BENEFITS OF TORQUE PLATE BORE?

WHAT ARE THE ACTUAL BENEFITS OF TORQUE PLATE BOREING A BLOCK? I NEED TO HAVE MY BLOCK BORED OUT AND WITH A TORQUE PLATE IS GONNA COST A LITTLE MORE. I FIGURED IT WAS JUST PRECISION.  

think of where the head bolts are... between the cylinders...  think of the thread pitch angle...

when you pull a bolt tight... the threads try to pull up... expanding the hole slightly...  this expansion distorts the cylinder bore...

you can see it sometimes when tearing down a small block chevy.. where the crosshatch is left over from honing... and clear areas next to the head bolts...   this is where it got started..  somebody saw these wear areas and figured thats where the highest compression is made.. and where the highest cylinder pressures are made... on a small block... a 5 sided bore is what you get...

when you hone with a torque plate with head gasket and properly torqued torque plate bolts... will distort the block the way it is going to be when the engine is assembled...

when you do your hone.. the bore will end up being totally round...

there is even a spark plug thread repair kit.. that uses J form threads...  that pull up... not spread out...  so this would reduce the distortion to the cylinder bores... i even talked to ARP about it... making their head studs with the J form thread ... and supplying matching taps...  but the head bolts holes have to be tapped at manufacturing stage... engine manufacturers have not requested them yet..

i do believe the J form threads are patented..  so that may be a draw back...

while i was on the phone with arp... i also ask them about having a torque wrench tester on their truck that follows the drag race tour around...    as i have seen a bunch of torque wrenches that are slightly out of calibration...  most racer have specific settings they use... so adding a Ptouch label for the corrected readings would let the racer set their torque wrenches at the exact settings for proper torque..... seems the torque wrench tester is now on the truck.. i wonder if many racers use it.???????

i have always worried that when using torque plates that the length the torque plate bolts stick through into the block may not match the actual installed depth of the head bolts or studs that you install..

if you want it to run better... and have the few extra bucks... and are going to keep the motor.. do it...

you might also want to finish the bores with a ball hone...  after final machine honing...   a honing in one direction.. then in the other to smooth down all the little tears the hones leave as they remove metal from the bore...

want to prove me wrong... got some 0000 steel wool...   wipe it around the bore in one direction.. then the other...  you will feel a difference...

then run the ball hone ... doing it in both directions...    then do the steel wool test...   you are not going to make a bunch of difference in the scratches necessary to lube the rings...... but it will make a huge difference when it is break in time... the rings may seat much sooner... as they have less metal to remove from the cylinder walls...

oh.. and be sure you wash the hot soapy water after you hone it... the tiny bits of metal and honing stones get everywhere.. and do not wash off easily..    throw a magnet in the water you have just used to wash the block with.. see how much metal sticks to it..   keep washing till you get no more metal in your wash water...  just a tip...

i used to have a friend who worked on indy car motors.. they did this ...  after 500 mile races.. they had very low leak down rates...  but they also used Zero gap second rings... ( Zero gap rings are a ring with an over lap cut... not a conventional gap with NO clearance)