Ill add, spent a bit of time re-engineering old Brit Iron... There was 3 of us that started the Land Speed record racing project for a Norton. We went for the 500 pushrod class and it took many years.
This is the engine in a earlier variation. Note the cyl, While Sir Eddy was a master tool & Die maker and there was no casting he could not manage, He felt that a solid Billet block of 6061 was the best bet, and made it on his Mill. The early design used BSA lifters as well. We looked at sleeving but opted for a coated wall to keep the tolerances tighter. YRMV but with a liner you have to run a looser wall clearance with the pistons.
Pistons were custom made forged (First batch was defective and they had to make us more)
It wasnt Nicasil, but something similar. I cant recall the vendor but can find it if you like. Needless to say a lot of time was invested to get it right.
If you look close Eddy cut small grooves in the fins and inserted small strips of alloy that duct the air around the walls of the cyl as we found that heating & expansion was not uniform.
Nortons are backwards so the cyl was repositioned Desaxe, And the cases were stock Commando Combat cases which are stronger than the others. (The VR880 cases are even better but Eddy had bad blood with Dreer so that was not an option). The first variation was a custom machined 270 degree crank made out of several donor cranks. A marvel of engineering and machine work by Eddy, but ultimately at the target RPMS it would not have survived. (We got a LOT of good advice from others) So opted for a custom made Billet one piece crank and of course Carillo H beam rods.
Early version had a race car external segemented oil pump with needle bearings and custom lube points. Later versions after Eddy died did away with the external pump, But the problem was the target RPMS with 11,000 so it was felt that the external pump consumed too much power. Sure did move some oil though!
You can also see in the picture the custom finned rocker covers and side oiler on the head that were all custom castings that Eddy used to make and sell. (He had a finned points cover he made also)
One last pix is the top secret cyl head tech we spent over a year on. Sadly later versions of the team went another direction (Several of us are not involved after Eddy died) But if you want details happy to share. Read up on Singh grooves. (It WORKS!)
