utvolman99

Well guys, It looks like I may have made a pretty good deal on having a cage welded in! $760 for a six point including the windshild hoop, welding in new floor pans and adding subframe connectors. He is a friend of a friend who used to do a lot of work for the local round track guys. He hit hard times a while back and had to sell his bender and dies. He is using this to buy new ones. I have seen his work and am pretty impressed all his cages seem really tight and look to be welded well. I will post pictures when its done!

Thanks Grumpy!

What would be the problem with using a ford aluminum drive shaft core and having it converted to chevy? would this work? I have access to a aluminum drive shaft out of a F150?

Oh well, I forgot to ask one last question! When Im finished what would be the best way to clean all the metal bits out of the heads. I really dont want to have them hot tanked. I am not removing the teflon valve seals.

Oh and by the way, I would hate to think that casting flash could be worse on a factory head. One of my exhaust valves had a chunk the size of a pencil eraser but longer! I had to get it out with a little chisel.

yeah, I am only cleaning house! Im not worried about polishing my exhaust port into a mirror or anything. Most of the port intake and exhaust will be left alone. Ive read that about 90% of your results can be achieved with about 10% effort. I am however trimming down the valve bosses just a tad and working the seam of the short radias turns down smooth.

Hey Grumpy. I just broke into my Iron Eagle 215s yesterday and am very disapointed in the quality out of the box! One both the exhaust and intake sides there are very obvious (1/8") lips where the pocket was machined. Around the valve bosses there are huge chunks of flash that seem to be very hard to get at with a grinder on the exhaust side. None of the combustion chambers are close to being the same. You can tell the tools were not set up the same from cylinder to cylinder. I even have one exhaust seat that I am very worried about. The combustion chamber has a lot of large pits right next to and a little on the valve seat! At first glance these heads looked really great. All I can say is Im glad Im doing a little cleanup work while Im in there! Is this normal for an aftermarket head?

One thing to keep in mind that any computer dyno #s will be based on a new engine. The computer also assumes that carb, timing and ignition setups are perfect. Like I said above, I based my assumptions on stock "wedge" style heads and I know that the flow numbers in Dyno 2000 are a little optimistic.

Im not grumpy but I will take a crack at it. I think your running somewhere around 8.6:1 compression ratio. Putting your combo into Dyno 2000 you are looking at around 300 HP at 5000RPM and 350lb/ft of torque at 4000RPM. Now this is just guessing on the heads. Im using a stock wedge style chevrolet head from Dyno 2000. As I understand it the head flow numbers provided by the program are not a very accurate representation. If you were to add a set of Dart Iron Eagle 215cc you should be able to bump your numbers up another 50hp or so. I will be interested to see if my numbers are anywhere close to grumpy's.

Well, yesterday I bravely started cutting on my Dart heads. I went to my fathers and worked using his long shank die grinder. I hated it! It is very heavy and pretty hard to control! The last thing I wanted to do was hurt my babies! Well when I got home I decided to dig out the old dremel tool set. I have a three foot long flexible shaft attachment with a pencil type end. This thing works GREAT!! It is the perfect tool for working bowls and intake runners. I have been told not to use a dremel type tool for heads but I cant think of anything that I could afford that would work better!

Im pretty sure that in 72 they changed the location of the R180 to the forward postition. From what I understand if your 240 is a 72-73 you shouldnt have to worry about driveshaft length! What year is your baby 327?

Im pretty sure that in 72 they changed the location of the R180 to the forward postition. From what I understand if your 240 is a 72-73 you shouldnt have to worry about driveshaft length! What year is your baby 327?

Well okay as usual your right. I did end up buying the eagle rods off of ebay for $215 delivered.

This may be a dumb question but if I use a rod with floating pins dont I need a pistion that is also set up for floating pins? Can I have that done to a non floating pin piston? Is it very expensive? Like I said it probably was another dumb question!

Did all 260s have the R200? I know the early automatics had a 3.54 R180. If that is the case you may want to think about changing to a R200!

He will not split them up! I would have to buy the whole lot. I think Ill pass... I need to stick with my original idea. I will reuse the stock crank and rods. The rods are strange... I am certain that the rods are original but I dont seem to have a matched set! It would seem that I have seven X rods and one pink rod?? I suppose they could of ran out of X rods when they were putting the engine together?? Oh well, I will be having the whole thing ballanced anyway...

a combustion chamber and bowl clean up job is all I had in mind. As grumpy said these heads already flow pretty good. I have yet to crack them open so I dont even know what the bowl looks like. I would say that the short radias is about as good as it is going to get. I will maybe work on the valve boss and just smooth the intake and exhaust runners in addition to polishing the combustion chamber.

