Normal piston color?

[Spyder John]

My stock piston seems to me to be very dark below the rings to about halfway down the piston. Is this normal? To be honest I've never pulled a perfectly good piston before, so I have no idea. Maybe its because of the low miles, like it happened before before the rings seated and hasn't had time to wear off? The top of the piston looks fine, no pitting or signs of perdetonation. The sides show no scuffs or case colors, just dark. Like I said, it may be normal. If it sounds like anything unusual I can post pics.

[XPS1210]

sounds like some blow by but nothing to out of the ordinary...

If it concerns you, you could get new rings and replace those, but it should be okay the way you discribe it... nothing should be damaged, but you might be missing a little power...

[Spyder John]

Others have posted better performance out of a stock GT5 than I was getting, so maybe I was getting a little blow-by. I'm just keeping it for a spare since I've got my Airsal 70 in there now. Way more power.

[speedy_scooter]

Its normal with the stock vento motors.