Darwantae951

The shortcomings of JE are well documented here. A good supplier of Darton wet sleeves is Chris White.

blade7

Wet sleeves aren't in my plans, Alusil or maybe dry sleeves is where I'm looking. If I sleeve what options do I have for pistons ?.

rlm328

Anything you want.

blade7

Great, I want cheap, quiet and indestructable.

George D

JE makes fine products. Our issue was we ordered sets of Pistons from JE with rings for NiCom/Nikasil bores. (Nikasil/Nicom is the same process. Porsche ownes the Nikasil trademark name and is using it today on many of their motors) Garrity ordered six sets, I believe two for 3.0 968 motors and four sets for the 911motors.

Garrity told JE exactly what he wanted, and got different rings than ordered. You can't tell by looking at them you have to trust the manufacturer. Because JE wouldn't accept any responsibility, we choose to use a manufacturer that actually wanted a relationship. JE settled the lawsuit, and trust me, lost respect from many.

Since this is a sleeve vs whatever, thought this LONG post might be helpful. I'm a little under the weather, and bored. This is a cut and paste. I'm just sharing here:

Nikasil is a trademarked electrodeposited lipophilic nickel matrix silicon carbide coating for engine components, mainly piston engine cylinder liners.

Nikasil was introduced by Mahle in 1967, initially developed to allow rotary engine apex seals (NSU Ro 80 and Mercedes C111) to work directly against the aluminum housing. This coating allowed aluminum cylinders and pistons to work directly against each other with low wear and friction. Unlike other methods, including cast iron cylinder liners, Nikasil allowed very large cylinder bores with tight tolerances and thus allowed existing engine designs to be expanded easily. The aluminium cylinders also gave a much better heat conductivity than cast iron liners, an important attribute for a high output engine. The coating was further developed by US Chrome Corporation in the USA in the early 1990s (under the trade name of "Nicom"), as a replacement for hard-chrome plated cylinder bores for Mercury Marine Racing, Kohler Engines, and as a repair replacement for factory-chromed snowmobiles, dirt bikes, ATVs, watercraft and automotive V8 liners/bores.

Porsche started using this on the 1970 917 race car, and later on the 1973 911 RS. Porsche also used it on production cars, but for a short time switched to Alusil due to cost savings for their base 911. Nikasil cylinders were always used for the 911 Turbo and RS models. Nikasil coated aluminum cylinders allowed Porsche to build air-cooled engines that had the highest specific output of any engine of their time. Nikasil is still used in today's 911s.

Nikasil was very popular in the 1990s. It was used by companies such as Audi, BMW, Ferrari, Jaguar Cars and Moto Guzzi in their new engine families. However, the sulfur found in much of the world's low quality gasoline caused some Nikasil cylinders to break down over time, causing costly engine failures.[1]

Nikasil or similar coatings under other trademarks are also still widely used in racing engines, including those used in Formula One and ChampCar. Suzuki currently uses a race-proven nickel phosphorus-silicon-carbide proprietary coating trademarked SCEM (Suzuki Composite Electro-chemical Material) to maximize cylinder size and improve heat dissipation, e.g., on the engine of the Suzuki TL1000S, V-Strom 650, and Hayabusa motorcycles.[2]

George D

[QUOTE=George D;10107190]JE makes fine products. Our issue was we ordered sets of Pistons from JE with rings for NiCom/Nikasil bores.

I wanted to elaborate on my particular issue with JE. The motor was assembled using JE pistons, but incompatible rings for Nikasil bores. After tuning was completed, Garrity borescoped the engine and saw slight scoring. He pulled the head and saw this scoring on all bores. He knew this wasn't a tuning issue, and tested the rings to find what type of coating was present. Not what he ordered from JE. He tried to allow JE to make it right, and this turned into a lawsuit with an eventual settlement.

My motor with these rings would have probably lasted 50K miles. Nikasil/NiCom is very wear resistant, but Garrity decided to make it right and asked me to be patient while he completely rebuilt my motor using Wossner. He had a 968 block sent out for Nikasil coating and Karl at Racers Edge ordered new Wossner pistons for my motor.

Point of this post is that JE could have simply accepted their mistake and taken care of the issue. JE makes pistons as good as any manufacturer. JE just didn't give a **** about "us". Garrity and his corporation, Motorsports, Ltd. build race motors, and a host of other motorsport support services. JE likely won't be one of their partners moving forward.

I'm venting here, but wanted to share my experience.

333pg333

There seems to be those who are in JE's camp and those that are not. I'm no engineer and can't testify to their design and build quality but there have been more than a few people here and elsewhere that have had problems with them. My thumbnail guide is that they're on the heavy side and are known colloquially as 'rattlers'. As in, make sure you leave plenty of piston to wall clearance to allow for expansion. The downside of this is that they're noisy on cold startup. The other issue is that they really don't give a damn for one off customers and I'm guessing a one off customer could order 1 - 20 sets of pistons and be granted the same level of customer service. Essentially you're considered annoying at best. They make mistakes and send the wrong product and it's a nightmare to resolve the issue as George painfully illustrates.

btw George, what's the status of your build? I know Garrity is making good but it's been a while. Hope there is light at the end of the tunnel fast approaching for you and H.N.Y. also.

blade7

Thanks for the info George D. I wonder if JE have always supplied those rings and there's a few rebuilt 911's running with them in Nicom cylinders ?.

333pg333

Oh, Jon Mitchell is one of those that are in the camp of JE so perhaps speak to him?

blade7

I think he's running them in plated sleeves in the 3.2 engines.

333pg333

I'm not 100% sure if those sleeves are plated. You might be right. I've always heard that by going with a steel or ductile iron sleeve you had a very large choice of piston.

George D

I'd say no. JE pistons are in many Porsche engines with great success. Racing motors included.

I was simply part of a mistake that cost me a few bucks and time.

JE will build whatever you want, but if it's not right, dealing with them after the sale requires tenacity, time, and in the case of my engine builder, money. JE made a mistake, and it took pressure to get it resolved.

I'm not stating other piston manufacturers that are willing to support us are not successful businesses. I'm stating there are other choices for folks wanting a solution towards a motor that isn't relevant to most piston manufacturers.

Call JE for pistons for your 40 PSI blown GMC 6.2 drag motor, or your bored 6.? NA. You'll get what you want. They sell thousands of pistons to folks enjoying there manufacturing tolerances towards the mototsports community.

The Rennlist Sponsor that posted earlier here would be a company I'd call for help with our particular needs. I believe it was Bisomoto Engineering.

All forged pistons buy their stock material from similar places. How you are treated and supported is the most important part of who you choose to work with.

blade7

I may be mistaken as I'm speculating on who did the sleeving, in any case at least one 3.2 has been stripped so any problem would have been found then I'm sure.

blade7

Fair enough, I'm too far away to chase them if there was an issue.

Jay Wellwood