HPBooks How to Hotrod Your ya Bae OHC FORD Covers 2.0-Liter OHC Fords installed in 1971 —74 Pintos & 1970—74 rye eee UCC oe we Cou) ee Cer Mat itl ae aE ote © Flow-Bench Testing es ure tear Bleed © Turbocharging, Reale | Pa ieee tl © Engine-Building Tips Ber) Manufacturers i fHPBooks® How to Hotrod Your 2.0-LITER OHC FORD David VizardNOTICE: The information contained in this book is true and complete to the best of our knowledge. All recommendations on parts and procedures are made without any guarantees en the pact of the author, Foun tain Press Lid or HPBooks. Because the quality of parts, materials and methods arv beyond our control, author and publishers disclaim all liability incurred in connection with the use of this information, treet Windsor, Berkshire SL4 1EH. England is reserved. No parl oF this book may be reproduced in any. form or by any means without permission of the publisher. ISBN 0-86343-0856 (UK) Published by HPBooks, Inc. P.O. Box 5367, Tueson, AZ: 85703 602/888-2150 ISBN 0-89586-965-0 (USA) Library of Congress Catalog No, 84481920 ©1985 HPBooks. Inc, Printed in USA.Contents CHAPTERONE CHAPTERTWO CHAPTER THREE CHAPTER FOUR CHAPTER FIVE CHAPTERSIX CHAPTER SEVEN QHAPTFR EIGHT CHAPTER NINE CHAPTER TEN CHAPTER ELEVEN CHAPTER TWELVE (CHAPTER THIRTEEN CHAPTER POURTEEN CHAPTER FIPTEEN Introduction How Do We Make Horsepower Heads for Power & Economy Cam Drives, Cam & Valve Trains Air Filters, Carburation & Manifolds Exhaust Manifold & Exhaust System Ignition Systems Blocks, Pistons, Rods, Cranks & Flywheels Lubrication & Cooling Fuels & Water Injection Nitrous Oxide Turbocharging & Supercharging Building a C4 Automatic Transmission for a Turbo Engine Off-Roading the Pinto Engine Building the Engine for a Purpose Dyno Tuning Suppliers & Manufacturers Index 47 79 93 us 1g 125 131 a7 165 168 171 173CREDITS Writing book lke this is never a five minute wonder. A lot of time, effort and hard thinking went into it, but 1 would all have been for nothing it had not been for the generous assistance of | many people, Some people were able 10 help more than others, and almost all helped as much as they could, My special thanks must go to Duane Essiinger, Jim Flynn, Carl Schattilly, Denny Wyckofi, Dave Egglestone, Kerth Roof, Doug Somerville for many, many hours of assistance. To these I must add the names of my able Australian contacts, John Briderlin and Doug Huntley. From here the names belong to people all over the English-speaking world, so here are sincere thanks to all, the following) Racer Walsh, Steve Burton. Davee Ray, Bill Quinne, Sig Bison, Harvey Crane, John Reid, Barty Reynokds Ron Capron, Ak Miller, Jerry Branch, Darryl Koppel, Dan Swain. Ken Johnson, Mike Uneh, Derek Sansom, Geoff Howare, Bill Nelson, Kevin Rothe, Joe Antonet John Campanelli Terry Davis, Frank Casey. Harold Bettes Il, Gary Polled, Mike Anson, Jobn Shankle and John Lievesly To this I must add a special thank yon to Daphne for one year's hard typing.Introduction The Ford Motor Company introduced. thetr Single Over Head Gam (SOHC) en: gine in 1970, and since then they have been installing it m close on a million vehiclesia year. This ineans that by now there are a lot of these engines around. In Europe, this engine fulhls a number of duties ranging from every- day workhorse requirements to the ingher performance needs of Ford's more sporting vehicles like the RS Es- cort. The same basic engine cant dis: place 1300, 1600 or 2000ce: In some ‘countries such as the USA, Gnly the 2000ce engine was used, thus being in stalled in Capris, Pintos and Bobcats ‘This is Ford'suniversal engine, apower unit designed to be put to as many uses as posable. Thad the opportunity to pull one of these engines apart not long after their introduction and [rom the racer’s point of view, [liked what saw. At the time | was wnting a technical chat page for Cars & Car Conversions magazine in England and I did not hestiate to extol the virtues of this engine, as well as centicising some of the possible draw backs as I'saw them. I pointed out that this engine had all the ingredients for hugh horsepower outputs al modest cost Ils overhead cam, eight port crossflow head should, I said, be capa ble of allowing this unit 10 produce in excess of 100 bhp per litre in normally aspirated form, and twice that amount per litre in supercharged form, With all it had going for it lexpected this engine to be an instant, overnight hit wath the: speed equipment companies and the general public alike, just as the British Leyland Minis had been eleven years previously. You don't have to be a student of au- tomotive lustory to know that my en- thusiasm was not shared by all and sun dry. After my inital acquaintance with this engine, many years were to pass before one came into my hands again During those intervening years, one of the great unsolved mysteries of life for me was — why hadn't performan minded people “discovered” this gem of an engine? True, a fow enterprising folk