The plastic bottle hone and cognitive thrift vs cheapness discussion

[Mark(The Miser)UK]

I understand cheap. I also understand frugal and that's a much more desired term. Maybe after 14 times a person just being cheap. I don't for see any shortage of seals and in the unlikely event that happens, there are alternatives (see my other post about mercedes seals). By the time there are no more seals, we'll probably be putting a handful of garbage in the flux capacitor and accelerating to 88 mph.  

Never understood cheap. Personal satisfaction may come into it, and not to forget, the millstone of having only paid £29=38 for the car some 5 years ago, so everything I buy almost matches the  cost of the car; eg 5 heatshields @£6 each, or half a tank of diesel...

The engine dates back to about 1984, so will be 30 in a couple of years, yet after the $22 rering , from Autohause, and honed with a plastic drinks bottle, it has low enough emissions to match, or beat modern smoke spec.

[belchfire]

Honed it with a plastic bottle? That's a new on for me. How does that work?

[Mark(The Miser)UK]

Honed it with a plastic bottle? That's a new one for me. How does that work?

IIRC about 160 grit emery...

[belchfire]

Glad I own a real hone.

[Mark(The Miser)UK]

Glad I own a real hone.

A real hone doesn't guarantee a proper honing.  Plenty of examples of failed attempts on these fora.

I have plenty of honing tools, in fact I'm an obsessive collector of tools... and books. How many can say they have a socket with 13.5mm stamped on it?
Anyway back to the bottle...
 I like to give myself challenges. I thought it possible, especially as true engineers from the past were able to hone using a wooden piston.
It worked for me, and this old engine now uses something like a pint every few 1000 miles; much of which is from the new, [but useless] push fit valve cover vent rubber grommet .

This is an engine that was running with 160 thou ring gaps previously. A lesser man would have spent a fortune oversizing the bore and pistons, or scrapping the engine perhaps. I'm glad that there are people around who buy all the latest kit, because if it weren't for them, industry would surely fail. I better not show you the pictures of my freehand head skim using a table, sheets of plate glass, more emery, and newspaper for shims

[ORCoaster]

Mark, I think you are trending dangerously close to Neanderthal Mechanic here.  Only the most basic tools for producing quality results.  There are contests like that.  You should seek them out.  I bet you'd at least place in them.

Creative minds rule.

[theman53]

Not to pick too much, but how hard is it to buy a proper tool for the job. I understand many can make tools to do certain things and I do the same, I am not saying your plastic bottle would or wouldn't work. At the same time I started to buy certain tools as the garage started to look like an episode of horders with things like that plastic bottle stored away. Why? Cause I don't like to do things 2 times and throwing away a bottle that I made work before wouldn't seem right. Keeping it looked like I was going to become Fred Sanford. I really started to notice when I was following some of the late Hagar's thread. I was looking at things he did and tools fashioned. Don't get me wrong he had some good ideas, but would it have killed him to get a bentley manual and do some things correct? I am not trying to pick on a dead guy or you, but sometimes there are things that just shouldn't be short cut.

In the end if the specs all measure out it is all the same I guess...proceed.

[Mark(The Miser)UK]

Mark, I think you are trending dangerously close to Neanderthal Mechanic here.  Only the most basic tools for producing quality results.  There are contests like that.  You should seek them out.  I bet you'd at least place in them.

Creative minds rule.

Lol yeah...
I try my best, like when I'm growing potatoes from halves of a potatoe then a quarter , then from a knocked off eye, surely unbeatable; then last week someone on the radio has done it  from peelings... Time to get the testtubes out and perform a little 'In Vitro'....

[Mark(The Miser)UK]

Not to pick too much, but how hard is it to buy a proper tool for the job. I understand many can make tools to do certain things and I do the same, I am not saying your plastic bottle would or wouldn't work. At the same time I started to buy certain tools as the garage started to look like an episode of horders with things like that plastic bottle stored away. Why? Cause I don't like to do things 2 times and throwing away a bottle that I made work before wouldn't seem right. Keeping it looked like I was going to become Fred Sanford. I really started to notice when I was following some of the late Hagar's thread. I was looking at things he did and tools fashioned. Don't get me wrong he had some good ideas, but would it have killed him to get a bentley manual and do some things correct? I am not trying to pick on a dead guy or you, but sometimes there are things that just shouldn't be short cut.

In the end if the specs all measure out it is all the same I guess...proceed.

Theman, I know what you mean, for sure, but even the Bentley has it's weaknesses, omissions, and failures. I admit you have to trust the professionals at least at first if not permanently. IIRC at least one Bentley edition transposed the 1000km retorque as good ole 1000miles. Not neccessarily fatal, but possibly creating a leak to the gasket that just wont torque away...

