smooth pintle = better spray pattern?

Doubtful, it's there for a reason.

Alrighty, pulled the injectors last night, broke 2 1/2 inch breaker bars on the first injector before it budged so beware if you attempt such a task have backup tools. Pulled out all of them, in varying condition from cylinder to cylinder but no holes and all the pintles are still intact. Broke them down into their individual pieces and cleaned everything but the actual nozzle parts in beakers making sure to keep each shim with its correct injector. Cleaned the pintles in the degreaser and then polished all the surfaces with 4000 grit garnet paper. This improved the surface finish on all the sufaces and I believe it will help with more consistent spray patterns. Cleaned in alcohol to remove the oil from polishing and then immersed in some Power Service until i was ready to reassemble. Retorqued everything new return lines, and a degreased engine bay, the car looks like a million bucks and is starting to run like it. Next question, now the nailing is gone from the cylinder head side, I can hear a popping/rattling noise from the IP. Is this just the fuel being pressurized or is it something else entirely that I should be worried about?