did spend some time making them produce more power but few, very few, remotely approached anything like the true potential ofan engine of ths contig uration. Those clever souls who dia manage to produce reasonable Horse power from Fords single overhead can (SOHC) engine usually found a very limited response to thetr efforts by the public ‘About 1976 I became re-acquainted with Ford's SOHC engine. Hbecame the proud owner of a MK I 1600 Cortina GT. Although it was not cute the car 1 expecied, I grew very aliached to the mactune, and as a result I slowly be came mote involved with the perfor mance aspect of ts engine, AAs time passed, I began to forsiulate a theory as to why this engine fad not achieved wholesale accepiance by ‘motoring enthusiasts Fords European competition involvement is probably well known throughout the flee world Thetr principal competion engine 1s the CoswortlvFord BDA. four-valve: pereylinder engine. This unt isavaila ble from Ford at displacements trom 1400-2000 ce. Power output m excess of 28) horsepower normally aspirated can be achieved with this engine, though for long distance events such as rallies, 220 bhp is considered the norm, Since Ford already possessed a highly suc cessful engine, it seemed to them to be pointless to cevelop its poorer, less-en dowed cousin the SOHC engine. Hay ing acquired the easy-to-come-by hor sepower ftom the SOHC enaine, they appeared, at least to outsiders, to have drawn the departmental Ime. At the time of wnting (1983), f you built an en- gine using Ford parts, about 155bhp would be the bmit you could reasona bly expect. lam sure you willagree this, is not a lot for an almost bullet-proof SOHC engine. The argument that since Ford has the Cosworth engine in its sta ble, why should they spend time and money on an alternative unt holds water excep! for one point’ not everyone can afford the price of a four value-per cylinder engine. On the other side of the com, a lot of vehicles: are already equipped with the SOHC engine, If Ford has to date, declined to explore the true potential of the engine, wlial have: the privatests done? Many people ted their hand at making the engine go but precious few, il seems, have actually found the key to unlock the true horsepower potential from this unit. You would thuik that the elforts af those who did make horsepower would be readily received, like exhaust into a vacuum, Unfortunately, thisappears not to be the case. The situation seems more akin to a castaway on a Pacific island, reading the national news. Was this apathy on somebody's part? [ think not, Ineffective lines of communication would describe it better. My ‘low acceptance’ theory 1s based ‘on what [have already said, Ithingeson the fact that for an engine to be an in: stant performance bul, we must see leadership from the factory to con: stantly keep the unit in the public eye. Morever, it must be responsive to even the simplest modifications. The factory leadership we don't have, but this situa- tion is changing with the increasing populanity of Group I now group A com: pelition (the use of mass-produced vel icles with factory speed equipment) ‘The engine itself is only semt-repon- 9sive to simple modifications but highly responsive to the right modifications, ‘Making horsepower 1s only a question of finding the weak link in the chain af power production events, Those few who did find the way to high horse- power outputs were not ina position to publicize therr findings in a wholesale manner. Instead, the information fil- tered down through the ranks 30 that now, a decade or so after it introduc tion, the engine is only just beginning to achieve the status it deserves. The valicity of this theory will be difficult to prove one way or the other but to my mind it contains enough seeds of truth to cause me to restructure the concept ofthis book Normally would start with simple, bolt-on modifications and from 10 there, each subsequent chapter would delve deeper into the engine in the search for more and more horsepower and, of course, reliability. Not so with this engine. As Thavealready said, tis only ser responsive to relatively simple, con- ventional modifications. This is part of the reason for itsslow acceptance, and do not intend to be found guilty of further retarding matters. Indeed, my intention is the reverse, Whether you are looking for a big horsepower increase ot a small one, you need to have a reasonable under. standing of the device you are dealing ‘with, Hopefully, this book will give you a good insight as to what youcan expect the results of any modification to be, It should also allow you to get the best in- crease in performance for the money You intend to spend, Ifyou are anything like me, economics play a vital role as to what you can do to your vehicle. Bearing these factors in mind, I in- tend to go straight into the engine and deal with its idiosyncrasies first. When you have a greater understanding of the engine, we will then deal