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Kwik-Way boring bar specs

kcumbus

Plastic
Joined
Sep 21, 2021
Newbie here, hopefully I've posted this in the right place. I'm looking to get setup in my small motorcycle restoration business to be able to bore small cylinders (as small as 1.5" diameter). I'm a fan of the Kwik-Way boring bars, but having a hard time finding specifications for the various models. I realize that these boring bars were discontinued manufacture in 2013. Can anyone guide me to a good Kwik-Way resource site? Or if anyone has recommendations on other equipment, I'd be interested to know. Thank you.
 
Newbie here, hopefully I've posted this in the right place. I'm looking to get setup in my small motorcycle restoration business to be able to bore small cylinders (as small as 1.5" diameter). I'm a fan of the Kwik-Way boring bars, but having a hard time finding specifications for the various models. I realize that these boring bars were discontinued manufacture in 2013. Can anyone guide me to a good Kwik-Way resource site? Or if anyone has recommendations on other equipment, I'd be interested to know. Thank you.

They prolly made one that small IDK for sure. Mine has an arbor about 2.5" diameter You might be better off with a Sunnen hone like a MBB 1600. They make stones and arbors for any diameter and you can finish the bore to whatever is required,.
 
The FWH is made for small cylinders. I had one many years ago. It's a marginal unit IMO, the downfeed is air operated and touchy, prone to chatter. The standard tooling sucks, upgrading to a high positive carbide made a big difference. They fetch around $2,000 if you can find one that is is good shape. Although with automotive machine shops folding left and right these days, you might find a deal. You need to join the Speedtalk forum, all automotive based.
 
try the kwikway website. they still sell manuals and they have a phone number 319-377-9421
i believe, but not certain, the bike bar goes down to 1.75
 
They prolly made one that small IDK for sure. Mine has an arbor about 2.5" diameter You might be better off with a Sunnen hone like a MBB 1600. They make stones and arbors for any diameter and you can finish the bore to whatever is required,.

Tell me more about the MBB 1600. Most of my bore jobs require removal .020" material to reach the next oversize piston. Is it practical to remove that amount of material with a hone rather than cutting with a bar? Will it be true? Thanks, apologize for the basic questions, I'm learning. :)
 
Every small cylinder I've bored I just used my vertical mill or made a fixture plate and used my lathe. IDK if that's an option for you but probably easier to find that tooling than a small kwick way and would give you the option of doing other stuff.
 
You probably just are not familiar with the part # MBB1600, every shop has a Sunnen horizontal hone in one form or another. The 2 or 3PL Sunnen mandrels work great for finish honing cylinders up to approx 2.600". I've bored thousands of bike/snow machine/lawn mower/outboard/you name it using a 944S Van Norman bar on this little stand, which is available, I don't do that stuff anymore. The 944S goes down to 2.188", anything under that I used the FWH or honed to size with a PL. Above 2.600 you can use AN stones with the AN600 mandrel in the LBB.small boring table 001 (Small).JPG

I should add, that is a Kwikway FN sitting on the stand, I used that a lot on there also for larger stuff.
 
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We have a Kwik-Way and a stand which will get you down to 2.25" for $3200.

Rottler has a stub bar option which will go down to 1.5". We have a old original Rottler for cheap, but I'll have to confirm the later stub bar will fit the older bar.

jack vines
 
We have a Kwik-Way and a stand which will get you down to 2.25" for $3200.

Rottler has a stub bar option which will go down to 1.5". We have a old original Rottler for cheap, but I'll have to confirm the later stub bar will fit the older bar.

jack vines

I do very little work above 2", at least 95% of my rebuilds are no larger than 90cc engines. So that Kwik-Way wouldn't do me a lot of good.

I'd like to know more about the Rottler solution though, can you expand on that a bit more?
 
Tell me more about the MBB 1600. Most of my bore jobs require removal .020" material to reach the next oversize piston. Is it practical to remove that amount of material with a hone rather than cutting with a bar? Will it be true? Thanks, apologize for the basic questions, I'm learning. :)

It is a horizontal honing machine, mine has power stroking. mandrels are available down to about .25" the biggest one I have is 3" stones are available in any grit you can think of. Yes it will be straight. .020 is no problem, start with a roughing stone and then switch to your finish grit and you are done. Google it for photos. Call Sunnen and talk to an applications guy and they will sort you out. They are very friendly and helpful.
 