[belchfire]

Not being born with a silver spoon in my mouth, I've always had to improvise. While things weren't always pretty, they worked. However, sometimes you've just got to bite the bullet and spend the bucks. Now you're beginning to sound cheap. Dude, I think I hear banjos playing.

[Mark(The Miser)UK]

Not being born with a silver spoon in my mouth, I've always had to improvise. While things weren't always pretty, they worked. However, sometimes you've just got to bite the bullet and spend the bucks. Now you're beginning to sound cheap. Dude, I think I hear banjos playing.

You mean like "Deliverance" ? Mighty fine playing  

My inexpensive techniques are simply giving an additional option to those who have limited money to spend on their vehicle, but are trying not to have to throw it away as it is a lifeline.

It is also for those who like challenges; or it suits my lifestyle, where  I am not rich and not poor, but by living right smack in the middle of my means, am completely recession proof  

[ORCoaster]

I like Marks method.  If you are able to buy the perfect tool for every job you own a well managed shop.  Most of us don't so we improvise where we can and spend our hard earned coin on those tools we find over time are necessary to do it right.  Living on a budget and keeping your head above water is not always as easy as it would seem.

[R.O.R-2.0]

I like Marks method.  If you are able to buy the perfect tool for every job you own a well managed shop.  Most of us don't so we improvise where we can and spend our hard earned coin on those tools we find over time are necessary to do it right.  Living on a budget and keeping your head above water is not always as easy as it would seem.

Whats wrong with using a pop bottle to hone your cylinders? if the end result is acceptable, then who cares WHAT he honed the cylinders with? right?

i, for one, think its definitely a GOOD WAY to hone cylinders without a proper hone.. pop bottle is going to keep the emery in contact with the bore, even if the bore is egg shaped..

i think i would rather hone my cylinders with a pop bottle, rather than sit around and wait until i had enough money to buy the proper hone..

[Dakotakid]

Well, I'm sure glad that you like marching to the beat of his wooly mammothed-skin drum, because I sure don't.

Case in point:  closely exam the photo which he has provided to support his "mechanical skills." Zoom in on that photo and you will see that good ol' Mark has been honing his bores, with all kinds of chips a-flying. His delivery valves, all oil drain passages, and the intake tract of his turbocharger are fully exposed to the deposition of steel chips. NO attempt has been made to avoid contamination.

Personally, I would never cut corners and hone a block in the car. I have an interest in doing things much more carefully. If I am setting up an engine to carry me down the road, I prefer the much more cautious/careful route to make every attempt to rule out any sort of breakdown. And, I proudly admit that this frame of mind has served me very well as I have been driving these diesels since '79 and doing right at 50,000 miles (not short kms) many of those years. Do the math, and then understand that I have never, never had one of the diesels stop on the road. Does my poop smell, of course it does. But, close adherence to good practice pays off very well.

I think the introduction of hap-hazard practices and shortcuts, which is Mark's hallmark, steers a lot of the new guys into dangerous waters. This logic is reckless at a time (at least in the USA), when available replacement engine components are getting almost impossible to find. I prefer to follow the "rules" and avoid the catastrophes. Just my humble take. Let the turd-slinging begin.

[theman53]

I guess what I was saying was not to not try out of the box ideas, I do that all the time. But for things as simple as a hone that tons of people have, go borrow one. It is usually a tool that you use once and don't need it for a long time. I have about 3 friends that I could go to and several parts stores that loan tools and are less than 20 minutes away. * I live in a hick villiage and most people have stuff closer* For the time, mess, energy, and then disposal or finding a place to stick that thing I now usually go to my friends for a tool I don't have and borrow. Most times I can get a beer out of the deal too, so it isn't a total loss of resources to borrow the tool.

If you don't have any friends, or shops, or parts stores that loan tools, or money to buy one, then by all means do what you can to keep a car on the road. If you junk it in the process you have lost nothing, as it wouldn't go without work anyway. I think this could and looks like it did work, but you have to know how to hone and engine with the real tool to even have the basic understanding to pull it off. Most that don't have a tool might not have ever done or know how to do a hone, so I agree with Dakotakid in that it may steer the newest crop in a bad direction. But then enters the live and learn principle that always seems to work for us.

I am as frugal as anyone I have ever met, but I am not cheap. I try to get the most out of a dollar, but something like this where you could be out all that work and parts if it didn't go well...That doesn't save money for me. If it works then you saved 25.00 on buying a hone, if it doesn't then all the time, HG, and head bolts at the least are needed again.

I may split this topic as I think we may have come a long way from heatshields.