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® PIONEER SIDE PORT or REAR EXHAUST

Wavier of Liability and Indemnification Agreement
Because we have no control over the application or installation of our products, the purchaser by placing an order and accepting products from us, agrees that all materials purchased will be used solely at purchaser’s risk and that purchaser will indemnify and hold Quickdraw, it’s owners and employees, free and harmless from all loss, liability or damage resulting from claims brought by reasons of any alleged failure or defect or any part or parts supplied by us. It is the responsibility of the owner/operator to determine the suitability and proper installation of any of our products.

WARNING: Always set your boat up so you can kill the engine with the radio. You will need a kill switch connected and activiated by a 3^rd channel to kill your engine reliably. Simply closing the carburetor will NOT kill the engine reliably, you MUST have a 3^rd channel kill switch installed. Some radios have a feature that allow you to mix the 3^rd channel with your throttle channel, this will allow you to engage the kill switch through your throttle trigger. Read your radio programming instructions and understand them. DO NOT operate your boat until you are positive you can kill the engine reliably with a kill switch of some type. You need to contact the kill switch manufacturer/supplier and get the correct kill switch that is compatible to your particular radio. For example, you can review the gas kill switch at www.killerrc.com A good kill switch will also be a fail safe if you have radio issues. Shop for quality, not a cheap price.

HARDWARE

4 10-24 X 1/2 Front motor mount
4 5/16 X .058 wall X 1.272 Pull starter standoffs
2 8-32 X 7/8 Source coil bolts
2 5/16 X .275 Stainless steel Source coil standoffs
2 5/16 X .050 Stainless steel Source coil mounting washers and base bolts
4 10-24 X 7/8 Intake manifold bolts
2 10-24 x 5/8 Exhaust flange to engine
4 10-24 X 1 3/4 Flat head Case screws
6 8-32 x 5/8 socket head Cylinder head bolts
4 6-32 X 3/4 Water cover bolts
6 10-32 Thread Hose barbs, 2 in and 3 out and 1 for pulse hole
2 1/8 X 3/8 Dowel pins Cylinder base
2 Wrist pin circlips RedMax part# 1260-41320
1 Silicone o-ring Water cover
3 #10 Lite Washer Ignition coil mt.
1 8-32 X 1/4 Bolts Braided grounding wire to engine case
1 8-32 X 3/4 Gray Ignition coil mount bolt
1 8-32 X 5/8 Gray Ignition coil mount bolt
2 8-32 Nylock nuts Gray Ignition coil mount nuts
1 10-32x3/8 Set screw Pulse ports block off screws
2 #10 Washer Goes under head of intake manifold bolts
1 Silicone o-ring Head button
4 8-32 x 2 socket head ss Pullstarter/Motor mount screws
20 #8 split washers Pullstarter spacers
2 5mm x .8 x 20mm flat head Output seal plate screws

BASE BOLT KIT

4 8-32x5/8 Bolts For cylinder base
4 5/16 x. 050 Stainless steel Cylinder base washers
4 #8 Belleville Washers Cylinder base lock washers
1 Base Gasket For cylinder base
1 Intake manifold gasket Used in between intake manifold and cylinder

HARD PARTS

1 Watercover 1 SPARK PLUG NGK CMR7H
1 Head button 1 SPARK PLUG SPACER .060" for 26 or 27cc only
1 Cylinder casting & sleeve 1 OUTPUT SIDE SEAL PLATE
1 Set of cases
1 Ignition plate
1 Zenoah 260 or 290 Piston*
1 Zenoah 260 or 290 piston Ring

*PISTON NOTE: The outside of your 26 or 27 +1mm stroker piston has been very precisely modified to work in your Pioneer. It is NOT the same modifications that most Zenoah engine builders do to their Zenoah pistons. If you use a Zenoah style modified piston, you are going to have a major drop in performance. You need to get a modified Zenoah piston from us or if you want to do it yourself, you need to call us for instructions on how to do this. The Pioneer engine will NOT perform very well with a stock Zenoah piston, it must have these changes. The 29, 29.5 +1 mm Stroker or the 30.5 +2 mm stroker DO NOT NEED ANY MODIFICATIONS TO THE PISTON. The best piston to use if the stock Zenoah coated piston.