with the speed equipment, which falls into the more accepted bolt-on category. This and the more complex task of buulding a competition engine will be dealt with last, In other words [ will deal with the sum total when T have dealt with the comprising parts,CHAPTER ONE How Do We Make Horsepower Lam gong to stick my neck out and tell you that really there are no such things 88 speed secrets, If more power is te quired from an engine, then improve- ments must bo made in one or more of the following areas: |, Increasad vol: umeine efficiency, 2 Increaged ther mal efficiency, 3 Increased mechan calefficiency Let's look al each of these three fac tots in turn andl analyee them in a litle mote detail. First ofall, increasing vol umetric effiaency. in simple terms, this means improving the breathing ll- Cleacy of the induction and exhaust sys tem, When you reahze that at 7.500 RPM a typieal engine has only” six thousandths of a second to fill or expel the gases in the cylinder, you will realize the ease of doing so becomes important. To improve volumetuc eff ciency, we make changes to atr filtra~ ion, carburatien, manifolds, intake ports, valves, combustion chambers, exhaust ports, exhaust manifolds and silencers (mufflers), Into thas caulehor ofparts, throw the etect ofthe camshaft profile on engine performance, ane you wall beaun to appreciate there are @ lot parameters affecting the end product While on the subject of cams, 1 should point out that high performance cams very often (but not always) increase hig RPM breathing at the sacriice of low RPM breathing. In other words, they trade low end performance for top ‘end. Improving the breathing ability of the engine ts the most important single factor affecting power output. Because of this, it hardly surprising this book deals with various aspects of mproving the volumetric efficiency in detail. Pay attention to that detail and you wall nc the extra power you are lookang for. The concept of velumetnie efficiency is relatively easy to understand, but the term thermal efficiency, for many, 1s not, Let me explain: when a certain quantity of fuel 1s burnt, i releases a certain Known quantily of heet. All fons of energy are interchangeable. If ou engine converted all the heat eneray te mechanical nergy, it would have a thermal efficiency of 100% Re: member, the fuel is burnt to heat the ait ‘the cylinder so that it expands and pushes the piston down the bore. The more heat the air contains, the higher the pressure it reaches and the harder it pushes clown on the piston, [after burning the fuel, the hest is ken away from the ax, it will noi want 10 expand.as much, 99 cylinder pressures will be lower and the power will be down, ‘Typically 80% of the fuel we burn incur engine 15 wasted heating up the rest of the world, The remaining 20% 18 all that 13 converted to mechanical energy 10 propel the veiuicle Heat that 15 dissi- pated in the cooling system oF goes out as hot exhaust 1s heat that the engine burned fuel to produce and cid not con- vert to mechanical energy. The factors which alfect thermal efficiency are im- portant te those of you requining fuel economy as well as horsepower, The plinorpai factors affecting thermal eft- ciency ate the quality and correct im- ing of the igaition spark, proper atomt- zation of vaporizaion of the fuel in the airstream, conect cylinder to cylinder distribution, and comect cahbration of the cattburettor to dehver the optimum aitifvel ratio, The compression ratio is also a factor, The higher this goes, the better the thermal efficiency gets Re- ducing heat losses to the cooling and lubrication systern increases the ther mal efficiency. Lastly, reduced tric- tional losses help thermal efficiency, but this really comesunder the heading of mechanical efficiency As far a5 mechanical efficiency 1s concerned, the biggest step you can take to improve itis o build the engine (o the finest tolerances possible, Things bke con rod accuracy, crankshait susighiness, piston to bore clearances all alfect the final frictional losses the engine will have. Care in selecting and establishing the right clearances when building the engine will produce higher mechanical efficiencies, The overall concept of building a high performance engine is attention to every detail, big ar small, In the follow. ing pages [ will elaborate on the points that were touched upen here Iwilleawe, you the necessary details or accepta- ble ground ules So you can success fully bud or modify an engine te your particular needs. uCHAPTER TWO Heads for Power and Economy Today, the challenge of coaxing extra horsepower from a modern eylin- der head produces imeresting () prob- lems Gone are the days when a little thoughtful use of the grinder, plus a set of larger valves, were all thal was needed to gel one step ahead of the compention No Sir. ‘Those days sophisticated equipment Js regmed fo produce cylinder heads of advanced performance. Foremost among this hardware are the flow