Ok. I just wanted to think about this for a bit before replying.
Number ONE thing here is a tunnel ram is always the best intake IF you don’t mind the hood issues. Always. I don’t care if it’s a street only car. If you have a TR and you don’t mind the hole in the hood, use it. That helps everywhere.
Sooooo...with that you should use a custom cam from a grinder who “gets” you and what you expect. I’ll say this again...Jim Dowell at Racer Brown is the master at using his lobes (wherever he gets them) to make the best of what you have. I think of Jim the same way I think of Mike at B3. He is that good. A bit hard to get ahold of, because he grinds the cams, answers the phone, pays the bills, sweeps the floors...he does it all. But worth it to me because he “gets” me. That’s more important than any name on a box. The cam is the second most important part of a TR setup, right behind carb tuning.
If you don’t want to spin the guts out of it, that’s fine. It’s less load on the induction system. I’m going to do a 3.79 stroke with W2 heads (maybe a TR...maybe) and shift it at 7800. That’s going to take a roller lobe for sure.
Lift never hurts a W2 head. Ever. The only exception is the wrong valve job causing turbulence issues. If the flow curve bends over it doesn’t matter. Get as much lift as the valve gear will tolerate. I’m going to shoot for a .725 net lift lobe, but Jim may tell me I’m wacky. But that’s what I think I need for what I’m doing.
I haven’t thought about port cross section verse displacement very hard yet. I do know a 340 at 8500 needs all the cross section you can give it. Unless someone else is writing the checks, I won’t do that again. My best guess today is for a 3.79 stroke at 7000 or a bit more will need the port squared at the top, and can be left round at the bottom, with at least a 2.055 valve and a 50* seat to keep the bowl and throat reasonable. It may need an odd size like 2.065 or 2.070 and a 50* seat, or a 45 and a 2.08. Im not sure about a 2.08 and a seat steeper than 45 because you’ll need a pretty big cross section to feed it. So that means if you start running bigger valves and need cross section to feed it, then you not only square off the top of the port, you do the bottom too.
That’s sucky because those heads are harder than the hinges of hell and grinding them sucks. And you just can’t square the opening. You have to square the port all the way back. Thats a ton of miserable grinding work. And, you have to grind the manifold to match. If you are using a Pro Dominator and you square the top of the port and do the intake correctly, you might as well weld it before you start grinding. Because you’ll find the thin spot pretty quick.
On the MP TR...I’ve never had one for the W2 but I did for the W5. It took some grinding, but that’s just because like the head, the ports in the intake are small to begin with.
So the big things are cam selection, carb tuning and valve sizing verses cross section. When you get all that on the same page the HP/CID will be impressive.
Lead69 and I (and several other really smart, cool guys) did a TR, cam and carbs for a friend, and it turned out very impressive. It’s a 3.75 stroke SBC (so it’s a .040 over 400) and for that we used 2 HP Holley 750’s and a Racer Brown 279/279 248/248 .648/.648 grind with on a 108 installed at 105. That thing is pretty impressive. He can shift a 7000 and it’s making power. Hopefully he can get it on the wheel dyno sometime and see what it really does.[/QUOT
Can Mr Dowell be reached thru email also ?