BREAKING IN YOUR PIONEER QUICKDRAW

FOR THE PIONEER LONG BLOCKS:
For breaking in your Long block you need to run fairly rich mixtures, definitely rich on the low speed needle and it needs to be run fairly easy for the first 1/2 hour. After that you can run it hard for short on and off bursts for the next 15 minutes then you are pretty much ready to go. Do not let the low speed needle get too lean, a lean low needle and 1/2 to 3/4 throttle is death for the exhaust bridge. You can ruin this bridge on your sleeve in just a couple of moments by doing this.

FOR THE PIONEER READY TO RUN ENGINES:
Your engine has already been broken in and thoroughly tested here on our water brake dyno. No further break-in precautions are needed. Your engine will continue to loosen up and perform better ove the next 2 or 3 hours of running. Mix the oil the same as you would for regular running, 10 ounces of Klotz Super Techniplate KL-100 with 20% castor oil to 1 gallon of 87 octane regular pump gas. Do NOT use premium or any kind of race fuel with this model engine. This will not hurt the engine, but you won’t get as much power as you will get with 87 regular.

ENGINE MOUNTING: READ CAREFULLY, VERY IMPORTANT

The Pull Starter side engine mounting bolts utilize the same bolt pattern that your plastic pull starter uses. These bolts pass through your pull starter and your engine mount, then you use the 4 stand offs supplied and then the bolts bolt to the ignition plate. In order to do this you need to drill the threads out of your Zenoah motor mount that your pullstarter originally bolted to. Do this with a #18 drill bit. The split lockwashers are spacers to go under the heads of the 8-32 x 2 motor mount bolts. It is very important that you space the bolts correctly so they don’t go too deep in the 2 top motor mount holes in the ignition plate. If they do go too deep, they will hit the engine case and try to bend the ignition plate away from the engine case. This is a BAD situation. If they are not deep enough, you will not have enough thread engagement in the ignition plate and it will strip the threads out of the ignition plate. The way to determine the right amount of washers and to adjust the depth correctly is to do the 2 bottom motor mount holes first. These holes come through the ignition plate and they will not hit the engine case and they are visible so you can see the depth your bolts are going. You may need to grind your bolts slightly shorter to make them fit perfectly. Once you determine what it takes on the bottom bolts, you can switch them to the top and they will be fine then you can put 2 more in the bottom. It is best to adjust the bottom bolts for the correct depth even though they don’t hit the crank case, that way if you switch them in a hurry there is no danger of mixing the top bolts up with the bottom bolts because they will all be the same. If you have any questions, call or email us.

WARNING: DO NOT USE A BELT STARTER OR ANY TYPE OF ELECTRIC STARTER ON EITHER END OF THE ENGINE. THIS WILL RESULT IN SEVERLY TWISTING THE CRANK. ALSO DO NOT TIGHTEN ANYTHING ON EITHER END OF THE CRANKSHAFT WHILE HOLDING THE ENGINE WITH A PISTON STOP OR HOLDING THE OPPOSITE END OF THE CRANKSHAFT. YOU MUST HOLD THE SAME END OF THE CRANK THAT YOU ARE TIGHTENING, THAT MEANS MAKE A TOOL TO HOLD THE MAGNETO WHILE YOU ARE TIGHTENING THE STARTER NUT AND HOLD THE COLLET WITH A WRENCH WHILE YOU ARE TIGHTENING THE SOCKET HEAD SCREW THAT HOLDS THE COLLET TO THE CRANK. YOU DO NOT WANT TO PUT ANY STRESS ACROSS THE CRANK. IF YOU DO, YOU WILL MOST LIKELY TWIST IT, THIS EVEN APPLIES TO ZENOAH ENGINES. PEOPLE DAMAGE CRANKSHAFTS ALL THE TIME BY USING PISTON STOPS AND OTHER METHODS WITHOUT EVEN REALIZING IT.

