difficult to reproduce on your shop bench.

all this being said, i honed a cylinder with a ball hone soaked in oil with great results!

 

[Jacob J.]

If the ball hone works for you, then great. There are applications where a ball hone can be useful. I don't use them on mine or my
customer's modern saws with Nikasil cylinder for varied reasons.

"Glazing" over is an antiquated term left over from the days of chrome bores, steel sleeves, and much lower grade oil formulations.
About the only places these days you'll see any kind of glazing on a modern two-stroke cylinder is third world operations- Brazil and
central Africa come to mind. Low-grade oil, poor quality gas, abusive conditions, etc.

You can see it here in the states, usually it's from some farmer mixing his gas with used motor oil (I've seen this.)

 

[Stihlofadeal64]

thanks again!

Thanks to the OP for another entry on this subject. The debate concerning the viability of honing has been aired here a few times. Being an analyst at heart I decided to experiment myself. After a similar experiment as the OP mentioned the saw came back to life after the rebuild with 150 psi. After having been on both sides of the fence, I will NEVER go back to doing it the old way.

Honing will not destroy your cylinder any more than porting it would. Simply stated if you misuse the tool, it will produce the same result as if you overgrind - misgrind in porting. To each his own,
thanks for the added insight. opcorn:

 

[Johny Utah]

My point is not to debate if I should hone or not, but to simply state that the sharp edges in the cylinder were smoother when honed which I believe is better for the ring.

Ball hone is perfect for breaking the edge of the ports. It's when people use to much RPM for honing that they risk damaging a cylinder.