benci and dynamometer. Bul, unfortu: nately, such equipment isouiside the & nancial means of most enthusiasts, Fortunately, though, | have over the years acquired such equipment. Thus, in the following pages I will detail cer: tam easier modifications, as well as many more exoue modifications which have all been developed on the flow bench and thoroughly dynamometer: tested As a result, the changes will help the engine develop the amount of power one would expect from a SOHC, canted. valve engine. ELEMENTARY PRINCIPLI The producuon of horsepower de- pends to @ large extent on ait ow. Ife head has insuficient air flow, 11 will never produce good horsepower but good air flow or an amr flow increase does not guarantee a horsepower in- crease. Sometimes achieving extra ait flow into the engine may upset some other aspect ofthe enenne’s functioning, Jesding 16 a situation where little or no gains are made. A rule which works al- mest 100 percentof the time is tfatr flow increases and nothing else changes, horsepower will increase Other factors affect horsepower apart from air flow, these beina princi 12 pally fuel atomrzation, combustion eff ‘Gency and heat losses, To optimize the cylinder head, attempts must be made to impove all these areas. ‘There is no doubt that cylinder head design is a very comples subject ILis often regarded by laymen as being 2 black ant Asa result, many myths exist, and one of these is that polishing the ports is the trick to make a head work Nothing coule! be further from the truth, 4 polish does nothing to mcrease the ‘power ofan engine In facton occasions itcan reduce horse power Another myth you should dispel, especially with the Pinto, 18 thal big ports produce flow, They do not: an ex Wo, FIGZIA esicogy, 140 120} 100] AIRFLOW CFM =e 8 cessively large port will sometimes ‘low less air than a smaliey one. ‘The moet important factor in cylinder head development isshape. This 1s the ‘most important consideration with any cylinder head modifications The shapes of the ports, combustion cham- bers and valves dictate yust how eftec: tive that eylincler bead will be. Ifyou it tend to grind your own cylinder heads, don't worry about a polished finish. A rough-around finisi is usually entirety adequate. ‘THE STANDARD HEAD The first step toward improving a STANDARD FORD SOWC 2000 HEAD INTAKE: 1-08" (42mm) VALVE 2) EXMAUST: 1-42" (36mm) VALVE 40| 0 005 0.260 ‘VALVE LIFT I 3365 —0.400—0-500 weHES ——————>Fig248 Fig 246 mechanical contrivance is to under stand the nature of the device. ‘To do this let us analyse the standard head in a hitle detail Take a look at the graph Fig. 2-1A. This shows the amount of air that can be passed through the stan- dard ports on 2 2000 head. The dotted line starting on the horizontal axis of the graph 18 typical maxium lift achieved 2.4.A section through an unmesified 2000 head ‘eve that noting ee hake ports plenty ‘Tis PORTION CAN BE FILLED Tniwirn citrus O8 NO RE ‘DUCTION IN AIR PLOW POTENTIAL with a standard camshall. Follow it up until it meets the inlet flow curve. ‘Then turn $0 degrees and follow it to the ver: tical axis. ‘This indicates that the head flows 131.5 CFM at 376 thousandth lif. Fora 1.88 inch diameter valve at this ft ‘this is not a very good showing. In fact the head, for all its promising looks, does not deliver the goods. As it comes, from the factory it falls short on many counts as far as alr flow and its power potential are concemed. First ofall, the valve seats, especially on the intake are very constrictive 10 ow. Secondly, the shape of the inlet valve is far ftom optimum. The port angle in the head is also disappointing, because it closely approaches the worst angle possible for flow. And last, the final approach to the back of the value is too short. In other wordis there isn enough length of straight port be hind the valve head to allow the alr a more direct shot 10 the back of the valve. Interestingly, 1600 and 1300 heads dont sulfer in this respect quite ‘as badly as the 2000 head. Both 1600 and 1300 heads have shallower cham bers and longer valves. This means the air can make a more favourable ap- proach to the back of the valve, espe Cally on the floor of the port around the lught turn just upstream of the valve seat. Fig, 2-IB shows the main restriction ‘points, Apart from its breathing ability, the inlet port does sulfer one other all: ment: the port itself appears to be too large for the engine. The resultant slow gas speeds allow fuel to drop out of sus- pension easier than if the port were smaller, A study of the air flow pattem ‘in the port reveals that most of the air flows at the top of the port, and the bat tom of the port is almost redundant. Fig. 2\C shows what I mean, Plow bench tesisshow that ifthe bottom of the ports filled in as much as Ya inch, almost no drop m air flow results. Any modifica: tions to this engine must be done bear: ing in mind that fuel dropout can occur. ‘When fue! dropout takes place the en gine