[Baron Von Zeppelin]

Originally Posted by tom s

.... IF someone REALLY wants that small of CC they are out there.I think I paid 400 for my 48s.tom

Yep , $400 bare.
I sold them to you for Bulletpruf's old Gold 69 Judge build.

Plenty of old low-flow D-Port cast iron heads stacked up all across the nation.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

GoatZilla is a pattern maker with casting experience.
Amongst other things , evidently.

Going to imagine his patterns and plans and calculations are already laid out.
Not much point in dreaming up other designs or boutique stuff.

He has a 300 cfm design Out-Of-The-Box

His initial intent was to out-do Edelbrock Aluminum and take that market.
performance-wise
and cost-wise .

The suggestion to go Iron instead of Aluminum - was a great idea given by another board member - mgarblik ,
of the Boss Bird racing team.
To even further reduce cost.

So if us Average Joe's can get 300 cfm heads - all new everything made in USA - pump gas friendly , modern combustion chambers - who really cares whether Iron or Aluminum at that point.

One-and-Done
Bolt-and-Go
goodbye 210 cfm - Hello 300 cfm

I don't see these being aimed at Racers or Restorers.
Not directly.

[Bruce Meyer]

Originally Posted by mgarblik

Try buying a set of Ram Air III D ports. $1000.00 for a set of heads that need another $1000.00 worth of work to produce stock HP numbers. D port heads will be the big seller. Many people want to use their expensive Ram Air D port manifolds. Every set of D port Pontiac heads I see need all the seats replaced, surfaced, and new guides and valves. That's a grand easily. Not that round port wouldn't be cool.

Maybe where you live but here in Phoenix its hard to get much for any D-port head. Recently the best I could get out of a nice set of 670 heads was 350 bucks. The deals are there if your willing to look. A set of 6X heads just sold on Craigs list here for 25 bucks. I was too slow off the draw to get them but I would of bought them if I could.

[Squidward]

I just want good street heads. Moving forward in my pursuit of this hobby I would rather buy something new out of the box in the head department. I don't want to worry about if my cores are cracked, or those "recently redone heads" off CL are actually garbage.

And I know that few people build 350's, but I think that more people WILL build 350's in the future if our hobby is to continue. Take your pick: 350P, or 350C. What do YOU want to put in your classic when all of the 400's and 455's are used up? Maybe more 350P's would be built if there were some decent heads available for a decent price. Who wastes their time putting hi-$$$ hi-po heads on a 350?

[Squidward]

Originally Posted by Baron Von Zeppelin

GoatZilla is a pattern maker with casting experience.
Amongst other things , evidently.

Going to imagine his patterns and plans and calculations are already laid out.
Not much point in dreaming up other designs or boutique stuff.

He has a 300 cfm design Out-Of-The-Box

His initial intent was to out-do Edelbrock Aluminum and take that market.
performance-wise
and cost-wise .

The suggestion to go Iron instead of Aluminum - was a great idea given by another board member - mgarblik ,
of the Boss Bird racing team.
To even further reduce cost.

So if us Average Joe's can get 300 cfm heads - all new everything made in USA - pump gas friendly , modern combustion chambers - who really cares whether Iron or Aluminum at that point.

One-and-Done
Bolt-and-Go
goodbye 210 cfm - Hello 300 cfm

I don't see these being aimed at Racers or Restorers.
Not directly.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

I will never pay $2500 for new set of Aluminum E-Heads , K-heads , CV-heads.
None of anyones brand in that market or price.
I won't pay $2000 set either.

i'm an average joe. or below average. maybe way below
but that's the majority of the Pontiac Worldwide Owners committee.
we are the majority

I won't spend professional porting money to get 240-260 cfm on any of my D-Ports
that are stacked up in the back.

The reason i'm in on this Iron Proposal is it was said it could lower
the cost by 50% going with Cast Iron.
And ARROW was going to beat the $2500 buy-in for E-Aluminum to start with.
SO ....

If that means we could get 300 cfm IronArrows for $1000-1200 complete pair ,
average-iron-joe has been waiting for decades.
1 Head 1 price ... low-low

And Arrow can still pursue their Aluminum Market in its original structure/fashion, too.

[steve25]

Baron, I don't know where to start with your comments on this I must say!

Let me ask this serious question of the poster of this and the string in the other section, that being how many heads do you invision you need to sell to recoup the full start up cost of doing this , and do you really think you can pull it off, or are you just pulling us off?

Because as for me if it can't be done in the real world then as far as I am concerned I am tired of the day dreaming that has been put forth in both of these strings already!!

[Tom Vaught]

I Apologize to the forum for my comments in this thread with another member. Not really on subject except for the flow numbers
info posted, right or wrong.

Butler investigated the 300 cfm cast iron RA-IV market and dropped the proposal. Good enough for me.

Tom V.

[72LuxuryLeMansLa.]

