Feed Ramp Polishing

[stansdds]

Umm ever heard of polishing and port-matching an intake and heads? It's a "thing"...

Polishing ports was a thing 'till it was shown to be inferior to managed texture.
10 Myths Of Cylinder Head Porting | Speed Academy

I have been there and done that! Back in the mid-1980's, with my '72 Ford Gran Torino Sport, which was blessed(?) with Ford's then new 400 cubic inch engine. I really wanted it to have more power than what Ford engineers had put into the 400-2V engine and I really did not want to be changing radiators and engine mounts. With no internet (Al Gore was still busy inventing it), just some books written in the late 70's to early 80's, I embarked on building a performance version of the 400.

I kept the 2V Cleveland heads as swapping on 4V heads meant finding intake manifold adapter plates and headers would likely be a no-go item due to the 351M/400 block deck being 1 inch taller than that of the 351C. Anyway, I gasket matched intake and exhaust ports, cleaned up the valve bowls, but I did leave the intake port surfaces rough, no polishing there! It took a lot of work and a lot of machining, but I ended up with a streetable, high power Ford 400 long before John Kasse started messing with them.

 

[chief38]

Usually shooting a few hundred FMJ will do the trick in smoothing it out.

 

[USBP SW]

Use smooths everything fine for me, as others have suggested. Many years ago my friend took his Colt .38 super to a "gunsmith" to polish the feed ramp. The first time he shot it, he blew all the rounds out of the bottom of the pistol and splintered the grips. Fortunately, his hand was only numbed. I examined the pistol and cartridge and the idiot that did the work had polished the feed ramp beyond the supported portion of the cartridge base.

 

[Jakerin]

In 1971 I bought a new 39-2 and it came with two barrels, one looked normal and the other had an obvious ramp job. Much smoother and feeds every kind of ammo. The ‘normal’ looking barrel doesn’t.

 

[chief38]

In all the pistols I have ever owned I've never encountered one with a ramp that caused any feeding issues. Most name brand and descent quality pistols have nicely polished ramps.

 

[Autonomous]

...I ended up with a streetable, high power Ford 400 long before John Kasse started messing with them.

Nice.

Are you familiar with Speed-Talk.com – Home of the Best and the Brightest!
It's the best general purpose speed forum I've found. Some industry pros as well as accomplished amateurs hang out there.

 

[tom2]

SO the gist is, there is no relation between proper polishing and "grinding away" on a feedramp.

 

[WR Moore]

We don't hear about Glocks needing their feed ramps polished because:
1) They do not need it.
2) We don't have an internet to afford mass communication.

Some short time after NYPD made the Glock 17 one of 3 permitted service pistols, the training staff made a call to Glock. Fix the guns or we'll return ~20K pistols. Several mobile machine shops staffed by Glock personnel arrived at the NYPD range complex shortly thereafter. They were there about 3 years until they got all the bugs out.

I could go on. And on..............

 

[Autonomous]

As good as Glocks are in the end, they are mechanical devices with all that goes with it.