will suffer a loss of horsepower, economy and throtile response. Any changes which help produce a more homogenous mixture entering the cylinders will usually improve the en gine’s performance in these areas. Straight away this should tell us two things about these heads enlaraing the ports 16 defintely oul, and polishing them is not a good idea because a coarse finish is more likely to rein- troduce puddied fuel back into the aursiream, A shiny finish will allow fuel lo stay on the surlace as a hqud or drops which will run into the cylinder and subsequently pass through the en: ‘gine unburnt EXHAUST PORT ‘The exhaust port suffers many of the 1322. Too many abrupt changes in direction mean bad flow through the standard exhaust port Arrows indicate the prime soures of efiiency. same ailments that the inlet port has. ‘The valve seat geometry needs im provement. On the other hand, though, the exhaust valve shape, unlike the in lake, 1s reasonably satisfactory. ‘Phe exhaust port shape, however, is even worse than the intake port its flow fi ures are way below those attainable bya highly developed port, COMBUSTION CHAMBER Tam not suggesting this head is junk Far from it. The faciory designed the head to do a particular job, and this tt does ina satisfactory manner. They cid not design itor racers and for high per formance 11 will need some redesign ing. You may well ask if there is any: tung that doesnt need modifying? Cer tainly. The combustion chamber is a very good desion and has many factors: im its favour. Many production cylinder heads sulfer from what is known as valve shrouding. ‘This 1s the situation where, as the valve opens, the gap bet ween the edge of the valve and the ‘combustion chamber wall isinsufficient to allow air out. On vertical valve en. gunes, the cylinder bore will almost al ways cause shrouding. Although the Pinto engine has inclined valves, the in cclination is not sulficient, nor is iin the night direction ta obviate shrouding, 23, Valve shrouding caused by the unnecessary {lose proximity of chamber walls te valve heads all butnomexstent on the standard eying 14 Unnecessary —shrouding by the chamber though, is virtually non-exis- tent, The only shroucing suffered is caused by the proximity of the cylinder walls and there is litle we can do about that IMPROVING THE HEAD ‘The prime factor of an engine's power characteristics, he it a well de: veloped unit or not, is the cylinder head, Because of this, I will deal m depth with head modifications and how they affect airflow. [ will show precisely what modifications are needed to pro duce the required results, Improving airflow is finding the right combination of shapes, Two head mod thers starting off with the same basic head casting may amive al two different combmations of parts and shapes 10 produce compatible airflow figures And importantly, irying to combine the specifications of ne with the other may well produce worse airflow figures than you started off with. A more precise example: lets say that somebody de velops a trick valve shape which really tums the flow on with a standard port "Where 1s no guarantee such a valve is going to work in the same manner ifthe port 1 steeply downdralted I all comes back to.combmations of shapes, In other words, don't reckon on produc ing a super trick head by using what may appear to be the best pointsofsev eral different heads. More than likely whatever you do will be worse, asthasis not an easy head to unprove upon. The ‘only way to find out what will work for sure is by testing on the flow bench and dynamometer. Fizz SIMPLE MODIFICATIONS My policy, when modifying an on tine, is always to try the simple modi Cations first uvan attempt to extract the most for the least. In the category of simple modifications, we have such thingsas maln-angle Valve seat jobs, re moving sharp edges from valves, plas going into the port with a grinder and just taking off any flash marks or sharp edges produced from machining in the port. Well, Ihave newstor your the 2000 hhead does not often respond positively to such moves. In fact, the first week I spent on the flow bench with one of these heads produced a large number of negative results Whoever designed thus head, made st so youhave to Aghtall the way ta get any flow mcrease. Let's consider those multi-angle valve seats that are often touted as the trick thing for a few extra horsepower for next to nothing, | tred such valve seats on brand new heads, and believe ‘me, the usual result 1s reduced aurflow compared with the standard 30, 45, 60° sea that Mr. Ford putson thehead. ‘Ths doesnt mean we cant improve the head; it just means that an elaborate 75, 60, 48, 30, 1 seat is not what's needied, ‘Take a look at the chart (Pig. 2-2) and you will see the typical difference bet ween a standard valve seat and a mult angle one. To be truthful, taking the sharp edges off the valve makes things even worse. If you do any grinding on the back of the valve, it must be a sub- stantial 30° cut as shown in Pig. 2-3For such a simple modification, as you can see from the graph, the flow was sub- siantially creased. This led me to test many valve shapes to determine which Comparison between standard valve seat and multi“angle sea. Vaveuit crm CEM. Inlnches Standard Multi“Angte 0.025, 120 na 0.050 256 259 oe. 4 a8 0165, 84 ne oz 1083 n08 0330 1257 87 ose 1378 wuss. 0.995, v3 wos 0577 473. 