I do very little work above 2", at least 95% of my rebuilds are no larger than 90cc engines. So that Kwik-Way wouldn't do me a lot of good.

I'd like to know more about the Rottler solution though, can you expand on that a bit more?

If you do nothing over 2", you can hone a .020" bore, using roughing stones in the PL mandrel to within .002", then finish stones to size. Or assuming you already have a lathe or vert mill, bore it to within .005", then finish hone with a PL.
 
I have had to bore those small engine cylinders. and had problems. I have tried doing it in the mill with several brands of boring heads and it seems like you always get some chatter? I have had better luck using a good lathe to bore them, but its always a challenge to mount the cylinder on a face plate and get it dialed in? Still can have chatter problems too? Honing works fine but is very slow. One shop I worked at had the small kwikway bar and as mentioned the air/hydraulic feed is a pain sometimes and the side mounted mike was a pita that overbored if you were not real careful? Sorry, no easy fast way to bore small cylinders? Not fast enough to make any real money?
 
If all you do is motorcycle cylinders with bores under a few inches you could do anything under the sun with a small CNC mill and about 3 sizes of Devlieg cartridge boring bars.

I bought a selection of Devlieg bars that covers .300" to 3" at an auction for $10. I have bored 1.7500" with one of them 6" deep with nearly a mirror finish in 6061.

This is old school stuff. Like 1950's through 1990's era. A Cartridge bar is way more rigid than a boring head.

You could do it in a Bridgeport, but I don't see the point. A small VMC is cheaper than a nice Bridgeport and about 1000 times more useful.
 
If all you do is motorcycle cylinders with bores under a few inches you could do anything under the sun with a small CNC mill and about 3 sizes of Devlieg cartridge boring bars.

I bought a selection of Devlieg bars that covers .300" to 3" at an auction for $10. I have bored 1.7500" with one of them 6" deep with nearly a mirror finish in 6061.

This is old school stuff. Like 1950's through 1990's era. A Cartridge bar is way more rigid than a boring head.

You could do it in a Bridgeport, but I don't see the point. A small VMC is cheaper than a nice Bridgeport and about 1000 times more useful.

Yeah, I always thought the chatter problem in the mill was because the bar lacked enough rigidity? I would love to find some Devlieg bars, but have never been to the right auction? Boring 6061 is a different world than a iron cylinder though?
 
Chatter was a problem with my FWH but it went away when I converted to TCGT221-AK HO1 inserts. I bore and sleeve a lot of Harley cylinders on my CNC mill using Big Kaiser tooling and the thin section below the flange is prone to chatter and balooning when using my normal insert. I save the last cut with that HO1 insert and no problem. I think the OP's best option is a FWH converted to the HO1 insert as it bores referenced off the base of the cylinder. Set-up and centering is fast and idiot proof.
 
mandrels are available down to about .25" the biggest one I have is 3"
Actually, Sunnen makes mandrels for their MBB-1660 down to 0.060", and their AN600 goes as large as 6.5" with the right set of stones. Unfortunately, it only goes as small as 2.5", which doesn't satisfy the OP's 1.5" requirement. Between 1.5" and the AN600's 2.5" the only choice would be mandrels in the P28 series, each of which only covers a limited range so it would require eight of them to span 1.5"-2.5" without any gaps.
 
The problems with the Sunnen mandrels are the expense! They are not cheap unless you find them used and they are slow if you are boring say .020? Yeah a cnc mill with Kaiser tooling would be nice, but how many cylinders do you have to do to justify that expense? You better have other jobs to use it on? I agree with slowmotion about getting better tooling if you can find a kwik way fwh? they didn't make alot of those and the youngest one is getting old now? I think they have been out of production for close to 40 years? I did see a small 1/2 size version of a Van Norman 944s at a trade show once? It was made overseas and sold by a canadian firm? That would be the machine to have for really small cylinders!
 








 
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