OK, so here goes, installation of a Bowman ring into my DLE-30. Hope this helps, please leave comments below!
First step is pulling the cylinder. The DLE is all one piece, the head and cylinder. (Most amazing thing is the Chinese don't use washers on anything on this motor. Odd.
Here are the descriptions for the pics below:
Pic 1 - you can see the blowby from the old ring. This motor had about 1 1/2 gallons through it of 40:1 petroleum based oil (valvoline that I used to run in my Jet Skis). I never made the transition to synthetic in it yet, as it was barely broken in.
Pic 2: what the cylinder looked like. The carbon is soft and wipes out with a rag. It is not baked on.
Pic 3: closeup of the stock ring, you can see the specs in it, whatever type of steel this is, it's not broken in very well, it's pretty rough from either shot peening or whatever it's made out of.
Pic 4: stock ring end gap, I didn't bother measuring it but it's between .005 and .010" Orange paper just so it photographs a bit better for you.
Pic 5: Bowman ring end gap. About .001 to .002"
Pic 6: Making sure the circlip ends are up and down, NOT SIDE TO SIDE or they can come loose. This is just common knowledge from my old MX racing days...
Pic 7: All cleaned up and ready to go! Break the varnish with 600 grit, wash in hot soapy water and blow out with air.
Pic 8: 5mm Nordloks added to base bolts and muffler bolts.
Pic 9: reed cage marked with Sharpie, before sanding flat
Pic 10: reed cage after being sanded flat. I had actually put it all together without doing this mod, as the reeds seemed to fit very flat. I didn't test them (you can test by filling with water, it should retain it). Motor was hard to start so I decided to tear into it and do this mod. Don't use loctite on plastic (it softens it), be careful to just bottom the screws 100% and don't strip them. Turn over the reed holder so the smooth side is to the reed. Make sure the reeds lay flat when you are done.
That's it, the engine definitely has more compression, have not flown it yet, just annoying the neighbors with the break-in right now.