First time porting a head:)

Topic: First time porting a head:) (Read 3133 times) previous topic - next topic

First time porting a head:)

Reply #15 – March 02, 2012, 03:34:00 PM

From porting my 2.3 head, My advice
WEAR A MASK, iron dust hurts lungs.
Get some good carbide stones, it is unbelievable how fast they go through iron.
Plus pretty much everything Shadow said.

For aluminum I found rubbing a cutting burr in grease kept the aluminum from gunking up in it.

First time porting a head:)

Reply #16 – March 04, 2012, 08:19:06 PM

Ok, I got a set of carbide burrs. Got all the smog humps removed from 1 cylinder. Also cleaned up the intake flow around the intake valves. Now for the bad news, I hit the water jacket in one spot, I welded it up, cleaned it up, but I have go over it one more time and then pressure test the head to make sure I didn't kill it. I am also going to be welding up the smog holes. Also I didn't buy the extended shank burs, now I see that I need them! It is too bad I couldn't do what I wanted with the head, but you can only go so far, and then you hit water.

I will also be doing the valve guides and redoing the valve seats.

First time porting a head:)

Reply #17 – March 05, 2012, 09:26:54 PM

Ok, so I bring the heads to my buddy (who owns an engine machine shop!!) after he stopped laughing, he picked up the head with the welded water jacket and threw it in the s metal bin without saying a word. I wish I would have grabbed the non ho head first, then I wouldn't feel so bad for wrecking it. Anyways, I think I have a basic understanding of how to port a head. I can do a full port and polish in probably 6 hours. (3 hours per head). Those smog humps take up the majority of the time and my buddy talked my out of welding the smog holes, he says welding cast is not a good idea and that they would come off within the first few heat cycles of warming up and cooling down. I kinda wanted to try it, but I also don't want to wreck a freshly rebuilt motor. I have a thing where I have to try stuff for myself before I learn. I will try and figure out how to get some pics up, my printer died and I don't have a USB cable for my camera.

First time porting a head:)

Reply #18 – March 10, 2012, 04:20:47 PM

Ok, according to my buddies flow bench I am still nowhere near gt40 heads, BUT with some more work I could get closer! I did not port the areas that benefit more, I didn't really didn't touch much of the inside radius, my buddy say blending the inside radiuses will help more than I think. So I did a little crash course feeling with my finger what a better head is supposed to feel like. Also he said to do BOTH heads at the SAME time, this will help them be more consistant to each other. I honestly thought that the outside radius would gain more than the inside, but I guess the inside is more important.

PS: When I said I would open up a porting shop beside his engine shop, he laughed and said he would sponsor me just to keep himself entertained. Let me tell you I spent as much time as he spent on my aluminum heads, and I killed 1 head and still didn't achieve my goal of attaining gt40 flow out of E7 heads.

First time porting a head:)

Reply #19 – March 10, 2012, 05:41:41 PM

Why not just start with GT40s from the get-go?

First time porting a head:)

Reply #20 – March 10, 2012, 06:21:35 PM

Because I didn't want to use a decent set of heads to learn how to port on. GT40 heads are a little more hard to come by here in my area as well! I haven't really enlarged the ports yets, mostly just removed smog humps and cleaned up the flow around the valves. With some longer shanked burs I can clean out the exhaust ports better and also might get a polishing kit. I am sure I can get close to gt40 heads with more work. I have 6 sets of E7 heads, and up here the junkyards charge as much for gt40 heads as you can get bare aluminum heads for.

First time porting a head:)

Reply #21 – March 10, 2012, 07:53:34 PM

wow, the junkyards near you are a ripoff.. i only pay $100 a pair, beings it's a u-pull it and it doesn't matter what the heads come off of..

but as for getting them close to P heads, good luck lol.. a little porting on a pair of P heads makes the E7's look like model t heads, in terms of flow