Fuck this car.

[akula52]

piston

Yea, I broke it! I look at it this way, at least now, I have Triangle Speed billet oil pump gears!

 

[05stroker]

Here's a pic of my stroker failure. I am not blaming anyone for the failure, and it could of been caused by any number of things, including mods that I did and didn't know any better, but I was not excited to pop my motor. That's about all I will say about that, it is just a data point for trending only. Enjoy!

P.S. Hell, it could of been bad gas or maybe the rear cylinders are just not getting enough cooling, and it is a block design issue. I am not blaming Livernois, I think they are a great company, with a good product!

Mines more jacked than yours . LOL! Not Livernois though . I win for best ugly piston !

 

[Freaknazty]

hell we all have shitty piston pics lol

 

[05stroker]

hell we all have shitty piston pics lol

LOL!

 

[akula52]

Ugly

Hands down, you guys have some ugly pistons!

 

[2k05gt]

We stand behind our warranty 100% which clearly outlines that tuning issues are NOT covered. If we determine that the cause of this failure is tuning, I would hope people would understand that this is not a Livernois Problem.

Again there has been no final decision with us or Mahle.

Thanks

Dan

The Comment "if we determine" bothers me, I mean really, this should have been an independent party making the determiniation, someone that does not stand to loose or gain depending on the outcome.

Sorry thats just my take...
Not Accusing you of wrong doing, I would never do that, but that could be in the minds of some on this thread if you say it was the Tuners fault.

I had a simular issue in my business where I wired a sun room, and a few months later the wiring caught of fire. I investigated and determined that the owner pluged 20 amp heater into the plug that was rated for 15 amps and caused the wire to overheat and catch on fire. They tried to blame my wiring, I tried to blame the owner for using an over sized heater and the Breaker manufacture as to why their part failed to protect the wire and trip. after months of fighting about it, I decided to save face and paid to rewire the room, fix the drywall and replace the defective breaker to keep a good reputation with the community that I stood behind my product even at my loss. I even gave them a 20 amp outlet for their space heater.

Not saying thats what you should do, just relaying a story.

 

[lostsoul]

how about running built 9.2:1 @ 15psi on 91?

 

[KIM_05_GT]

Let me just say this.....If it is so obivious to some, that you should only run 15 psi on a livernois stroker on pump gas, why is that not stated? I mean really why? If you only recomend 15 psi that should be clearly stated...

Maybe you guys should start doing it, if its that cut and dry. You have to remember, that not everyone is an expert and not every tuner out there gives the best advice.

Not trying to start anything...just my .02

 

[Dan Millen]

Here's a pic of my stroker failure. I am not blaming anyone for the failure, and it could of been cau………………. maybe the rear cylinders are just not getting enough cooling, and it is a block design issue. I am not blaming Livernois, I think they are a great company, with a good product!

This is a good example of why you cant always look at the top of a piston and make a determination of if there was detonation or not. Obviously this piston was trashed and the sides were melted (worse) and the top was not as bad. I have several race pistons from my POS that this has happened to. This was a good example here that some of the readers were posting about that didn’t believe a piston could have detonation and the top look perfect.

Sorry thats just my take...
Not Accusing you of wrong doing, I would never do that, but that could be in the minds of some on this thread if you say it was the Tuners fault.

I had a simular issue in my business where I wired a sun room, and a few months later the wiring caught of fire. I investigated and determined that the owner pluged 20 amp heater into the plug that was rated for 15 amps and caused the wire to overheat and catch on fire. They tried to blame my wiring, I tried to blame the owner for using an over sized heater and the Breaker manufacture as to why their part failed to protect the wire and trip. after months of fighting about it, I decided to save face and paid to rewire the room, fix the drywall and replace the defective breaker to keep a good reputation with the community that I stood behind my product even at my loss. I even gave them a 20 amp outlet for their space heater.

Not saying thats what you should do, just relaying a story.

I hear what your saying but I don’t know of any company that would warranty anything because some other company gave there opinion?

Now if this was a legal matter you might have a point.