Originally Posted by tom s

There are still OK buys on 70ish CCs Dports.There is a set of #12 on ebay right now for $500 BIN that have been magged.A set of pretty complete set of 48s for 800 ish.Many for over a grand that dont sell.IF someone REALLY wants that small of CC they are out there.I think I paid 400 for my 48s.tom

Tom,
For my part I'm not just wanting smaller chambers. It is the combination of small, modern chambers and increased out of the box flow that I would love. Good porting is expensive with old heads and then you still have the old less efficient chambers.

[Formulas]

A small chamber set of heads would broaden potential sales as the new product could be used on more engines IE 350 engines which i feel have been largely handicapped by head choices,
They do have more stroke than other brands and the are still oversquare
Only special consideration for a decent 350 head is valve size perhaps the chevy 2.02/1.70 size , this could be checked just by temp install the valves in any post 67 head drop them on a 350 block and push them down to evaluate bore contact

[mgarblik]

Originally Posted by Bruce Meyer

Maybe where you live but here in Phoenix its hard to get much for any D-port head. Recently the best I could get out of a nice set of 670 heads was 350 bucks. The deals are there if your willing to look. A set of 6X heads just sold on Craigs list here for 25 bucks. I was too slow off the draw to get them but I would of bought them if I could.

It's good to know that there is an ample supply of OE iron out west still. And at reasonable prices. Here in the Midwest, good old cast iron, blocks and heads are not an easy find or inexpensive. Not crazy expensive, but quality of the casting is an issue here. So many blocks and heads are very thin from rusting away from the inside out. By the time you thermal clean and blast the castings, the blocks are so deeply pitted on the inside of the cylinder barrels, you are scared to death to use them. Same with the heads. They are very thin internally. Any porting, even mild work, and you are breaking through or creating very thin spots and pin holes. Plus when you are done using a pair of these heads to make a decent 250 CFM head, you have $2500+ in them. Brand new castings would be sweet, even at 250 CFM out of the box. I am very encouraged by the chatter in here. Keep it coming, good and bad.

[Bruce Meyer]

Originally Posted by mgarblik

It's good to know that there is an ample supply of OE iron out west still. And at reasonable prices. Here in the Midwest, good old cast iron, blocks and heads are not an easy find or inexpensive. Not crazy expensive, but quality of the casting is an issue here. So many blocks and heads are very thin from rusting away from the inside out. By the time you thermal clean and blast the castings, the blocks are so deeply pitted on the inside of the cylinder barrels, you are scared to death to use them. Same with the heads. They are very thin internally. Any porting, even mild work, and you are breaking through or creating very thin spots and pin holes. Plus when you are done using a pair of these heads to make a decent 250 CFM head, you have $2500+ in them. Brand new castings would be sweet, even at 250 CFM out of the box. I am very encouraged by the chatter in here. Keep it coming, good and bad.

I noticed that with back east iron. It all looks like it was dragged out of a lake.

[NeighborsComplaint]

I can't imagine how it would be much more cost effective to cast and iron head vs. an aluminum one. The materials are a small part of the total cost.

[Formulas]

Yeah you would think production machining thousands of heads cost would favor aluminum but im not in that buisness

aluminum you would think machine faster and cutters last longer reducing cutter cost and set up time

[gtofreek]

Believe it or not, I find for example, that installing valve seats in aluminum heads is a lot harder than cutting seat pockets in iron. With aluminum, I need to use a lot of lubricant and every .010"-.015" deep I go, I have to stop and blow the chips out or they start balling up and galling the side wall. I can cut seat pockets in iron in 1/4 the time it takes to do aluminum. That's why we charge so much more to put seats in aluminum. Iron needs no lube to cut the valve seat pockets so there is way less mess too.

[dataway]

I'm only an amateur machinist but I find cast iron a dream to machine. Somewhat abrasive on tooling, but chips are almost powder and very easy to deal with. Aluminum likes high speed, lots of lube, schwarf is a pain, tooling gums up.

[gene simmons]

I would be satisfied with a new,direct replacement,cast iron head,better chambers and 260+ flow.

[64speed]

I would just like an aluminum head that doesn’t cost as much for one as it does for a full set Chevrolet or Ford heads. I will buy aluminum just for the Performance factor and for the max effort I am putting in this car but I will have to grit my teeth to do it. Same with the transmission. The trans itself is reasonable it’s all the accessories they get you with and you can’t tell me it costs 800 bucks to make a bellhousing

[Matt Meaney]

I would think, that a fair amount of customers for this proposed factory looking iron head, will want to use their unmodified factory shaker/ram air set up. if not, just fit under a early formula hood.


would this head be compatible with a factory iron or aluminum intake?


if you were to really go off the reservation and make a intake to compliment these heads, putting the carb (either square or spread bore) in the "factory location" would increase sales potential. imo,


sincerely hope this head comes to fruition.

[Frank R]

If the heads were round port and looked externally like Ram Air IV’s you can put my name on the list.