[Sirrotica]

I'm kind of surprised of the content of that E Mail. Although I've never done any business with the Butlers, I have shared an adjoining spot on the manufacturers midway at Norwalk for 7 years, and have had occasion to talk to them during the event in the course of selling my Pontiac themed T shirts.

One year there was someone displaying a crank that was pretty much destroyed in the swap meet, that was from an engine that had problems, alluding to the crank was bought from the Butlers, and was alleged to have been defective when bought, causing the engine to fail. The situation got back to the Butlers and they went and discussed the situation, and came to some type of understanding that the aggrieved party was going to get some type of compensation for their trouble.

From the story I was told, it didn't sound to me that the crank was the fault of the vendor, but in a leap of good faith they were willing to do something to help out the customer.

I've heard that some of the employees in the past have been abrupt on the phone with customers, and that the owners would have been less than happy with the responses from their employees. In my speaking with them over the years they're nice, fair, people. I'm wondering if the E Mail was from an employee, rather than one of the Butler family.....

The core shift response sounds like a far fetched reach in trying to explain away what happened with the rotating assembly. Just kind of surprised at that response.

I'm in agreement that core shift happens during the casting process when the block is made. It has little to do with how main bearings sit in the block decades after the fact. IMO, If anything, the factory machining initially would make a problem, not core shift. FWIW.

I have a friend that builds his own SBC oval track engines, when he stepped up to using aftermarket cranks over factory pieces, he also ran into the radius problem on rod throws. He caught the interference problem and had to order the relieved rod bearings to solve his problem. The Pontiac community doesn't have anywhere near the choices of bearings that SBC builders do, we sometimes have to modify the bearings themselves rather than buy a bearing that fits our applications. Just a fact due to the supply, and demand in our small circle..............