Honing cylinders

Question for the experienced: what is a good plan for home honing of cylinders, this one has .0005" ovality and taper and is on-size for .020" over, upper cylinder ridge is barely detectable and doesn't show on a bore gauge, plan to source new pistons and rings, leaning toward JCC and Hastings package offered by two net vendors. Old pistons had scratches, old rings worn flat. Probably had thousands of miles by previous owner. Should I buy a Flex-hone for ~$25, or mail out to a shop for much more? I think Hastings rings are cast iron- would they seal without hone?
Thanks
Doug

'Half a thou ovality' is less wear than you'd expect to see on bores that had been run in even !
And less than some shops are probably capable of doing....
A light rub over with a sheet of fine wet-n-dry to bust the glaze, and a good scrub out, and its good to go ?

You should be able to still see the hone marks ?
Make sure you get the new pistons and check the clearances BEFORE doing anything....

Yes measures out rather good and as you are able to measure to the .000N'th degree, why not heat the barrel to 300' F-ish and see if the slight oval becomes more round and go rather light on the hone, especially in the widest area. Hope the new pistons are sized right on the money too. MIght slightly touch up the lower part of the nil top ridge evidence just for peace of mind but rings shouldn't cross over it anyway. Consider dry ring install and nail it good soon as starts and blip like crazy and may seat no smoke in about a min, though a new cam or lifters needs longer.

No expert here, but I've always run a less than a minute hand hone on new rings with good luck. But don't baby it on start up. Get a load on it, but don't thrash, get it on the road and keep it moving. I read things about not honing too, but I like to get the glaze off the walls.

I should talk, I've only done it twice.

Flex-Hone is an excellent tool and the company has a great web sight that describes all their flex-hone products. Important that you get a correctly sized one and of the correct grit. They have recommendations on grit according to cylinder material and ring material. I have used them a lot to break the glaze on otherwise acceptably dimensioned bores with great results and it's very easy to produce a factory looking cross hatch. Just be carful not to overdo it. Just 6 or 7 rapid passes is all it takes. There is no end of the advice on how to break in a freshly honed engine and I won't go any farther than to say don't let it just idle away at initial start up. The sooner you can get out on the road and play with the gears the better. I personally oil the rings and pistons just like the book said to in the old days (and the way we all probably used to) before it became fashionable put it together dry. I fell into the hype once and tried a dry install in a BSA motor. It didn't smoke at all at initial start up but 10 or 15 seconds later it wouldn't stop smoking so went back to my tried and true oiled rings, pistons and bore technique. Works for me.

hobot said:

why not heat the barrel to 300' F-ish and see if the slight oval becomes more round and go rather light on the hone, especially in the widest area.

Click to expand...

Why not bolt up a torque plate to simulate the distortion caused by head bolt tension,and then use a fixed hone to hone it round.When you release the torque plate it won't be round until you torque up the head.
A flex-hone will only follow the errors that are already there.

Then again,0.0005" is 3/4 of nothing.If the rings are iron,use a #180 grit hone.

Oh ok then we agree its about as good as it gets unless a bit under sized to give a few more light hone and ring jobs before next step up to the end. I once was tender foot and timid on initial start up, but after reading many reports of many break ins styles most boil down to rev it right up under a minute, let cool down and diddle leaks then rev right up into cam break in rpm and beyond with the satisfying blipping style we love so much. Just give it longer heating periods so ring bore metal don't melt to gall before seated. Rings should seal about smokeless in a few minutes I've found. Check ring gap for their base line to compare later.