Thread: Let's see all the ported heads you have or have done

That's a pretty good crack. I've always had cracked valve seats but like Josh said, not that thick . Kind of the nature of the head if it sees knock. Some of the castings just down right suck to begin with. It's not that the casting has gone bad, but it was made crappy from square 1.

I have fun with bad castings. There's an inside view shot of one of my recent intake runners on my page. That head had 30 thousandths of core shift through the entire intake runner.

Here are some of the tool I use when porting and polishing heads. Snap-On air grinders, Matco extended length porting shanks, Standard Abrasives porting cartridge rolls and 3M ans SA 3 ply cross buffs in medium and fine grits.

dont make me post pics of my qwikway valve grinder and my souix seat grinder crap to one up ya?
i always wanted to pickup some of those cross buffs but that sort of polishing is really only effective on the chamber and exhaust and the gains negligible for the cost of those buggers.

how much yer crossbuff kit/arbor cost and how well does it last?

Originally Posted by Turbocharged400sbc

dont make me post pics of my qwikway valve grinder and my souix seat grinder crap to one up ya?
i always wanted to pickup some of those cross buffs but that sort of polishing is really only effective on the chamber and exhaust and the gains negligible for the cost of those buggers.

how much yer crossbuff kit/arbor cost and how well does it last?

I purchased the 50 count box of cross buffs in fine for $180 and a box of 25 count mediums for $115. The more quantity you buy the cheaper it is. The Standard Abrasives porting kit ran me $40 years ago and just the small box of cartridge rolls was $30. Last year I purchased a box of Merritt 3" flap wheels 40 count for $220 that I use for cleaning and opening the inlet side of superchargers and works awesome.
I got close to $1200 in product and tools ie. Snap-On grinders, Ingersol Rand grinders and Porting bits, long shank & short shank then a seperate set of long shank porting bits for aluminum with bigger flutes, but the nice thing being a tech I buy this for work and personal use and write it all off on my taxes at the end of the year since it's tools

I cant wait to get mine!! ^^^^^

Gotta send you that money, completely spaced. Chaotic days sorry!

Nice work OrangeL67, on a pair of heads how long does it take you to complete a set hours wise if you did intake, exhaust, and combustion chamber work??
I just do it as a hobby and one head took me close to 7-8 hours total, but i do a little at a time after work hours

Originally Posted by dezebe1

Nice work OrangeL67, on a pair of heads how long does it take you to complete a set hours wise if you did intake, exhaust, and combustion chamber work??
I just do it as a hobby and one head took me close to 7-8 hours total, but i do a little at a time after work hours

I spend 40 hours on some pairs not including any runs to the machine shop for valve jobs, or milling. It really depends on what all needs to be done. A crappy casting can draw the work out a bit.

I usually don't polish the CC's because the air comes to a stop in the cylinder and takes off again when the exhaust valve opens. A little traction, a good valve job & short turn radius can make a lot of velocity.

Originally Posted by ADecker

I cant wait to get mine!! ^^^^^

Gotta send you that money, completely spaced. Chaotic days sorry!

I'll do my best not to dissapoint. Thanks for the good word.

Originally Posted by dezebe1

I purchased the 50 count box of cross buffs in fine for $180 and a box of 25 count mediums for $115. The more quantity you buy the cheaper it is. The Standard Abrasives porting kit ran me $40 years ago and just the small box of cartridge rolls was $30. Last year I purchased a box of Merritt 3" flap wheels 40 count for $220 that I use for cleaning and opening the inlet side of superchargers and works awesome.
I got close to $1200 in product and tools ie. Snap-On grinders, Ingersol Rand grinders and Porting bits, long shank & short shank then a seperate set of long shank porting bits for aluminum with bigger flutes, but the nice thing being a tech I buy this for work and personal use and write it all off on my taxes at the end of the year since it's tools

yeah they are still ****ing expensive. i have way too much into this stuff as is, the makita and pencil grinders, carbides and cartridge rolls with the belt sander are about all i use anymore. i see far more to gain from cleanup and blending and radiusing the valves and spending the time polishing to fix the oil windage issue which is a far more pressing concern for us as the cyl 4 oil ring hates the oem setup

Originally Posted by OrangeL67

I usually don't polish the CC's because the air comes to a stop in the cylinder and takes off again when the exhaust valve opens. A little traction, a good valve job & short turn radius can make a lot of velocity.

i dont polish em but i still knock down all the cast to machining transitions around the seats. i hit the ridgeback with a hone stone to break the sharp edge and radius the ends...

the air doesnt come to a stop, the air tumbles/falls all over itself. the air actually moves quite fast past the chamber surface as the valves open.
the biggest gains in these heads with a high angularity rotating geometry (high piston acceleration/decel rates at TDC/BDC) is increasing the low/mid lift flow.
to that degree i cleanup the chamber but yeah i usually dont polish it... the time is much better spent unshrouding the valves.
the seat wall, seat to cast transitions, knock down the common skijump at the chamber to quench area, as well as a common casting defect near the plug boss and the chamber walls next to the valves

i do go to a high luster on the exhaust side, but thats for polishings primary benefit of reducing carbon buildup

the downturn sucked for machine shops...but i was able to give some vintage iron a good home
its no where near as clean anymore...but this bugger is far more useful than the seat grinder (the souix is in its case under alot of my lathe and morse tooling lol)
our seats are always beautiful...its the valves that pit

That looks very similar to the one my highschool had. I'm jelly.

only thing i have thats the same as any of these pics, is that black ashtray, i got a perfect match for it lol