Maybe you guys should start doing it, if its that cut and dry. You have to remember, that not everyone is an expert and not every tuner out there gives the best advice.

Not trying to start anything...just my .02

There are far to many variables to give specific tuning instructions to prevent mishaps. It might actually get us into more trouble by doing that. We do state that we don’t warranty engines because of tuning. That’s my opinion at to say the least its a very good suggestion

Thanks

Dan

 

[Steedman07]

Wouldnt meth help quite a bit if your running pump gas and higher psi?

 

[marcspaz]

Let me just say this.....If it is so obivious to some, that you should only run 15 psi on a livernois stroker on pump gas, why is that not stated? I mean really why? If you only recomend 15 psi that should be clearly stated...

Maybe you guys should start doing it, if its that cut and dry. You have to remember, that not everyone is an expert and not every tuner out there gives the best advice.

Not trying to start anything...just my .02

There are far to many variables to give specific tuning instructions to prevent mishaps. It might actually get us into more trouble by doing that. We do state that we don’t warranty engines because of tuning. That’s my opinion at to say the least its a very good suggestion

Thanks

Dan

Not instructions, recommendations in print and on the web page for the item. You could say... "For this product we recommend you not exceed 15 PSI without the use of race fuel, as even with conservative tuning there is a significant risk of damage.” You could also have a link to a secondary page of descriptive exclusions to the warranty and some sample pictures of common failures typically not covered.

You could do this for everything. You Heads for example. Over-rev is not covered right? Spell it out and show picture of heads with damage from valve float.

You could also do what Eaton does… no warranty for race applications.
There are many ways to warn/advise the public as to what to expect.

Sending someone a copy of the warranty agreement with a product doesn’t help set expectations ahead of time. Most people don’t even know you put the warranty agreement in the box.

Just a few thoughts.

 

[don_w]

holy fuckin dickface batman wtf ? wow shit i'm speechless

Those were my exact thoughts, too.

Well... not really.

 

[NastyStang113]

Those were my exact thoughts, too.

Well... not really.

Wow ...

 

[RRRoamer]

That is all good information, but the comment I was replying to was "at those compression ratios", not boost (pressure) levels.

There was VERY MUCH an implied "at those boost levels" in his comment on your compression ratio. Quoting the fuel manufacturer's info on compression ratios implied that you where assuming compression ratio was compression ratio and it didn't matter if you where NA or boosted.

 

[marcspaz]

There was VERY MUCH an implied "at those boost levels" in his comment on your compression ratio. Quoting the fuel manufacturer's info on compression ratios implied that you where assuming compression ratio was compression ratio and it didn't matter if you where NA or boosted.

This is true, but I was not commenting on boost, I was commenting that compression ratios of engines don't change with boost, and per fuel makers, compression and heat cause pre-ignition regardless of the boost levels. The recommend fuel types/grades from the fuel makers are based on engine CR's. That's all I was getting to.

Mark and I came to an understanding. We saw and respect each other’s point, and it was done. If you would like, I will be happy to pick your brain some more, because I have no idea what the right answer is and I would love to hear it.

Now there is a direct relationship between boost pressure and compression, as the boost pressure is compressing the a/f mix prior to the compression stroke, during the "intake" stroke. It is called "effective compression ratio", and is calculated like this --> ((boost in psi / 14.7) + 1) x motor compression = effective compression ratio.

If you use the effective compression ratio to figure out if you need race gas, you will find that everyone boosted at 2 PSI or higher fit into the "101 oct race fuel recommend" class according to VP Fuels. We all know there is absolutely no one using race fuel, every tank, for a daily driver on 2 psi of boost.

So... What is right? 2 PSI on your s197 and now you are spending $140 per tank to get to work? or PSI / effective CR's don't matter if the charge is cool and timed right and mechanical CR's need to be adhered to? or something in the middle that is fuzz and undefined and people will twist the numbers and opinions to win the argument of the day?

