You get what you pay for, this is an excellent demo. Thank you for posted these vids, hopefully it saves people money in the end, unwanted grief and most of all risking destroying your engine..
Powell Machine is a breath of FRESH AIR, in these times of IMMENSE BS! I learned in just 2 of your videos, that the Chinese steel hardness is acceptable on their cams and lifters, but their valve springs, straight off the boat, are junk- coil bind, weak seat and open pressures, inconsistent free standing height. I've built maybe a dozen or more engines and worked on many, many more over the last 50+ years. Mopar was my first love, then Chevy and Ford. Your videos inspire trust and confidence, and I will look to your website in future endeavors. I'm almost done collecting parts for a SBC 406, and a Mopar stock bore 440. Thanks for your knowledge and candid, to the point videos!
One place you absolutely can't take a chance on is on the valve train. Why people cheap out to save money on junk and take a big chance on dropping or breaking something is beyond me.
I've already seen a bunch of these cheapies fail on the web, it's a pretty nasty sight. Best case was they had to buy decent springs anyways, worst was a dropped valve and every head/piston trashed.
just another reason I only use American made parts. If we don't make them I have them made here. Plus it's the right thing to do so there's that. Thank you for your time.
Load loss is a big tell tale, coil bind them a few times and see what the FL does. If you want to know if the springs will last (and they're geometrically the same), then you have to measure the compressive residual stresses on the surface. You can cut and polish the cross-section, then use knoop to map the hardness vs depth, or put it through XRD. Shot peening is required for any engine valve spring to survive, there is no such thing as an engine valve spring that hasn't been shot peened. That is how important shot peening and compressive residual stresses are. The last characteristic I can think of now is that PAC uses super clean (low inclusion) wire from Japan for all the high end springs, we don't know if the chinesium is comparable. Former PAC racing engineer here ;)
Once again gr8 video and explaination Daniel, appreciated. Have always wondered about the eBay and Amazon cheap ( Pac Springs ) copies. Not even worth the trouble wasting money on them. Thank you for the informative video.👍 From " the land down under " 🇦🇺
Now I know some people have bought Edelbrock E-Street Heads which are made in China, and come assembled. So that would mean those $43.00 springs are being used, or am I just overthinking? If I'm right, and I've been hearing that these China made valve springs are failing.... There's gonna be a lot of trashed engines...
Those are probably PAC seconds revoked, lol. I have been using 1218’s on 408” Dodge builds. Never had any issues . You would probably have to get 5 sets of the Chinesium springs to get a usable set , then prey they don’t fatigue after the 2nd or third 6800 rpm pull. And don’t worry about the coil bind, a tall valve guide will keep it from float, lol.
I worked there in Southfield as an engineer years ago, that was never a thing (trying to salvage bad parts). It's a batch process with quality checks throughout so it's a bad batch would continue processing.
Daniel, thankyou for your informative videos I've benefited from watching some and I hope you don't think I'm being picky but shouldn't you have scragged both spring sets before the pressure testing? You can put the vernier under the pressure tester top pad and compress the spring to get individual coil bind. FYI put both in an oven for an hour at 190'f then test when hot. You'll find they are softer. Don't burn yourself!! Keep the quality content coming.
Really...how did you observe the change? Truthfully.. I like to learn about these differences compared to the supposedly " USA " parts (which is RARE, even with the TOP manufacturers) . Too many Folk on here using "Country Boy" testing, rather than actual Engineer precision testing... Too many rumors, "I heard", Personal, Subjective, and even just flat out lies from people who talk like they Actually know, but rather just wanting to say stuff they have ZERO knowledge of...anyways, How did you figure they get "smaller". Maybe not spitten a lil tabacca juice on them before install??? ALL Springs wear out and loose there compression and tension which causes them to relax and possibly "get smaller"...the main question is how long do they last compared to the TOP brands, and consistency of specifications. If a Cheap chinese part has consistency in specs, and tolerable life span, I don't see anything wrong with using chinese. Considering, much of what we add under the hood is actually made in china, and a lot of times BY THE SAME MANUFACTURER Top Brands contract with! Just relabled in a different box, name, ect....so with every compression they shrink..lol that means after a few revolutions, we gotta swap them out before even leaving the driveway! 😊
The PAC springs also measure light,, 175 when supposed to be 180, what will they be after the first decent rev? The China springs will be 140lb after the first rev!! Engine I am building uses PAC so I had better check them all, dont need light ones at 7500
I have a friend who has a machine shop. He took on a job and as his article (part) he made was right to Spec using American steel. He took on the production job contract and decided to buy Chinese steel because it was a lot cheaper in cost to buy. The job became a disaster. Reason being, he didn't realize that Chinese steel is not made up of the same alloying elements as U.S. steel. These parts had to be formed to a specific radius, NOT even close. He called me to look at his problem and I noticed the steeled came from China. After I told him what the problem, he had to buy U.S. steel to complete the contract agreement. He lost a lot of money buying Chinese junk material. JR
So, if your going to go with the sloppy china, get 2 or 3 kits, don't exceed a .545 lift, and may want to install a bit tighter than 1.8? Lol. Or just buy pac. I have a set of those pac sitting on the shelf. Can shelf time cause harm? Serious question. Thanks!
Afr enforcer head 8mm valve stems. Loaded head out of box set up with hydraulic roller springs. Supposed to be PAC springs but the coil wire looks thin to me. Can you confirm Pac springs are what comes in these heads? Was thinking about that while watching this video
We need manufacturing brought back to the USA I gladly would pay more to get the great quality parts. It's no fun spending hours on a rebuild to have fail prematurely
OK ...I know this all about building killer racing engines and all and I thank you.... but who is that doing that sick music band jammin' in the intro to this video? Do they have a download site? And also.... and I am not complaining..... but when i clicked on this very informative video's freeze-frame pic there was this cute chick (probably your daughter or something ?) anyway... good video... so valve springs. Probably why my engine eat a valve last weekend running cheap Chinese springs while trying to retake the lead from that show-off from three counties over. At MY track. I only maybe pushed my engine 500 rpm pass red line trying to pass him out of the final fourth turn. I didn't save much that race. And no winner's trophy. Quality matters. Got it.
You could take out "1218 valve springs" and insert pretty much any part name in there and the answer would be pretty much the same. I wouldn't put no name ebay chinesium stuff on my lawn mower.
Please excuse my ignorance. When the boxes were first opened you mentioned a difference in the color of the springs. Why is that? Thanks for your time and the content.
Obviously stuff from China will always be 2nd rate compared with American products but regardless I am amazed that People worldwide buy Chinese products when doing so, supports the CCP !
CHEAP CHINESE CRAP MADE THE MISTAKE OF BUYING ENGINE-TECH TIMING CHAIN SET FOR A 4.0L FORD V-6 LASTED 103 MILES BEFORE THE REAR TIMING CHAIN SNAPPED AND DESTROYED MY REBIULD THE CHAIN WAS MADE TO SHORT
Who in their right mind would even think about buying Chinese crap when you can buy American stuff and the price difference isn't that much you'd have to be nuts to spend money on Chinese junk
