Most of us take for granted that building a modern automobile engine actually is quite the accomplishment. It’s a merger of man and machine. When it comes to building a high-horsepower car with the race track in mind, automakers like GM have to go that extra mile to ensure that customers won’t be blowing holes in the engine block the first time they hit the track. GM has worked a lot of magic on the supercharged 6.2 liter Camaro ZL1 engine, and among their tricks is a process for ensuring that the engine block and cylinders are honed to perfection. And in this video [1] we get a look at some of those tricks.
[2]With 580 horsepower, the supercharged 6.2 liter V8 engine is among the most powerful ever built by GM. With a redline near 7,000 RPM, all the forged components in the world don’t mean diddly-squat of the cylinders aren’t perfectly round. Anybody who knows CNC machining knows that metal can, and does, bend, including the cylinder sleeves. This can cause quite the problem when it comes to high performance motors.
GM gets around this by attaching a special deck plate to the block, prior to machining it. This plate simulates the same stresses that the engine would experience if the cylinder heads were attached. This helps keep the cylinder sleeves perfectly round during the honing process, ensuring extra longevity and peak performance. It’s a cool video [1] for anybody interested in watching an LSA come together.