Heres a question for you

[old]

When installing rings on a 4 ring piston, 3 compression rings do you put them top to bottom with the gaps at 12 o'clock, 6 and then 12 again or do you do it 12, 4, and 8?? What do you guys do. I've always done the 12, ,8,and 4 but have always wondered which way is best??
Thanks
Hobby farm

 

[Anonymous-0]

I've rebuilt many engines and I have never had the ring gaps of any two rings in the same postion. I have no set pattern that I use but, I do try to keep the ring gaps as far away from the ring next to it as possible. Like a four compression ring piston, 12 o:clock, 6, 10 &, 4.

 

[Floyd A tn]

I always have done the 12, 8, and 4. Never given much thought as to any other way of doing it. My dad told me this was his way as well.

Now that I think about it, 12-6-12 should do well too.

 

[JDemaris]

This is what we experienced in our shops. Most companies suggest at least a 90 degree staggering of ring-gap-ends from one ring to the next.
We had several that were found to have those rings get lined up - all in a row after awhile. These were all Deere diesels and Deere Co. sent some engineers to come out and look things over. We only discovered it because we had a few engines with just a couple of hundred hours on them burning oil. Some new from Deere and some newly rebuilt in our shop.
Deere guys came up with the following. Engines not loaded down enough in the early break-in period did not develop enough wear patterns to prevent ring-walking.
After all that we started putting all rings on all engines 180 degrees apart. It has worked fine and I use it for any engine that does not have rings pinned in place.

 

[Walt Davies]

I Have rebuilt hundreds of engines and never really worried about the clock I just turn then so that they were evenly placed around the piston. 3 or 4 doesn't really matter if they are evenly spaced. As far as using the clock I hope that you don't have a digital one. Giggle.
Walt

 

[trucker40]

On a piston you have a flat area where they machined it you dont want any of the gaps where a flat area is under the gap,I put them 180 from the ring thats next to it.when you get done you have 4 rings at least 90 degrees from each other,180 from the one next to it,none of em where the piston is flat where the pin goes through.

 

[Mike M]

I had rings in an air compressor walk all in line on me once. I'm glad others have confirmed this can happen. Because I know better than to put them in all lined up and am very carefull when I assemble this stuff. I was hopeing I didn't have a brain fart.

 

[guido]

Hey Old
Piston ring end-gap positioning is determined by the piston design.One piece aluminum piston ring gap should be 120 Degrees apart.On a 2 piece cross head piston like the one used for the Detroit Diesel series 50 and 60 180 degrees apart 1st and 3dr ring.On a two cycle Detroit Ddiesel you fallow the direction that come with the pack.
There are 3 top rings 120 degrees apart.
They have 4 oil controll rings with 2 expanders, and the expanders are color coded for the application,city bus, on highway etc.the color determines the expander's tension.

Guido.

 

[Pappy]

My old Chevrolet mechanic uncle advised the 120 degree method with the gap in the top ring placed away from the spark plug, when possible. He did this for 37 years. He probably learned something.

 

[Leroy]

The first engine I ever worked on was a Briggs lawnmower and it got using so much oil it would only run a bit before the plug fouled out from oil. Dad took it to a shop to get repaired and they said it was beyond repair, brought it home in a box and just to see if I could do it I tried putting it together and having never seen one apart I thought looking at it the rings should not be ligned up so I spaced them at 120* and got it back together, diden't expect it to run but decided to put some gas in and try it, started right up (Supprised me) used it for several years with no plug fowling and then sold it. It had to have been the rings aligned themselves up

 

[Mark - IN.]

So, if you have an engine, sounds like a recent build or rebuild and the rings have walked in line, hone the cylinders, replace those rings? I'm just asking because had that happen once. I always went 120, but now that its been mentioned, 180 does sound better.

Thanks.

 

[rrlund]

My son builds hi performance race engines for teams all over the world,European Grand Prix,etc,he says the gap should be lined up with the wrist pins. If they are 90 degrees from the wrist pins,they wear more on the cylinder walls. That's not my opinion,it's big time engine building science.