ScienceofSpeed Forged Piston Set:
http://www.scienceofspeed.com/products/engine_performance_products/NSX/ScienceofSpeed/pistons/
Have you been considering rebuilding your engine for forced induction (turbochargered or supercharged) use?
We've been asked by several of you who are interested in forged lower compression pistons for your NSX to do a group buy. The most common request is for 3.0L engine customers who want to build and engine similar to our stage 1 forced induction build: detailed here.
We have been building NSX engines for 6 years now, and have completed over 50 units and have sold nearly 120 sets of pistons for the NSX. Over these years, we have worked in conjunction with manufactures to develop the optimal design, metalurgy, and coatings to achieve a piston that has the best characteristics of durability, weight, noise, growth, resulting oil consumption, and price of any forged piston available for the NSX. Piston design is something we've taken a special interest and pride in here at ScienceofSpeed to achieve a piston that is not only highly durable, but also is easy to live with on an oil consumption and noise basis. In all of the designs of ours and other manufactures, these have been the best we have ever used.
As you may know, the factory pistons are a cast hypereutectic type produced from pouring a molten mix of aluminum and silicon into a mold. This is a cost effective way to manufacture pistons that results in a product that is completely acceptable on a strength basis for a factory engine and has certain advantages - such as low growth rates - which positively effect oil consumption and noise.
Forged pistons have distinct advantages to the factory cast pistons - namely in how ductile the material. The denser less porous material allows the piston to withstand greather heat and pressure from performance applications increasing strength against detonation. Forged piston metalurgy is generally a trade off in silicon content. Increased silicon makes the alloy harder and decreases growth rate however, the trade off being increased brittleness. After experimenting with different aluminum alloys in both naturally aspirated and forced induction gasoline and alcohol blend engines, we have found an alloy that works best.
Once the metalurgy is considered, an equally important aspect is of the piston design. Our pistons are manufactured using NSX-specific forgings. The forging used for the pistons described here is a strutted design which allows a high strength design with minimized weight. Being NSX-specific, weight reducing pockets (our pistons shed up to 28 grams compared to the stock piston) where material is not needed could be incorporated into the forging with out requiring additional machining. ScienceofSpeed has further refined the piston design by incorporating several features normally charged extra for by other manufactures. These are features such as brushed top crowns, contact reduction grooves, an accumulator groove, bin boss offseting for the front and rear cylinder banks, radial oil ring lubrication holes, and easy to install use pin locks. Our piston skirts are coated with a proprietary molybdenum-graphite coating which increases lubricity and reduces scuffing. In addition, like all aftermarket forged pistons, our design uses a floating 22mm mounting pin requiring the factory connecting rod to be bushed to accept the 22mm pin.
We have worked hard to incorporate the costs of the forgings and development into enough sets so that you will find our pricing is very reasonable.
Compare these manufacture's pricing (complete piston set with rings, pins, locks, and skirt coating):
JE Pistons: $968.00
ScienceofSpeed: $1,100.00 ($920.00 + $180.00 coating)
Mahle MotorSports: $2600.00
Toda Racing: $3000.00
Update 6/15: Unfortunately, only one person followed through with this, so we don't have the minimum quantity to put this group buy together.
90.5mm 9.5:1 compression ratio:
ideal for 91 octane gasoline engines producing up to 500 hp
90.5mm final bore (compatible with factory 3.0L sleeve)
9.5:1 compression ratio (stock is 10.2:1)
22mm / .866" piston pin (compatible with factory connect rod rebushed for floating pin)
90.5mm 9.2:1 compression ratio:
ideal for 91 octane gasoline engines producing in excess of 500 hp
90.5mm final bore (compatible with factory 3.0L sleeve)
9.2:1 compression ratio (stock is 10.2:1)
22mm / .866" piston pin (compatible with factory connect rod rebushed for floating pin)
The only difference between the two is a difference of compression - 9.5:1 vs. 9.2:1. We suggest 91 octane (R+M/2) gasoline engines up to 500 hp use the 9.5:1 CR while engines in excess of 500 hp use the 9.2:1 CR. In effect, the compression has a rather minimal effect on performance and anti-knock envelope for engines around this horsepower range.
If you are interested, please post here by June 14th. Once we have at least 5 interested customers, we will take orders (requiring a 50% non-refunable deposit), and the lead time will be approximately 4 weeks. If we do not have enough interest by June 14th, we will cancel the group buy, and order a more limited quantity of sets. Once the order is placed, pricing will revert to the standard pricing.
For more details:
http://www.scienceofspeed.com/products/engine_performance_products/NSX/ScienceofSpeed/pistons/
Please let us know if you have any questions.
Group buy information for NSXPrime Group Buy section:
regards,
-- Chris
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