Is this piston useable?

[citymunky]

This piston made contact with a valve sometime in its life (Start up), would you use this piston or replace it?

 

[ApexHunter]

I'd sh*t can it- not worth it. That gouge will serve as a nice habitat for carbon deposits and become a hot spot, encouraging detonation/pre-ignition.

 

[diambo4life]

A daily beater? I would run it. Something more adventurous.....no.

 

[donniekak]

Check that the rings don't get pinched in the land, knock the sharp edge off of it with a detail file and run it. The valve relief cuts are sharper than that dent will be.
The bottom end in my car was in it when I bought it. Eagle/wiseco combo. At some point in time the exhaust valves contacted the Pistons. I spent a couple minutes making sure they weren't sharp, and checked the pin boss skirt area for cracks. They work fine at 40+ psi on e85, and have no knock issues running pump gas at 25 psi with a 35r sized turbo.

 

[biglady112]

We have made over 800hp with much worse. Smooth/grind the ding down and go nuts. Don't be scared.

 

[Mdlimy]

Id smooth it out real good and run it. Like Apex said, the burs will cause hotspots and cause det. If it truly happened at start up it shouldn't have done any structural damage to the rest of the piston.

 

[EMX5636]

I've cleaned up marks like that with no ill effects. It depends if it's always going to be on the back of your mind. If it will haunt you, replace it. But you can probably beat the snot out of it without issues.

 

[TurboTurtle]

If you have to question it, you shouldn't use it

 

[Olson]

Clean it up smooth it out and run it.

 

[GSX_TC]

Quoting TurboTurtle:
If you have to question it, you shouldn't use it



^^
What he said.

 

[GSTwithPSI]

Quoting Olson:
Clean it up smooth it out and run it.



+1

 

[swe_gvr4_1991]

Quoting Olson:
Clean it up smooth it out and run it.



+1

 

[iceman69510]

Agree it is usable with removing sharp edges.

 

[citymunky]

Thanks for the input guys, I'm not a engine builder so I don't know much about this things.

Looking at the other pistons that were in the block, they all made slight contact with a valve at some point. However the piston pictured above was by far the worst one. I'm just going to use the other set of JE pistons from the motor that was in 733/2k to begin with.

 

[KoR32t4g]

Quoting Olson:
Clean it up smooth it out and run it.



I agree, worked for me with my R32.