WARNING: Use NGK CMR7H spark plug, gapped to .025.
DO NOT USE THE CHAMPION RZ7C SPARK PLUG, severe engine damage will result. Only use the NGK CMR7H spark plug, gapped to .025

WARNING: Do NOT use prop blast pickups, use a double water pickup rudder only. Make sure the smallest hole through this rudder is 1/8". If yours is smaller, drill it out to 1/8" with a long drill bit. Do not Tee a single pick up rudder to the 2 lines in.

WARNING: The 2 water lines in are below the exhaust port. The 3 water lines out are on top of the cylinder. DO NOT USE any 90 degree fittings either coming in or going out. For Double drilled water covers, the water outlets have to be at the highest point in the water cover to prevent air from being trapped.

WARNING: Do not change the hard plastic hose from the carburetor to the engine crankcase. Do not use a 90 degree fitting of any kind in this line.

WARNING: Always set your boat up so you can kill the engine with the radio. You will need a kill switch connected to the black wire on the red coil and activiated by a 3^rd channel to kill your engine reliably. Simply closing the carburetor will NOT kill the engine, you MUST have a 3^rd channel kill switch installed.

This engine uses the new style pipe. We use 2 o-rings, the outer o-ring may start to extrude out the flange fairly early on but there is nothing wrong with the o-ring and it doesn't need replacing until the flange starts leaking oil. This usually takes a while before it starts happening. After running for the day, remove the flex from both the header and the body. Dry the flex piece off and recoat inside and outside where it plugs into the coupler with Anti-Seize. Failure to do this will result in a permanently rusted in flex coupling. Go very sparingly with the Anti-Seize or it will make a mess all over the inside of your boat. Some people just take the flex out and use Rost off on the flex when they are done for the day and have had good results. Do what works for you but use common sense, you don’t want the flex joint rusted in your pipe or header, that is the bottom line.

If your flex coupling is leaking oil, this is because you are running your engine way too rich, or you have way too big of a prop on the engine, or you are just idleing the engine around slow and easy. The engine was not made to be a trolling motor. It was intended to be run reasonably fast. Some oil may leak after you first fire up your engine and it’s had Rost off in it and it is still running rich but this should go away in just a few laps.

IMPORTANT: Do not replace your flex joint with a piece of solid tubing. This defeats the whole purpose of the flex joint and it can very likely lead to pipe cracking and possible radio interference. It will also wear out the coupling joints and will ruin your pipe. Your flex joint will not leak oil all over the boat when the engine is properly tuned and the boat is properly set up.

BASE GASKETS

Your cylinder is marked with the type and number of base gaskets that your engine requires, there are Brown (BR) , Black (BLK) and White (WH) base gaskets.

Your particular engine requires ____ Brown, ____ Black and ____ White base gaskets. Put the brown or black one next to the cylinder and the white base gaskets next to the cases. You should check your deck height and change the required number of base gaskets as needed if you replace the piston and/or the crankshaft. How to check your deck height is below.

TO SET YOUR DECK HEIGHT:

You need to set the deck height very carefully, this is where the white base gaskets come in. If you need the white base gaskets, put them next to the engine cases and put the brown or black base gaskets next to the cylinder casting. The deck height should be set to .010 to .012 inches. On the +1 mm stroker, 34mm bore 27cc engines the deck height should be .018" to .020". To measure this, you need to have a dial indicator that will screw into the spark plug hole. You put the cylinder on with no base gaskets at all, bring the piston up until it hits the head button and stops. Now set the dial indicator to zero with the piston hitting the head button. (If the piston does not hit the head button you have to take the piston off of the rod and put it in the bore and hold it tight against the head button with your fingers while you set the dial indicator to zero. Then put the piston back on the rod.) Now very carefully take the cylinder back off without bumping the dial indicator, put one brown base gasket on and tighten the cylinder down. Be sure the gaskets have been soaked with Rost off. Now rotate the piston up and read your deck height on the dial indicator. Work with the different gaskets to get the correct deck height.

