Editor’s note: Donnie Davis ordered MaXpeedingRods H-beam connecting rods for his VR6 engine the first time. One month later when receiving it, he was thoroughly impressed.
With the cost being nearly half of what “name brand” companies are offering these exact same connecting rods for, and them making no attempt to cover that they are a chinese based company, it is easy to dismiss their products as trash.
After I spaghettified my rods in my 2.9l 12v VR6, I decided to take a leap.
I placed my order for a set of their h-beam rods with ARP2000 hardware for my 12v. The order was confirmed immediately with my shipping information as well as the tracking info. I could track the package as it moved across China, went through customs, arrived in California, and then hit my local DHS headquarters to be delivered to my door.
After receiving the notification that the package was out for delivery, I waited outside like a giddy child to get my hands on the package I had been waiting almost a month to receive. I provided my I.D. and signed my name and tore open the plastic sealed packaging. Inside I found a normal shipping box, cut it open and then found the product box within completely undamaged. I opened the product box and was pleasantly surprised that inside was company contact information, warranty information, torque specifications, installation instructions, and etc. All in legible English with no major grammatical errors.
The best part?
Each individual connecting rod is individually wrapped in a mineral oil cloth, and then placed inside it’s own heavy plastic bag, ALL while being separated by dense foam packaging.
5 out of 5 in shipping, packaging, and initial customer experience. I have purchased MANY items from big house brands with international backing for quality and literally none of them have packaged their products as nicely or they have met this same quality. Bravo.
Now let’s get down to the nitty gritty.
Everyone’s first reaction, “SEND THEM TO A MACHINE SHOP BEFORE INSTALL!!!!!!!!!!”.
While this is strong sound advice for ANY internal engine part you want to install, not all of us have the extra cash to throw away when a product SHOULD be good to go out of the box because it is purpose built for this particular application… .. right?
Well let’s test that.
After the rods sat on my bench for NEARLY TWO YEARS, I decided it was time to finally start rebuilding. Opening the aged box, I was pleasantly surprised to find that all of the rods are still in immaculate condition in their mineral oil baths even after sitting in a garage with no hvac or humidity control. I pulled out my snap gauges and micrometers to measure the rod bearing journal and the wrist pin opening tolerance.
The specifications for the rod bearing opening is 56.75mm and the wrist pin is 20mm.
Let’s get that in freedom units, 56.75mm = 2.234″ and 20mm = 0.787″
What did the rods measure?
2.234″ and 0.787″ with 0 runout or scooping.
They’re perfect straight out of the box just as they should be.
And guess what? That ARP 2000 hardware is 100% authentic as well and carries their full stamp branding and ARP has them listed as an official distributor.
I have to say I am throughly impressed. From the shipping to the packaging, the product quality control to how fast the company responds to your inquiries, and let’s not even mention the price, of which is half of what their competitors are!
MaXpeedingRods hit this ball all the way out of the park. I would recommend them to anyone building an engine and will continue to use their products into the future.
Enter to MaXpeedingRods.com and use coupon codes to enjoy:
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