weisco pistons

[quadracer711]

Looking to bump up compression in my xb12r

I know you can use a xb9r piston and it will raise compression. Curious if anybody is useing xb9r weisco pistons in there 12r?
Any better then stock HD 9r pistons?

[Internet Annoyance]

iWHY? why do you want to do this? Compression is already very high compared to most motor vehicles, Its surprising to me that more people arent putting holes in pistons from detonation and preignition. Gasoline quality widely varies and the numbers on the pumps are almost ALWAYS wrong, not to mention oxygenated fuels with steadily rising amounts of alcohol in the fuels isnt helping.

I could go on about the stage 1,2 & 3 forumlas for tuning and performance but rather than that,,,,,, WHY?

Track bike? other mods at the same time?

[quadracer711]

Porting/polish , exhaust : drummer or hawk, tuneing.

As what ive seen there lots of people doing this and I havent seen any promblems? As long as your running 93.

I do occasional track days.
Just looking for little more power. Not trying to make big numbers. No I dont wanna buy different bike.

[Sirius815]

From the research I have done, the wiesco pistons are lighter and the skirting is supposed to be better than the stock xb9 ones.

Ben K.

[GAXB9R]

build the motor and strap a turbo too it. you will go plenty fast.

[Internet Annoyance]

I saw you sent me a PM as well, will reply to that as well, I was just trying to see where you were coming from.
I had no idea what you had or were trying to accomplish,,,

First of all, Tuning and performance is more than i can type here. But its interesting to compare notes from here to the Sportster forums. They wish they had the Buell heads, cams and other bits that make a Buell way more powerful than a sportster. many people save a LOT of money over buying performance aftermarket parts by just bolting on a Buell top end and using the cams.

Stage 1-2-3 tuning is covered a LOT on Sporty forums, or read Buzz Buzzellis Sportster performance book (vol 3 is way better than the early ones) I cant directly answer your XB9 piston question as i have never tried it, but compression is only PART of the big picture, it comes with cams, porting, exhaust and intake upgrades and optimizing the ignition,. Truth is,,,,,,, your Buell is about as optimized as it gets, without sacrificing something,
Low end power, upper end, or driveability.

Also factor in cost and time,, it takes not that much money to go from here to there
################################################## ############## but to get that last bit #####
cost 3x or 4x the money. Compression in my opinion is already quite high on a Buell, go any higher and you will have problems unless you run race gas. Compression also doesnt raise the power much by itself, also,, there is the balance issue. To run a motor right it should be DYNAMICALLY balanced, all parts that spin, rods, bearings, crank, connection rod pins and clips all need to by balanced, and things like pistons needs to be weight matched,
I have found sets of pistons on other bikes (Triumph, BSA and Norton) that differ in weight by several grams, which has to be corrected, Dont forget to check the pins and clips as well. If you swap pistons, you need to try and figure out how it will change your balance factors Perhaps a LIGHTER piston would be an improvement, but dont count on it.
on a HD 883 sporty one of the best upgrades is a 1200cc kit after you did stage 1 tuning, it bumps up HP and Torque by more than any other mod, keep in mind you want to buy the right kit, pistons that match the heads you are using (lots of varietys) and that are weight matched for a 883. If done right its an easy swap and around $500 to do which is cheap compared to other mods.
keep in mind your intended use as well,, My Sporty in summer traffic would heat up and really cook the engine in city driving with lots of stop and go, had to carefully baby it to keep it from knocking like crazy. If you are in a warm climate, you are going to have problems with hi-comp, or get stuck in bumper to bumper traffic.

[Internet Annoyance]

If you or anyone else wants to see how much it really costs to upgrade a Buell motor,, I have a bike I bought just to get the engine. It was a XB9, someone bought a XB12 motor and spent about $7,000 to make it one hell of a hot rod, Has the big bore kit, NRHS ported heads, Ported intake, Red shift cams, and all kinds of other bits,, I also have the Dyno print outs, which are super impressive, but A few knowledgeable Buellers i showed all this stuff to think the Dyno specs MIGHT be a bit exagerrated, which could be to make the DPO feel better about how much he spent. The second owner bought the bike and thought it was making a weird noise and perhaps a valve problem
(Sticking he thought) so he partially tore it down and couldnt find anything. I bought the bike, the original Motor, and all the parts for an embarrassingly small amount of money. The seller was a super nice guy, and I told him he should just keep it, put it back together, No one will ever pay you what you have into it, But nope, for a variety of reasons he wanted it gone.
So I am putting the stock motor back in, and selling the bike, Im keeping the hot motor and rebuilding it, going over it with a fine tooth comb, Might be something wrong with it, maybe not. I am pretty happy with the deal, But there is NO WAY i would spend that kind of money the DPO did,, over $7,000 invested in hop ups

[quadracer711]

I hope I didnt come off being rude by sending you a pm.

I really appreciate you takeing the time to type all of that.

I think what im just gonna do is exhaust, tune, maybe xb9 primary swap. Not gonna dig to deep into the motor right now as far a modding.

[Internet Annoyance]

Not not rude at all, Like i said, i just wasnt sure where you were coming from on wanting to change compression. No point in going into all the details of stage tuning if not needed,

As I said,,, the Buell motors are already really far advanced for the V twin design, EB did a great job with these bikes making them as performance as possible while still being rideable and fairly reliable, I used to build really tricked out hot rod engines and while I still enjoy them, they arent that much fun on the street in many conditions.

Ive had motors where i dreaded traffic jams,, they would do a melt down if i had to sit more than a few minutes, Or gutless off the line until they hit their power band, Its really not practical to drive or ride around at 5000 Rpm and higher, sure, thats where the power was,,,,but pretty useless looking for a parking spot at Costco. Same with high stall torque converters,,
In my old Camaro, it had such a Rumpy cam, I used to get comments from people,,,,,,,"Sure needs a tune a tune up" not realizing what a performance cam sounds like loping at idle, That was a great motor in that car, But my problem with it was Fuel quality, A normal car would burn the gasoline from most any local station, but if i got any with any water in it or lots of alcohol (They go hand in hand) as we have alcohol treated fuel locally, the motor would run like ****. I spent a fortune driving around with fuel treatments in the trunk just so it would run. Gas stations dont like it when you come back and demand they take back the full tank of gas they pumped,

The point is, It made life really complicated to drive what was supposed to be a fun car.