The gasket thicknesses are given after they have been crushed. By spraying Rost off on the gaskets they will crush almost right away after you have tightened the cylinder base bolts. The torque specification for the base bolts is 45 inch pounds. You may see the cylinder settle maybe an additional .004" after the engine has been run for ½ hour to an hour. The crushed base gasket thickness values are as follows: brown = .020", black = .010" and white = .003".

OIL AND RUST INHIBITOR RECOMMENDATIONS

The Klotz KL-100 Super Techniplate with 20% castor oil is the very best choice. See this link at Tower Hobbies for what it looks like, if you can not find it where you live, Tower Hobbies can ship it to you. See this link at Tower Hobbies web site http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/WTI0001P?I=LXS622&P=8

You need to mix it at a 13 to 1 ratio, that is 13 parts of gasoline to 1 part of KL-100 or 10 ounces to the gallon. This oil is the best oil to run, try only to run this Klotz oil. DO NOT mix the Klotz KL-100 with any other oils, it does not mix with other oils well. Make sure you flush out your fuel can and your boats fuel tank to prevent mixing of oils. You also need to get Wurth Rust Off, and you need to flood the inside of your engine with it after you are done running for the weekend. The Klotz Super Techniplate does NOT have rust inhibitors but even if it did, if you get any water in your engine, it will still rust the bearings no matter what oil you run. So the best answer is run the best oil that will make your engine last which is the KL-100 Klotz Super Techniplate with 20% castor oil, and then flood the engine with Wurth Rost off when you are done. This gives you the best of both worlds. Wurth Rost off is what you need to use for after run oil. Do not use WD-40 or Corrosion X or any other after run oil. You should be able to get Wurth Rost Off, they are world wide. If you follow all our instructions your engine will last a long time without wearing out. The biggest danger that still exists is hydraulic damage, try to always get the throttle shut off before the carburetor goes under water if you can. You will have a pretty good chance of surviving a dunking if you do that and use the Wurth when you are done for the day.

WATER INGESTION AND STORAGE

Wurth Rost off is what you need to use for after run oil. Do not use WD-40 or Corrosion X or any other after run oil. You should be able to get Wurth Rost Off, they are world wide. If you follow all our instructions your engine will last a long time without wearing out. The biggest danger that still exists is hydraulic damage, try to always get the throttle shut off before the carburetor goes under water if you can. You will have a pretty good chance of surviving a dunking if you do that and use the Wurth when you are done for the day.

Info about how to use the Wurth Rost Off, use ROST OFF #08902 from WURTH products.

THE INSTRUCTIONS BELOW ASSUME THAT YOU HAVE ALREADY GOT THE WATER OUT OF YOUR ENGINE SO MAKE SURE YOU DO THAT FIRST! Run the engine if possible after you have got the water out, then follow the instructions below.

DO NOT even let the engine sit one night without filling it up with Rost Off. You need to put the piston at TDC, open the carb wide open and spray Rost off into the crankcase until the crankcase is at least 1/2 to 3/4 filled with Rost Off. Then put the piston down to BDC, now take the spark plug out and spray lots of Rost Off in the spark plug hole. Now turn the engine over slowly by hand, use the pull starter slowly. Pull it 20 or 30 slow full strokes, squirt some more into the spark plug hole, squirt more into the carb so it goes into the crank case with the piston at TDC, stand the boat on its nose & turn the engine over 20 or 30 more slow full pull start strokes. Now stand the boat on its transom, pull it over 20 or 30 more slow full start strokes, make sure there is still plenty of Rost off in engine, if not squirt more in the engine through the carburetor while you are doing this. The idea is to get the Rost off in all the bearings & the water worked out, it is very difficult to get the water out of the outer bearings. Once you are done with all that put more in the crankcase and put the spark plug back in and leave it that way until it is time to run again. When you go to run it again, take the spark plug back out and pull the rope fast a lot of pulls to get as much Rost off out as possible before you try to start it. While the boat is setting full of Rost off in storage you may see some dripping from the crank seals, this is normal and it does not mean the crank seals are bad. Just fold up a paper towel and put it under the engine if it is making a mess in the boat. When you go to run the boat for the first run after the Rost off, run it very easy for 4 or 5 laps. You need to get the Rost off out of the engine before you run full throttle, this is because the engine will detonate as the Rost off is being ran out of the engine and if it detonates badly enough you could break the porcelain on the spark plug. This causes a lot of damage when the porcelain breaks and it falls into the engine. You also could crack a head button from detonating.

