Head quest

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Ironmike

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Well my quest for heads is now kind of back on. Catching up my checkbook after the rotten HVAC upgrades we had done .

So tonite I went to check out some W2 race heads a friend of a friend has. He said they are from the 80's, untouched , unmolested and still in the Mopar boxes. BINGO! I talked to the guy for awhile....asked as much as I could think......sounds pretty good.

Drive 45 miles, meet and greet, down his cellar steps I could feel the humidity hit me in the face. There in the original boxes they were. Covered in rust from head to toe. Combustion chambers, in the threaded holes so heavy they weren't even holes anymore. It was just everywhere. Pretty heavy too. Not the typical "dusting" we all have seen. I didn't even know what to say other than "I'll probably have to pass".

Man it amazes me this nice older guy paid real good money for these things back then, and just let them sit in that dank basement for years and years without even looking at them. So the quest continues.

I hear tales of a company that actually makes Eddy's work really good. Going to research that for sure since all my gear is of the standard LA variety.

I decided to post this today I guess because a fellow had such really nice stuff that he just let rot to hell. Ain't it a shame?
 
It's a shame...but if he cuts you a deal and let's you see if they clean up before you pay it would be worth trying.
My biggest concern would be the intake seats. If you are going t run pump gas you need a hard seat under the exhaust anyway so if they have some pits it's no biggie.

If the intakes have minimal pitting and the seat is only 2.02 you'd be amazed at what a valve job would clean up.

The W-2's are far above anything with a port that doesn't take an offset rocker. You need all the port volume you can get.
 
I agree with YR, see if he'll let you have them cleaned first. Modern dipping solutions can amaze you with the results. I use sodiumhydroxide, when it's fresh it cleans. Another dip we use is muriatic acid (about 15-1 with water) and then switch dip container to neutralize with baking soda.
 
By his description they sound wasted.
"Not even threaded holes anymore" sounds devastating.
 
What level of performance are you looking for. While the Edelbrock head can be very good, they do fall short of a race head status. There have been a very few to run rather quickly with that head, there car is well sorted out and a dedicated track car.
 
Just my opinion...
If the price is right, get them. Run them through an airless shot cabinet, and they will come out looking just-cast. Threaded holes are probably fine once they've been tapped, and the only ones that have any real force on them are the rocker stands. Those could be fixed if needed. If these were never run, there's no way they could have rotted that bad.
 
All the work to get any head into this zone , yet still chained with stock constraints.
Spend 1500 on just eddy heads, then 1000+ more on port work and more $ to redo the valve job and guides anyhow.

W2.
Or if you're crazy , bored or like to be odd take some easy 360 heads, tube the head bolt holes between intake ports, tube oil feed to rocker stand, epoxy washers into bolt recesses, die thread some mild steel round stock, tap the push rod holes....screw them mild steel stock in with epoxy or red loctite....then Bridgeport some reliefs for the offset rockers, hard seat all int/exh, vmve job, BP guides to half their height .....and of course port the **** out of them, but...oh wait, that's exactly how they came up with the W2 prototype....isn't it.
They just can't seem to do much better with these blocks, they are always only a hop or a skip away from a old iron 360 head.
It's all been done. You see the ceiling? Its right there...
 
MOPAROFFICIAL said:
This is an inaccurate statement.
Click to expand...


Educate me. You need volume and flow. If I have 2 heads and they both flow 300cfm but one has a port with a bigger CSA I'm taking the bigger CSA, especially when you are using a head that was designed for 330-350 CID on 400 plus CID and roughly the same RPM.
 
yellow rose said:
Educate me. You need volume and flow. If I have 2 heads and they both flow 300cfm but one has a port with a bigger CSA I'm taking the bigger CSA, especially when you are using a head that was designed for 330-350 CID on 400 plus CID and roughly the same RPM.
Click to expand...
Yes I grasp that part, but we aren't bolting on ootb are we..

I would take the smaller cross section for a dual purpose motor. Now if this were all out....this wouldn't even be discussed on this forum... This is Mike and his dual purpose motor imo...which falls into the boat with a lot of us here. We are the types trying to bridge the gap between street reliability and race and that bridge is minutely getting shorter with the more we learn about our combos/range....because look around...today's cars are rolling of the floor with 450+ hp, I'm not about to bow down to that crowd.
I have not been pulled on yet, be it vette,tesla,porsche,bmw,benz,z turbo, suberpukes, bikes galore, and a tons of old rods. I see no need for an intake port volume larger than 190's ,if that ,for what he wants.
I know a couple of our best guys here could/can do that and would agree maybe only to some extent , but only because it might take more work/harder than working the large port....but what aids that torque? Velocity sure does.
The w2 isn't big is it...rhetorical question.
 
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MOPAROFFICIAL said:
Yes I grasp that part, but we aren't bolting on ootb are we..

I would take the smaller cross section for a dual purpose motor. Now if this were all out....this wouldn't even be discussed on this forum... This is Mike and his dual purpose motor imo...which falls into the boat with a lot of us here. We are the types trying to bridge the gap between street reliability and race and that bridge is minutely getting shorter with the more we learn about our combos/range....because look around...today's cars are rolling of the floor with 450+ hp, I'm not about to bow down to that crowd.
I have not been pulled on yet, be it vette,tesla,porsche,bmw,benz,z turbo, suberpukes, bikes galore, and a tons of old rods. I see no need for an intake port volume larger than 190's ,if that ,for what he wants.
I know a couple of our best guys here could/can do that and would agree maybe only to some extent , but only because it might take more work/harder than working the large port....but what aids that torque? Velocity sure does.
The w2 isn't big is it...rhetorical question.
Click to expand...


I agree with most of this. Velocity is important. So is controlling it. Too much speed is just as bad as too little speed.

Dual purpose or not, the engine doesn't know it. With the correct CSA you can run smaller timing numbers to get the same RPM and not give up anything.
 
yellow rose said:
I agree with most of this. Velocity is important. So is controlling it. Too much speed is just as bad as too little speed.

Dual purpose or not, the engine doesn't know it. With the correct CSA you can run smaller timing numbers to get the same RPM and not give up anything.
Click to expand...

You can't seriously believe that the torque curve would be the same.
 
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