Cylinder Hone Machine

Hone Your Cylinder

Honing a cylinder can go from mild to wild. If the cylinder is within specification and you are only going to put in a new set of rings, you must hone the cylinder to break the glaze. This will put a nice crosshatch pattern in the cylinder walls. The crosshatch pattern will hold oil and help lubricate the piston and rings as the rings wear in to the cylinder. That is mild. A cylinder hone can also be used to bore a cylinder to a bigger size and that is wild. Well... yeah, your right. I need to get a life if I think that is wild!
Cylinder hones can also be used to hone brake cylinders, clutch cylinders and most any round cylinder. Cylinder hones can be fairly cheap in price, around five dollars, or quite expensive. Ammco and Sunnen hones can cost hundreds of dollars. The cheap ones work well for cleaning up a spot of rust or breaking the glaze. The expensive ones can accurately bore a cylinder to accept the next oversize piston or bigger.
To Hone a cylinder is easy. Just stick the hone in the cylinder, slobber on some oil and have at it. Move the hone back and forth in the cylinder to produce a 45 degree cross hatch pattern and in a minute or so your done. That is assuming you don't need to bore it oversize. If the cylinder is well worn you will have to bore it oversize. In a cylinder that is grossly worn out, the piston, set at top-dead-center, will wiggle forward and back in the bore. This tells us two things. One, you need to bore the cylinder oversize and two, you are sadly lacking in your maintenance. If the piston is fairly tight you might be able to get away with just a hone job and a set of new rings. If you are unsure you will need to measure the piston clearance. You will need inside and outside micrometers to accurately make the measurements. More info visit http://www.cylinderhone.org