145 NOTE: Standard width vale seat used in all tots. Test pressure drop 25° 0.MODIFICATION TO STANDARD INTAKE VALVE FOR IMPROVED FLOW 1 1a sao] 135] 20S 3 12 ng2e ‘THIS Hows DIRECTION OF THE MaiN Mass oF INVA 2000ee HEAD WHEN-THE VALVE Is AT MID OF CLOse TO FULL VALVE LIFT 1.875" (40.0mm) DIA. 1 113] sack curinraKe vawveon VALVE SEAT GRINDER 5 110 100 asl A. mopIFiED VALVE “185287 390-472. STANDARD VALVE VALVE LIFT IN INCHES. profile would be the best for this par ticular port. Flow testing quickly estab lished that the fatter the profile on the back of the valve and the thinner the stem, the more air the port would flow. Velocity probing the port quickly showed the reason the flat_ valve worked best. If you look at Fig. 2-4 you will see that the airflow pattern is across the back of the valve, rather than in a downward direction toward the valve head and around its sides. ‘This shows that mnast of the air entering the cylinder 5577 exits the port on the plug side of the valve; and litle aur exits the port on the opposite side, A valve witha large tulip section on the back presenis a consid. erable obstruction to the airflow. A flat valve presents less obstruction and asa result md-lit airflow 1s increased con siderably as Fig. 2-5 shows. This trend 1n valve shapes predominates throuah- out all flow testing, where the basic port angle remained unchanged. In other words, unless we put in a new set of steeply downdralled ports, the flat ras Valve Lift CFM. CFM. In Inches. ‘Standard Valve Flat Back Valve 0.025 133 23 0.060 za 23 ose 25 25 0165 743 a1 oza7 1083 1196 0330 1275 1358 0.412 135.6 142.6 0.495 457 1485 0.577 148.9 152.5 Test pressure drop 25° 0, valve profile is the shape to have. VALVE SEAT AREA. Any competent head modifier will tell you the most important part of any head modification i the area 4 inch belore the valve seat t0 "a inch after it Because the multi angle valve seat proved singularly unsuccessful, a new line had to be med. The obvious thing was to bore out the throat of the intake port 'This would give a useful mcrease in the breathing area Such modifica: tions don' always result m extra flow because very offen the efficiency of the port may drop due to the abrupt changes in shape in the vicinity of the seat, However, in the case of the 2000 head, this modification did work out ‘The easiest way to do this modification sstotakea cutter of |-"/ie meh diameter and bore the throat down to a depth of 4 inch or so, This leaves you with aseat width ofapproximately 070 inch, which is ample for the job, The step produced. from bong should be blended into the rest of the port, After boring the port it will be necessary to remove the sharp edges fromm the inside diameter of the seat. A needle file can be used for this, ‘ora quicker job can be done by taking off the sharp edge with a 76° grindstone. The amount of chamfering required at ths pomt is minimal. If you 18a7 890 ATS 498 7 VALVE UF Mopincartonero-me vauve THROAT 0000¢ ENGINE Fig 27 IME VALVE GUDE 206 MOCICATION FOR USE WITH STANDARD $OEiNSewne value Ure Neo ane" oor have broken tine corner with a.010 inch wade Cul, that issullicient, Phe resultant merease mn aurflow is shown in Fig, 26 At ths pont, compare these figures wth graph showing flew periormance ofa llat-back valve. All hese modifica ons work using 4 sore conventional valve with the back cut at the 30° angle 16 ‘Sige nent hae Mares Ber SORES 170, 105} 189] 155| saa saab ‘247 80.412 405.577 VALVE LIFT deseubed earlier ‘The proportional (gai s similar bur the results achieved with the more conventional valve shape ate less than those achieved with the Tat-back velve ‘Moving farther down the port brings you to the guide boss, Here you must make a decision ‘The quide bass causes a Now restriction. Iyou are buy- ing = head and you are paying big money for a so-called tnck head. be very wary of one that still convains the guide boss, a8 the head will flow more air with the guide boss cut away, Just hhow much cunting away needs to be done depeneis om the lift of the cam you will run in the engine, Look at Fig. 2-2 ‘which compares the relative flow in creases for the original and io mod- Wied shapes m the guicie boss area Note that with mo guide bess there is only asutastantial increase inflow at ifts over 492 inches. [11s unlikely you wall see any benefit by cutting the guide boss completely away, unless you are rumning with 2 cam of at least .600 inch lif. Importantly. cuting away the guide boss does bring about its own prob- Jems, Because the guide length is shor- tened, valve