ROST OFF’s phone number is 1-800-987-8487, their website is www.wurth.com (and look under contact to find a dealer near you) and the partnumber is 08902 . You will have to take it in case quantities of 12 per case. This is a very good product and you will use it in many things.

If you run in salt water, be sure to remove head button and dry out the 6 bolt holes in the cylinder and reapply anti-sieze to the bolts once you are done running for the day. Do not let the engine sit overnight after it’s been running in salt water without doing this. Otherwise the bolts will corrode in and removal will be difficult if not impossible.

THESE ARE THE INSTRUCTIONS IF YOU WANT TO DISASSEMBLE THE ENGINE AND CHANGE THE MAIN BEARINGS OR DO ANY OTHER WORK TO IT.
You can send the cylinder casting with the sleeve in it back to us to have a new shrink in sleeve installed or you can install a slip in sleeve yourself, see the special instructions on how to do this. If you want to change the bearings, heat the cases up to drop the bearings out and then follow the instructions below to put them back in. When installing the clip in the case, make sure that it is pushed outward all the way or the bearing won't go all the way down and you won't have any crank end play. Use only genuine ZENOAH bearings. Do not use any other bearings besides these. Failure to do so will result in little or no crank end play. Heat cases to 350 Deg. Fahrenheit and drop bearings in. DO NOT PRESS BEARINGS IN OR OUT OF COLD CASES. Be sure the bearings are all the way down and not cocked in the bearing bores. Put some grease on the seal lips for seal lubricatrion. Put a little gear sealant between the case halves and bolt together. (Use Mopar gear sealant #82300234, you can find this at Chrysler, Dodge or Jeep dealers. Use this sealer anywhere on the engine that sealer is required. This sealer won’t dissolve in gasoline and it is easy to clean up. This stuff is worth going after and once you get it you will use it on everything). Use a little bit of gear sealant on the ignition plate to case surface. Put case in the vise, but do not crush it. Use a good fitting #2 screwdriver to tighten the screws while pushing down on them. Either use a screwdriver like a Snap-On brand or another style that has a hex on its shank to put a wrench on and tighten it. A channel lock plier grabbing around the handle also works in a pinch. Install piston with the ring locating pin towards the intake port. Apply oil on cylinder, piston, wrist pin bores and all bearings. DO NOT assemble dry. Install head button o-ring into head. Make sure the o-ring is in the groove and does not get pinched between the sleeve and the head. Be sure and use antiseize on the bolts that hold the head down. Install head button and tighten down. Check and make sure that there are no burrs in o-ring groove in the water cover. Install o-ring into water cover groove. Apply a little bit of oil on the o-ring. Add gear sealer to outer edge of the water cooling cover. Cylinder was designed with the intake port on the right side of the motor when viewed from back of boat. DO NOT TRY AND REVERSE THE CYLINDER. Spray base gasket with WD40. Give it a few minutes to soak in. DO NOT USE ANY SEALER IN THIS AREA. Install cylinder using 8-32X5/8 bolts, Belleville washers and the 5/16X.050 washer. Belleville washer goes under head of screw. Then the 5/16X.050 washer goes under that. Tighten down cylinder base bolts using a L-shaped wrench to do this that has been ground shorter to fit in this area. You may need to use a ball driver. After each run check the base bolts. Continue to check until fully seated and will not tighten any more. Gasket is now seated and you should continue to keep an eye on them, but they should not loosen as quickly as they will with a new gasket. The 2 water fittings on the base of the cylinder are for the water in. The 3 fittings on the water cover are the water out, they go on the pullstarter side. Do not reverse the cover to make more clearance under your cowl. If you reverse this your engine will overheat and it will do a lot of damage. Use 3 water lines to dump overboard. Use blue loctite on the crankcase pulse port holes that you do not want to use. Use the set screws noted in the hardware list to do this. Use the 2 #10 washers under the head of the intake manifold mounting bolts. Use blue Loctite on the screws that mount the intake manifold. Be sure and run Klotz KL-100 Super Techniplate with 20% castor oil at 10 oz. per gallon of oil. When it comes to the oil, do not think that you know it all and use something else or some other mixture. If you want to run a different oil because you run it in one of your other engines, then change the oil for your other engine, not this one. After all, you probably paid more for this engine than the other engine anyway. Do not call us wanting to discuss different oil or oil ratios. We do not want to talk about it. As far as we are concerned, this is the only oil and the only ratio you can run. NOTE: If you use Aeromarine drive couplers, cut (shorten) it so there is .080 behind the hex. Usually you need to cut ¼" off of the backside of the Aeromarine collet. If you don’t do it, it will hit the output crankshaft seal and destroy the seal. If you use any other collet, check for clearance.