You know what bro... I think you helped me answer my own question. The more I think about it, the more I see that it is something in the middle that is fuzz and undefined, no one here can present any hard, defined facts to prove or disprove (or at least haven't yet), and people will twist the numbers and opinions to win the argument of the day... perception is reality.

 

[akula52]

Fuel additive

Since I have a new Livernios stroker and will be running about 15psi, do you guys think the fuel additive, Torco Accelerator would be any additional benifit to help reduce detonation while running 93 oct? Thanks

 

[MADMACS]

You would think that with all this info on this thread that the two parties invloved would step up and help, the engine builder and the tunner to offset the cost of a rebuild. How many motors has the engine builder built that have gone bad? How many motors has the tuner done that have gone bad? I bet both will tell very few, in the grand sceme of the bussiness why haggle over 1000.00 when you they could possible hurting future bussiness I for one am on the fence now about buying a motor on line and will most likely just build it myself.
Just my 2c

 

[RRRoamer]

per fuel makers, compression and heat cause pre-ignition regardless of the boost levels.

Note that your state is correct because it says "COMPRESSION and HEAT cause pre0ginition". "Compression" incompasses the compression that happens in the super/turbo charger as well as the mechanical compression of the engine. The same is true for heat as well. You have to look at BOTH compression ratio and boost pressure, no doubt.

Now there is a direct relationship between boost pressure and compression, as the boost pressure is compressing the a/f mix prior to the compression stroke, during the "intake" stroke. It is called "effective compression ratio", and is calculated like this --> ((boost in psi / 14.7) + 1) x motor compression = effective compression ratio.

This had me laughing. Go reread my original post about the ideal gas law. Where do you think this equation came from? It is just another way of writing what I wrote originally and it is derived from the idea gas law.

If you use the effective compression ratio to figure out if you need race gas, you will find that everyone boosted at 2 PSI or higher fit into the "101 oct race fuel recommend" class according to VP Fuels. We all know there is absolutely no one using race fuel, every tank, for a daily driver on 2 psi of boost.

True enough. There is SO much involved when it comes to pre-ignition / detonation besides just cylinder pressure heat, you just can't say "X engine will detonate on pump gas if the outside air temperature is Y and the compression ratio is Z." What if that engine had been run rich for a while and had a nice, thin coat of carbon on the piston and valves? What if there was a very tiny nick in the edge exhaust valve? Both of these things would reduce the engines detonation resistance.

As for your 2 psi example, well, true enough! Part of the reason that seems so silly is because the race gas manufacturer's are going to be conservative in their own statements. They do NOT want to be in the place of saying "you won't have any issues if you use our fuel X on compression Y", so they make sure that in the worse possible case that fuel will NOT detonate with that compression. Which of course means in the real world, it is way conservative. Aftercooling will also completely change the equation because you are removing so much heat from intake charge.

If this stuff was easy and intuitive, then just about anyone would be able to build a good engine that could handle any power level desired and anyone would be able to tune it to get the maximum power without damage to the engine. I think there are plenty of examples on this board alone that shows that isn't true...

Personally, I still haven't figured out if there is a ton of science buried under the art of engine building or if there is a ton of art hidden by the science of engine building.

 

[ZmanM3]

Since I have a new Livernios stroker and will be running about 15psi, do you guys think the fuel additive, Torco Accelerator would be any additional benifit to help reduce detonation while running 93 oct? Thanks

I'm at 15PSI with 91 pump gas but but my engine has stock compression. I personally would maybe look into Meth injection if your worried and do not want to run higher oct. I'm not so sure that Torco is so great for our cars myself. I also don't run 15psi on the street for the most part though, I use my 3.4" pulley which is around 10 or 11 psi I believe with my over drive crank pulley, for the street.

 

[mike@livernois]

Just an update-

We are currently waiting for information from Mahle on the piston inspection.

We are also talking further with the owner/OP on the matter and have suggested that it might offer more points for discussion if he posted the pictures and info that we had sent over to him. Again, that is completely up to him but is something that we thought might allow everyone to see what the parts themselves look like.

Thanks
Mike