guide wear increases drastically. The trick approach to rua mung short guides without sacnfcing ‘nnd life 15 to install bronze guide in’ seris In the USA. K-Line thin-wall bronze quide liners or Winona helical bronze msarts are commonly used. In Europe, especially in England, bronze quides are more commonly used. H you dont wanl to Go lo the expense of hronze quides, you can stilishorten that guide boss and make an appreciable gain in flow, Shape A of Fig. 2-7 stil cwves sufficiently long guide Inte for most applications but heed @ word ot warning: the higher lil cam you use, the shorter guxde Ie will be. If you are using a stock cam, modified shape A will probably be dood for around 60,000 miles, As cams approach 0 590 inch bit ‘you will find cuide lie reduced! to as t= tle as 25,000 miles. Consider this guide life before you deeicle whether or not tise a bronze guide and the expense it invyalves. ‘Moving on to the parallel part of the pout, you will ind that this isenitical. Is already 160 big for best results on the dyno; do not attempt to enlarge it Also, don't waste time giving ila super high ‘polish fish, In fact, you ean usually get the best results by not touching thispart ofthe port. "The main thingtozemember when you are modifyind the cylinder head is tha! t's shape that counts more than finish. The shape can make han- credis of percent areater difference in flow than polish. Alt your eons at ths stage should go on Careful shaping in the area around the valve seat ancl the guide boss, When you've gone that far, SOP.24. This low bench mode valve gave almost a6 ‘much alow increase na standard ports: Complete porting jb gave with a standard valve, INTAKE PORT DEVELOPMENT So far, simpl ations to the in take port liave been considered. Now let's begin to get a litle more exotic while retaming the standard size valve. Ifyou are good wath your cylinder head grinder, a venturt around part of the valve seat will pep up the flow. ‘Thus works with either a re-profiled stan dard valve or a flat profile valve. Such a yentunt shape will not generally. in crease peak flow but it certainly does help in the all-unportant mid-range flow. Renember, the valve reaches full lift only once in the lift curve but at reaches hall-i With the ventun, substituting the conventional shaped valve for the fal profiled valve pays off with even greaier Dow. See Fig. 2-8 FIG28 25, This heads being prepared at Shankle Automotive Alot ofa tion is being given tothe shape of ports {and chambers However. achromestke polish s nowhere tobe seen, This is asit shouldbe. INCREASING PORT FLOW AND VELOCITY So far, all the re-shaping we have considered has been done by remov Ing metal only from the port. But let us consider this problem of the too large a port diameter, We can largely over come this by adding material 10 the port, which on the inlet side is not toc dificult to do. A tmotenal or bonding agent with inetal nul, suchas Devcon or epoxy resin suchas JB Weld, makes good job of putting material back where its missing, The point is, where should we add it and what sort of vel caities do we need? If a comparison af the air velocitiesin the port of a 2000 en gine is made with, say, a small-block Chevy, we find the 2000 head yreld: INCREASE IN AIR FLOW WITH VENTURI VALVE THROAT seo|_| | 150] ae | 5 sao 8. Wrrngur veNtun! T rouse“ 120] ‘VALVE LIFT only about two-thirds the velocity, I will not spout lots of dhifferent tuqgesting that you should have this or that port velocity. Port velocity 1s sub ject which is very much misinterpreted The thing to consider most when juggl Ing with port velocities isthat the prime objectives are ia achieve a higher numbers and even port yelocity so {uel stays in suspension better and increased mer tial rammng of the cylinder 1s achieved, Dyno testing indicated that reducing the port size wlule retaming the same airflow in cubic feet per minute gives @ worthwhile ucrease m horsepower. ‘lus 1s especially so fn take charge healing as ts often encout ered on factory manifolds is not present. Even if intake charge healing is present, we can still Come ont on the winning side with more power and economy by not aggravating fuel dropout Let me give you an example: Some lume ago, I was testing an engine with engine builder David Ray. This engine had a very high spec constuthip tion, Its thermal efficiency was law. The head had fully re-worked and highly polished ports, This head was then sub siituted with another head with a rough Inlake port, Only the area in the it mediate vicuuty of the valve had been reworked. Airflow of both heads was about the same. ‘The rough port head produced its best horsepower with a secondary barrel main jet two sizes aller than required for maximum. power jetting for the polished port head--this engine produced |.Sbhp itm ace a duced more horsepower on jess fuel. Adding material to the port to in crease velocity is all very well but the 172687.The famp port” was a successful experiment as