Good guy alert Lead69 (Porting pictures)

[EP87]

I met Lead69 on this forum something like 10 months ago, and found out he was a local guy who lived just a few miles from me. I was Inquiring about my
son's 360 that we're putting together and he offered some advise about a local
machine shop and to help us out with porting the J heads. We ended up talking on the phone and meeting at a big local car show. We finally got around to doing the heads recently and he again offered to help, we took the heads to the machine shop that he recommended and they knew him well and talked highly about him. We had them do the preliminary work on the heads, hot tank, mag, machine the intake seats for 2.02 etc. and then took them to Lead69 to do the porting and just got them back the other day, And let me tell you they look great.
Lead69 is really a great guy who's very knowledgeable about mopars and cars in general. And asked for little of nothing to port the heads. which we couldn't be happier with.
I only hope we can return the favor someday.

Lead69 is putting together a great looking 340 Duster that should be a hot street machine,and like a lot of people I've met on this forum just over all
a great guy.
Thanks Richard and Donny.

 

[1971-valiant-RT]

Very nice, looks like some good work. Buy that man a beer!

 

[memike]

Or threeccasion:. They look great EP87.
It can be hard to find some one that will do porting.

Great job lead69.:cheers:

 

[lilcuda]

Hate to rain on your parade, but those guides won't last very long. They are knurled. Knurling lasts a few thousand miles and the guides are worn out again. You should have put bronze guides in. They cost more, but last longer.

 

[EP87]

Hate to rain on your parade, but those guides won't last very long. They are knurled. Knurling lasts a few thousand miles and the guides are worn out again. You should have put bronze guides in. They cost more, but last longer.

I was a little concerned about that myself but the machine shop assured me.
But even if they last a few thousand miles that will take us a couple seasons to go thru and with gas at four bucks a gallon I don't know if we can even afford to drive it much. Maybe just a 1/4 mile at a time. LOL
Richard

 

[71produster]

Nice work !!

 

[crackedback]

I was a little concerned about that myself but the machine shop assured me.
But even if they last a few thousand miles that will take us a couple seasons to go thru and with gas at four bucks a gallon I don't know if we can even afford to drive it much. Maybe just a 1/4 mile at a time. LOL
Richard

Richard,

My guy charges me about 80-100 to insert bronze guides in the heads. It's cheap to do and you don't have the issues with knurled stuff failing prematurely. I've seen some go pretty fast, especially if the camshaft is aggressive in nature.

Nice work by Lead!

 

[lead69]

Thanks for the compliments!,its nice to do these kind of things for guys like Richard and Donny who really appreciate it-they really are good people.As for the guides the machine shop normally reaplces them as part of the head job,believe it or not you get a serdi type multi angle valve job,new guides,cut for positve seals and up to a .020 surface for $275.00!!!-and it includes assembly.I think the heads already had the guides and hard seats so it saved a few bucks.Also FWIW Im getting flow numbers on a couple other sets of LA heads Ive done and if you guys are interested I will start a thread with the results when theyre done.Im very curious to see the results,I have an idea of what they should flow but the bench and soft ware is different,the mopar guru that usually flows them moved out of town.

 

[EP87]

The heads are back at the machine shop and should be done in a couple days
and then we'll be taking them to the same place lead69 is for flow testing so He can add those results too. BTW Lead69 showed me a set of untouched eddy heads when I was at his place, not for mopar but for AMC and I was
suprised how poor they looked right off the shelf. This was the first time I got to take a close look at them and I was not real impressed. It seams like it would take a valve grind and at least some minor port work just to take care
of the factory imperfections, which seams like a lot after spending that much.
When where done we will have far less invested in these J heads which includes new SS valves, comp valve spring,retainers and should flow as well or better then the eddys would off the shelf.
Richard