Would Anybody Attempt To Fix This?

Burt Munro would melt it down and recast it, I'd toss it and thats why I don't hold any world records. What went through the top? Ditto on removing the rest of it.
 
My Father welded up one for his E type jag in the 70,s it got mashed by a valve and he was short of $$ so welded it up, My brother still has the car,piston still in.
But Not for me,I would get a new one or set.
Lawrie
 
Only way to repair it safely is to drop pan, pull scrap aluminum out of the hidden places, and replace the piston, same as flatheadmurre suggests.
 
Two companies that come to mind are Egge and Arias that will make any piston to your specs. I would be more concerned with the fragments that are in your oil system. Ever try to TIG weld an aluminum part that has been saturated with oil? I don't care how you degrease it as soon as you hit it with any heat you will see the oil bubble to the surface. I know you will get several people that "do it all the time" but I would get another piston.
 
If you weld it up and it doesn't hold you will have to tear it apart again. The next time may cause a lot more damage. Not a good idea in my book.
 
This piston has a hole thru it. Exact brand replacement not available. One close in weight (8 grams) is. Plug the hole with weld and use it or? Don't really want to get into a major tear-down. Motor has a recent rebuild and practically no miles on it.

You are looking at a COMPLETE teardown.
All of the material that came off the piston is now distributed evenly ALL through the engine. Every nook and cranny and oil passage. A lot of it is hammered into the babbit. Lightly scrubbing the babbit surfaces with scotchbrite MAY remove it. May not.
In any event you need to look at everything in the engine for debris. After all this and reassembly, the engine may last forever but on the other hand it may not due to left over aluminum debris you missed.
 
If you can replace the piston, do it. On the other hand, when I dropped an exhaust valve in the early hemi in my vintage dirt car, it did the same type of damage to one of my JE forged pistons, which were new less than two years before. When I contacted JE, they wanted to sell me another set of 8 pistons for another $1200. My builder magna-fluxed the piston and found no internal damage. He then had it heli-arced and re-magna-fluxed, and found no problems. I've run it in at least 30 heats since then successfully.

Bottom line : replace it if you can, but they sometimes can be fixed if the circumstances require it.

EDIT : I should add that even though the piston was repaired, the engine was torn down completely and thoroughly cleaned.
 
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Hi Everyone, Wow that sounds like a sad story.

Exact brand replacement not available.

Just an idea Tony, and you didn't say exactly what the brand is, but if you know, and tell us what the piston is, someone may be able to help.

As we've seen recently, a few people who hang around here, have a thing for saving old ford parts of every description.

Don't really want to get into a major tear-down. Motor has a recent rebuild and practically no miles on it.

As others said, I'd be scared to run that for long without a very serious cleaning.

Do you know what caused this?
 
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By the time you try to fix the damaged piston you could replace it with a new one. My suggestion is do it right , otherwise this will come back and bite you in the $$$$$
Vic
 
You are looking at a COMPLETE teardown.
All of the material that came off the piston is now distributed evenly ALL through the engine. Every nook and cranny and oil passage. A lot of it is hammered into the babbit. Lightly scrubbing the babbit surfaces with scotchbrite MAY remove it. May not.
In any event you need to look at everything in the engine for debris. After all this and reassembly, the engine may last forever but on the other hand it may not due to left over aluminum debris you missed.
Yep... could not have offered better advice than this.
 
You do not say what it is out of. Pistons are made by dimension, not by brand of car. It will be a certain stroke, bore and number of rings and of course weight. Lots of different make cars had the same bore and stroke.
 
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