You know, your right. I dont really think I want to get into the part selling business. I would of loved to use the rods, pistions and crank but I already have pretty good internals.

Okay guys, as some of you know I have purchased a new pair of Dart Iron Eagle 215cc heads. I am wondering if I should attempt to do any head porting on my own and how much I should do? One thing I would like to do is smooth the combustion chambers to help prevent detonation. Im using flat top pistons with reliefs that should put me somewhere between 9.7 and 10:1 depending on who you ask. I was planning on using the information from the standard abrasives web sight. Additionally I was wondering if I should attempt to do a little clean up in the bowl area and gasket match my intake and exhaust runners? The last thing I want to do is mess up these heads! At the same time I dont want to neglect the chance to make them even better! Any advice would be great!

I have a friend who is wanting to sell all of his chevy stuff for $1300. Here is what he has - 3 four bolt main blocks. Two are fresh bored 30 and 40 over aline honed with ARP studs. One has a chip out of the bottom of a sleve and would need to be sleved. - One 2 bolt long block - Scat steel crankshaft (need polish only) - Eagle 6" H beam forged rods with floating pins (new in box) - Set of standard, ballanced X beam rods (used) - Weisco flat top forged pistons for 6" rods with floating pins. (out of engine that was only fired once for cam break in) - Mallory magnetic dist (used one season of circle track) - Set of fresh build double hump heads (35 laps run time) - mini starter (not sure of the name brand) - Holley Strip dominator intake I guess, I would be selling some of this stuff and using the crank, rods, pistons, dist, starter and one of the blocks. I dont want to take the deal unless I can get a big chunk of my money back. I am also not sure how these internals would work for my street car? I already have a perfect two bolt block with a perfect crank and a set of Iron eagle heads. Thanks for your help!

Well, I dont know about the nitrous but you can without a doubt build a 383 with 400HP that is very streetable. My setup projects to to make about 450HP on desktop dyno. I know that the desktop software is not completely accurate but it can be pretty close. Here is my setup... 350 sbc 9.7:1 compression ratio Dart Iron Eagle heads (215cc) Victor Jr. Intake Holley 750 Vac secondary Block huggers with 1 5/8 primaries XS-268S solid lifter camshaft DTD projects 449HP @ 6000RPM and 434lbs/ft of torque @ 4500RPM. I am only using Hyperutectic pistons so if I do put the squeeze to it it will be to the tune of 100 - 125HP. One thing to keep in mind is that if you have higher compression (around 9.5 - 10:1) you may have to use racing fuel with your nitrous!

Thanks for the info. I have a feeling that in this little jewels second life it will have a little more than 155hp!

Well guys just picked up a 350 from the bone yard. I was wondering if someone with access to engine castings could tell me what I have? The stamped number on the deck infront of #1 pistion is as follows, V0928TFJ 197502602. I would love to know what compression ratio the engine had and how big the combustion chambers were on the heads. The guy at the yard told me he didnt know anything about the block and that he it was as is for $100 without the heads. Well when I take it apart its like bran new inside! There was almost no groove in the cylinders and you could still see cross hatching. Best part is its standard bore! All of the main and rod bearings looked new and they were the original factory bearings maked with a date 8 78. the lifters didnt even have a mark from the cam. I may just go ahead and reuse the pistons, they have a slight dish but I think they may go well with my 64cc heads.

thanks for all the help guys. Looks like I will be going with a solid lifter. I am going to look at the xtreme energy grinds. Ill let everyone know how it goes!

Yeah, I know that a roller $etup would be best but I really dont have the cash! When I said the heads were set up for solid lifters I meant that they had springs rated for solid lifters. One thing that Im worried about is compressing my hydraulics with the stiffer spring! As far as the adjustment goes I was under the impression that you only had to do it every 12K miles or so. I am not really worred about reving much higher (at the most 6200) but I thougth that you get more advantages with a solid lifter than higher revving? Desk top dyno showes a 26hp and 20lb/ft of torque difference between solid and hydraulic with my engine setup at 6000RPM.