REPAIRS
If you want the repairs done correctly and the latest revisions, you need to send your engine back to us. We don’t recommend having other shops work on your Quickdraw because they don’t have the equipment it takes to do it correctly. That is because they don’t need that equipment to work on a Zenoah .

SPARK PLUG SPACER ALERT FOR THE 26cc PIONEER, the 29 Pioneer does NOT use a spark plug spacer:

This 26cc engine comes with a .060 spacer under the spark plug. This can be used as a tuning aid. Removing it will increase the mid range and decrease the top end. Also removing it can cause detonation so be aware of this if you are running in hot weather or hot water. All the testing was done with the spacer in and my suggestion to you is to leave it in. Moving the spark plug this small amount has a pretty big change on the compression ratio. If you ever use an NGK Iridium CR8HIX plug, you must use this spacer or the piston will hit the spark plug. Dyno testing showed no advantage to using this plug so far. Be careful not to lose the spacer when you change the spark plug.

IGNITION COIL MOUNTING INSTRUCTIONS:

Your engine comes with the gray ignition coil mounted to a bracket that needs to be bolted to a stringer or anywhere you want but DO NOT mount it to the engine. It has a braided ground wire that goes from the coil to the engine and it has a red extension wire to go from the coil to the red source coil.

The carb settings following are starting points for the 26cc & 29cc Pioneer engine:

26 cc: For the WYK33 it is 2-1/4 turns on the low and 2-1/2 on the high
29 cc: For the WYK33 it is 2-1/4 turns on the low and 2-1/2 on the high
Do not let the low speed needle get too lean, a lean low needle and 1/2 to 3/4 throttle is death for the exhaust bridge. You can ruin this bridge on your sleeve in just a couple of moments by doing this. You also can do the same damage with too lean of a high speed needle setting.

+2 mm Stroker Pioneer 30.5 cc Needle settings.

Very important, you will notice that you are going to probably need a lot leaner needle settings with the +2 mm Stroker engine. 2 to 2-1/2 turns out is not unusual at all. As you continue to lean the high needle it will get faster on the top end, if you lean it too much it will start to flatten out and you will need to back up a little. The tricky thing is if it is too rich, it still sounds and runs fine. It just does not make as much power as it could if you set it right. This makes it a little bit hard to nail down because there are no obvious signs that you are too rich. The bottom line is don't worry about what the turns are, just set it so it goes the fastest.

As far as the low speed needle goes, set it so you have your absolute best launch from a slow idle. If it is set right, it will just snap right out of the water when you pull the throttle. If it is too lean or too rich it will be boggy.

Do not let the low speed needle get too lean, a lean low needle and 1/2 to 3/4 throttle is death for the exhaust bridge. You can ruin this bridge on your sleeve in just a couple of moments by doing this. You also can do the same damage with too lean of a high speed needle setting.

