Looking for a thread that had a youtube video of different honing tools & which one worked better, like a ball hone versus a 3 finger hone.

Honing a cylinder without a bore gauge or at least a good inside micrometer and a good outside micrometer to keep track of that you are doing is pretty much insane.

If the bore is out of round and tapered (they ALL are after they run 150k miles or more with **** oil that was never changed) you need to be able to “see” what you are doing and try to get the bore as straight and round as you can.

Those 3 fingered hones will remove material but they are slow and they tend to follow the bore. That’s because they flex. A rigid hone will get the bore more straight and round much quicker while building less heat.

If you are going to do it (you as in anyone giving honing a try) make sure you use an oil like ATF or something similar and not something like WD-40 or gasoline or alcohol. Vitrified abrasives are designed to break down so that you constantly have a fresh, clean, sharp cutting face. The above listed light stuff doesn’t allow the abrasive to break down and you end up burnishing the bores and that’s a big no-no.

The cutting oil also clears away the swarf (the broken down abrasive and cast iron removed from the bore) so if you don’t use enough cutting oil that swarf gets impacted back into the valleys and it stays there. You can’t wash it out. It only comes out when the rings start moving across the bores. That’s the same as adding sand to the bores on start up. That’s not good. In fact, that bad. Very bad.

Most of the videos I have watched crack me up. They guys doing it look like a whirling dervish, pumping that hone up and down like they are banging a cheap hooker on blow.

They turn the hone way too fast and to get the crosshatch correct they have to move the hone so fast it’s crazy.

Slow the hone RPM way down, then slow down the stokes per minute a bunch until you get your 22.5 degree angle (45 degrees included).

Keep the stones wet and use a lot of oil to keep them clean and sharp.

Honing looks pretty simple and it is. But it’s way easier to screw stuff up than it is to do it correctly.