Quote: Was it purposly drilled at a angle to clear the drill past rear counter weight,and was it purposly stopped at the point it was as not to drill into the thrust face? kind'a hard to tell from the pic's
I think this needs more scrutiny before coming to a conclusion.
I am looking at my 440Source 4.250" crank (RB) and both the 5-6 and 7-8 rod journals have the lightening hole at an angle. This appears to be done to allow the drill bit/tooling to clear the crank flange. Mine doesn't appear to be at as much angle as BG's, but that could be a photo illusion or the angle the bar is held at (bar smaller than hole). It appears the 5-6 journal is drilled larger (0.79" dia) and not as deep as the others which are all the way through and about 0.71" dia. The larger bit/tooling for the 5-6 requires it to be at a slightly larger angle than 7-8 and the amount of metal removed may be the same. This does not apply to the front journals since there is no crank flange on the front (damper snout).
best I can tell from the pic , the protractor appears to be at a 5* angle.
Light travels faster than the speed of sound,,,this is why some people seem bright untill you hear them speak.
