Every engine that comes into Paul Kistler’s shop, Kistler Engines Inc., is an unique engine to him. Despite the fact that his Fremont, OH shop specializes specifically in Sprint Car engines, each one is special and requires attention to detail.
“We are unique in that the only thing we work on is Sprint Car motors,” Kistler says. “The 410 Sprint cars and the 360s and stuff. We do a lot of rebuild work on aluminum 410 Sprint Car motors. We have about four engines going together right now.”
These engines are all small block Chevys. Kistler uses Donovan blocks, Sonny Bryant cranks, CP-Carrillo rods and either CP pistons or Mahle pistons. He also uses All Pro heads, Engler or Kinsler injections, Xceldyne titanium valves, and Cometic Gaskets for everything.
“Engine rebuilds typically take us 40 hours,” he says. “The first thing we do when an engine comes in for a rebuild is hot water pressure test them, which is pretty unique. Then the motors are completely disassembled and the block is honed and line honed. We do a full valve job and we clean everything up to be put back together. Everything gets Magnafluxed. We do everything for the engine in-house except for crank grinding and camshaft grinding.”
When Kistler is done with a rebuild or refresh of a Sprint Car engine, these power plants put out somewhere around 700 ft.-lbs. of torque and 880-900 hp. The compression ratio is usually around 16:1. Time to go racing!
Engine of the Week is sponsored by Cometic Gasket
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