Has anyone tried the factory replacement rods that use a pressed pin? I was curious how many grams they are? Ive emailed but havent got a reply back

Yep, got a set of 'em once. Love the guys at 440 Source and use a lot of their stuff, but I won't get another set of those rods.

what did you find?

what was the story?

Probally a set of the many stock 440 rods that Brandon bought at every automotive swap meet he could go to in SO CA back before he and his buddy opened 440 source. I sold him many cast intakes and exhaust manifolds as well as water pump housing and every kind of sheet metal parts that he wanted

i have a set and they are nothing like factory. i noticed a couple of nuisance things but nothing i thought would prohibit use. perhaps mr. laroy has noticed something i haven't. weight is around 875grms.

With the set that I received, the big end that was supposed to .014" varied from .009"-.017". Not between the different rods, but on the individual rods, some had an .008" taper on the big end. From the beginning the threads were looser than I consider satisfactory and no matter how much effort you used to clean them up they felt like sand was between the threads as you assembled the rods. The area where the capscrew meet the rod cap was roughly machined and the torque never felt smooth when tightening the capscrew. Did some machining to get the big ends parallel and to clean up the rod cap. I have no doubt that 440 Source would have sent me as many replacement rods as I may have requested, they are good about that! Shipping things back and forth was going to cost me time and I had to get my personal beater back together. There are H-beam rods that are only $150 dollars more that would be a better, stronger deal with far less prep time involved.

i measured the big end widths but didn't measure for taper; i'll look at that. the bearing bore sizes fell with in spec and are a little larger than the medium dimension, typical of all chinese rods i've measured. the bearing locating tab notches were off on a few rods but i think it's fixable. i didn't like the 7/16" arp rod bolts. i think they'd wreck the rod if ever taken out and the machining was a little rough were the cap located on the rod.

There's a new 440Source stock replacement rod that uses a capscrew instead of a bolt. $250.00 I just went to look it up. The shoulder of the rod, the transistion from the shank to the big end, looks a lot nicer than the old ones, although the old ones for my uses would have been just fine.

Anyhow I am attaching a picture from the Source.

R.

I bought a 440source blem dist & when on it to correct that I broke one of the plastic adv weights (unrelated to the blem issue) and I called Brandon yesterday to buy another weight or pair of em & he said just buy some parts & he'll throw in another dist (blem) for free! Today I picked out ~$30 worth of stuff I needed & the ten dollars for shipping & all good. Brandon is the man!! Prior orders have all been good

Yep, those are the ones I used.

Most true, my customer service experiences with them have been exactly the same.

i dug out the set i have and did a quickie digital caliper measurement. it seems there is about .002"-.0025" variance in big end widths and maybe .002" taper in the big ends on some of the rods.

I'm planning on using a set of these rods myself on a current build. Haven't ordered yet. I work in the tool and gage, precision measurement field, and planned in checking all the dimensions on my own time to see the outcome of roundness, center to center, perpendicularity, etc.

I hate to buy a set that needs reworked. Kind of ruins the idea of cost savings for reconditioning an old set of rods.

I dont think I've ever had a set of Source rods that were good once you used the ARP lube and cycled them a couple times. Still a good value product but I don't believe I ever had a kit that didn't need something - and rods always needed attention.