Trick Flow 440 heads, The Real Deal?
I have 2 builds in the shop that I will be testing them on, a 505 RB and a 500 B, both with HR cams.
Firstly, heartfelt thanks to MRL and IQ52 for everything you guys do. There is no way to put a value on
your input and I for one couldn't be any more appreciative.
A set of the Trick Flow heads are definitely in the cards. Now the can of worms.
The one thing that I am still in complete flux on is the valvetrain. I am all over the place on whether to use
a hydraulic or solid; flat tappet or roller.
Best bang for the buck is probably a solid flat tappet but a hydraulic flat tappet is relatively maintenance (and
noise) free once you get past the break-in period.
Then you lean towards a roller due to the inherent performance advantages along with the elimination of
break-in concerns. There may be some durability issues on long term street use of rollers with "race type"
specs but I'm hoping that something more conservative should not be an issue.
You hear many good reports about no-problem street use of a conservative soild roller setup and then you go
somewhere else (ex. Yellow Bullet) and see where people swear that there is NO WAY a solid roller will last for
more than 2,000 miles on the street (admittedly this seems to be mostly from BBC and BBF owners running
.800 lift set-ups).
Many modern new cars come with hydraulic rollers albeit being designed for them from the start.
I am thus strongly considering a small Voodoo solid roller with MRL big wheel roller lifters (my only choice) and
wonder if there would be a significant performance penalty for using a 550+ lift hydraulic roller (with or without
bushed lifter bores) in comparison. What about switching the Trick Flow valve springs for Bee Hives on either cam?
Intended use will be anything from car shows and lot's of local cruising to hopping on the expressway for a
couple of hours.
Question: Are the lifter bores bushed in both of the builds mentioned above?
