Connecting Rod Bolts

Sleek Coventry coupe a sculpture on wheels

NORMAN — Charles Laurence drives a work of art. It’s a stunning, Arctic Blue 1965 Jaguar XKE that he has owned for more than a quarter century. This car’s elegant sheet metal draws admiration from men and women, motoring enthusiasts and non-drivers alike. The model is only one of two automobiles ever added to the Museum of Modern Art’s permanent design collection.

Italians know a thing or two about delectable design, and none other than Enzo Ferrari called it, “The most beautiful car ever made.” It’s a gorgeous automobile to behold but what Laurence really loves is driving it. In fact the Laurence couple recently moved to Oklahoma from Anchorage, Alaska in no small part because of our roads. He grew up in the Bay area and had never lived here until last year.

“My wife Ann grew up here, attending Putnam City High School and OU’s School of Nursing,” Laurence said. “We’d come to Oklahoma a number of times for reunions and had always enjoyed it here.”

Ann loved Alaska but in 2010 at her suggestion they decided Oklahoma would be a good place for retirement. During his successful career as a sales professional the couple had also lived in Honolulu and Europe.

“Because of my fondness for old cars, when I retired I wanted us to be able to go on road trips,” he said. “In Alaska, one highway goes north and one goes south, so that’s your trip. After you’ve driven the same road a dozen or so times it tends to lose its appeal.”

Driving from Anchorage to Seattle, the next major city, is a 5-day motoring proposition. “I wanted to live someplace where we could get in the car and go places,” Laurence said. “Oklahoma has great highways in all directions. We considered Seattle, Portland and California, but they are just too traffic-congested. Plus, the politics all over the west coast is insane. Everything just suits us here.”

Laurence found his Jaguar for sale in the San Diego newspaper classified ads while there on a business trip. His meeting was over fairly early in the morning so he rented a car and went to check it out.

“I took the Jaguar out for a drive and fell in love with the car,” he said. “Back in my college days, I’d had a 1954 Jaguar XK-120 and compared to that one, this XKE was just so easy to drive.”

Laurence described a light but powerful road demon. Its 4.2 liter, over-head cam 6-cylinder engine with 3 S.U. (Skinners Union) carburetors is capable of propelling the beauty to a top speed of 150 mph. This model was one of the world’s fastest production cars of its day. It has a 4-speed manual transmission and disc brakes all around which was unusual in 1965. The car’s independent rear suspension also was advanced for the era. No air conditioning — it’s more of a purist’s sports car with non-power assisted rack and pinion steering.

Preparing Your Connecting Rods For Installation | AutoNest | Birth ...

If you have been reading our articles on connecting rods you have probably realized the importance of connecting rods. Weak connecting rods are a failure for disaster; so are improperly installed connecting rods. Whether you buy new or used connecting rods, you should always inspect them and prepare them for installation. Here are a list of certain things you can do to get them ready.

Bent or even slightly distorted connecting rods can rob any engine of power because they will set the piston at an angle increasing the amount of friction it produces against the cylinder wall. Checking rod alignment is a must for every performance engine.

This can be done visually, by magnetic inspection, or magnafluxing. Cracked connecting rods can mean that they are weak or beginning to weaken. If the cracks are superficial, do not worry, there are ways to optimize your rods and we will talk about them later on in this article.

Another item on the to-do list is to check the connecting rod’s big-bore end. Make sure it is still within its prescribed limits. If not, it may need to be reconditioned. The bore size can change or even distort if the rod has seen many loads of detonation. Distorted ends are not good because they can easily allow the rod bearings to spin.

After you checked the connecting rods for any faults, it is time to optimize the rods for use. There is no need to install rods to have them seize or spin a couple race days later, right? Right.

These are some of the most overlooked parts in a connecting rod. Rod bolts are important for bearing reliability. If the bolts stretch under load, the crush will be reduced and the connecting rod can surrender its grip on the bearing shell. Be sure to buy quality rod bolts.

Reducing the weight of the connecting rods can help your performance a lot. It may not increase the horsepower output but it will improve throttle response. Acceleration can be just as important as power. Most connecting rods have large balance pads at both the pin (small) and journal (big) ends. Shaving these off can reduce the rod weight by about 10%. Make sure to keep enough material on so the rods can be balanced before final assembly.

What is shot-peening? Shot-peening is a process of when the rod is hammered with thousands of small steel balls. This puts compressive stress on the surface of the rod reducing the changes of small surface cracks which can lead to full-scale failures.

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