CARB SETTINGS FOR THE WYK33 CARB LOW SPEED NEEDLE SHIPPED BEFORE 6/15/11
The low speed needle of the WYK33 carburetor is in the center of the carburetor barrel. Use a small precision flat blade screwdriver to adjust it. The low speed needle on these older carbs is set to 6-1/2 to 7 turns out. You need to use #222 Loctite only on the needle. You can order a longer spring from us that will eliminate the need for Loctite and it will cause your low speed needle setting to be set at 2 turns out like the current carburetor.

TUNING INFORMATION FOR THE MODIFIED WYK33 CARBURETOR
With this carburetor, you can set your low speed so the engine is fairly clean and responsive. If it is too rich, it will be doggy on the bottom end, so go ahead and lean it gradually until you have good low speed response in the water. Do not do it on the stand. This will not tell you anything. Don't over do this, lean the low speed needle so the engine just cleans up and no more on the low end. If you get the low too lean, this carburetor will bog also. You also may have difficulty killing the engine when the low needle is set correctly. You need to install a 3^rd channel kill switch. This is the only way to reliably kill the engine. This is a major safety issue, so take the trouble to install a 3^rd channel kill switch, it is the safest thing to do. Set the high needle so your boat runs the best, a little on the rich side gives you better mid range torque and a little on the lean side gives you the best top end. Too lean will hesitate and slow down on the top end.

Can I advance my ignition timing on my Pioneer?
No, not on a Pioneer engine. The red source coil should be at the top set of holes when facing the red source coil. The advance set of holes are +5 degrees and they are the lower set of holes, but DO NOT use them. If you go to the +5 degree advance setting, it will cause detonation and will eventually crack the head button. The old Hi Rev series engines used the +5 degree setting. The Pioneer engine set on the +5 degree setting will produce less power and run slower. We continue to leave the advanced timing setting holes in the ignition plate in case we make a future change that does work better with the advance ignition timing. By doing this, the customer will not have to buy a new ignition plate if we make a modification in the future that works good with advance timing.

INSTRUCTIONS FOR MODIFYING THE TOP OF ZENOAH PISTON FOR A QUICKDRAW PIONEER 26 AND THE 27 +1 mm STROKER

The top piston crown for a 26 and the 27 +1 mm stroker PISTON are turned downto 1.332" to 1.331". Do NOT cut anything below the ring. Stock crown diameter is approximately +/- 1.337".

FOR A 29, 29.5 +1 mm Stroker and the 30.5 + 2 mm Stroker, DO NOT NEED ANY PISTON MODIFICATIONS. The Best piston to use is the stock Zenoah coated piston.

DO NOT cut more or less than the above dimensions, if you do the engine will slow down.

You DO NOT cut anything below the ring and you have to re-chamfer the top of the crown and the top ring land and when you do this you can NOT scratch the lower ring land. You can't touch the lower ring land in any way or the ring will not seal against it. I made a special file to chamfer the ring land, I ground one side of the file so it has no teeth on the flat side and the edge. Then I polished it on a scotch brite wheel so it is very smooth, this way if you do touch the edge of the bottom ring land it will not put a mark on it. Remember the ring has to seal to the piston just as well as it has to seal to the bore. And before you can cut the top crown you have to put a dial indicator on it and you can't have any more run out than .001" maximum, this means your chuck has to be good and you have to have the piston really well centered. Also the finish that you put on the crown when you cut it can't be too coarse, you have to use a very slow feed.   If you need a cut down piston we have them in stock.

Also, you have to check every Zenoah ring with a 10x magnifying glass and look at the chamfer on the top and bottom, 70% of the time one side of the ring will have a bigger chamfer than the other. You always have to put the bigger chamfer up otherwise it will not run very well on top end.   If the chamfer is the same on both sides, it doesn’t matter which way you put the ring on.

I can't stress enough how important cutting the piston correctly will affect the power and how it runs.  If you are not capable of doing this accurately the best thing to do is purchase a cut down piston from Quickdraw, they are in stock. Also if your piston looks good but you notice the factory lathe turn marks below the ring are starting to wear away, this doesn't mean you need to replace the piston. It will actually run better as these factory turn marks start disappearing.