far os slow and gas speed were concered, butts ‘shape was rather 0 criteal to produce even on a four of (one par port] bass problemis, where to add it? Making the port into a D-shape by adding material fo the floor will decrease the por and gain the higher gas vel quired for better fue out significantly affect Usually, only a very aurflow occurs, How much better to sex would. be: whether material could be added so as lo increase airflow aswell as increase port velocity To do this we need to plot out where and in which direction the atr ws moving sn the: standard port, The dravang onan earlier page tells us most of the air t travelling along the ceiling of the port when the valve is at working lifts. And, a8 a resull, air flowing at the top of the port makes good use only of the far side ofthe intake valve to feed the cylinder Ifthe core airflow can be moved so tha it ubhzesa greater amount of the intake valve, an ncrease in both port velocity and airllow are likely to result, Many hours experimentation were done along this line and it resulted in a port which, for want of a better nae, Icalla ramp port. With the ramp in the intak por! as shown in the photographs iflow was increased as shown mn Fig. 2-9, and port velocity was evened out to uch more consistent figure. ‘The urve on the ramp also tends to direct any fuel that 1s running low cown in the port into the centre of the cylinder rather than onto the cylinder wal where itis unbikely to burn, The addi tion of th ity which fell in hne wil known to produce good specilic fuel > ramp produced a port veloc ‘when ground to suta larger valve, the chamber sill etainsasiilar appearance tothe standard shape. Th photo ofa virtually fi Chamber 18 G29 Comparison of conventional port shape Vramp port Tested by David Vizard Seot.7 AlirFiow CM. uit [Conventional [emp Inches Port Port oes a7 «7 0165, 859 273 ozar 189 1258 0330 1489 94 oat 1614 614 0495 1537 ms os77 1605 ma 0660 m2 1808 Standard pressure drop 25° Ht. Valve Da 85" [42:mm) with iat profile consumption figures. Making this ramp 18.2 difficult job. To begin with, a rough 12m of the ramp needs to be added to the port, followed by the final shaping, which must be done in conjunction with the flow bench to make sure it's work: ing ight. It is not really a job for the amateur head modifier. Fortunately, the ramp does not need to extend up siream into the intake manifold, T tried this with a 45 Weber manifold and all succeed in cloing was reducing the total airflow My advice: if you intend to build a ramp port, do it as shown in the photos and leave il at that, To make sure you have some Devcon or JB Weld disappearing into the engine, be sure when you use it that the port is totally nib free. Also grind some grooves in the FIG240base of the port for the Deveon or JB Weld to grip securely. An engine which swallows a lump of the intake ort isn't going to produce as imuch hor sepower ast should. COMBUSTION CHAMBER ‘As Jong as the standard intake valve used, the combustion chamber sui fers no unnecessary valve shrouding apart from that caused! in the area ada cent to the cylmder wall, Here, you should lay the head gasket om the cylin der head and mark out where the gas ket comes to. Then cut the combustion chamber wall to that line. This will give the air the maximum chance of coming round on the chamber wall side. Fig, 2 10 shows where you should grind, The same situation also applies to the exhaust valve and the same technique an be used to grind the combustion chamber to the limits ofthe gasket tore eve the exhaust valve of any unneces sary shrouding, COMPRESSION RATIO Some easy increases in power can be achieved by raising the compres: sion ralio. These engines are available ma vaniety of compression ratios, ‘Those with ratios in the range of about 81 respond very favourably even to only stall increases compression, AS a rough quide, whichever enqine you have, 0,045-0.050 unch (1.15-1.2¢ mm) off 2.10 Machining ne hea acetate CR an any way of boosting power and economy rom Your Ford SOME engine the head raises the compression ratio about % ofa ratio point, and 0.080-0.068 inch (1.92-1.65 mm) will bring it up about one whole point. Typically, these engines will respond with about a five: fo-sever-percen! increase i torque and horsepower, Because the power increase is brought about by more eff cient use of the fuel, the econamy isalso increased In some areas of the world, such as the U.S.A, theoctane ratingof available vels 1s litle better than that of peanut butter. Once compression ratios start exceeding about $.7-9.9:1 the engine is, hkely to nm mto detonation problems, even on premium-grade fuel. Where 100 octane fuel is available, compres sion ratios up to about 11.8 of 12.1 can be used. As compression ratios increase, less metal has to be taken from ihe head to raise tla corresponding amount. Form stance, If it took 068 inch to raise the compression ratio from 8.3 10 9.3, t will probably only take another 040 inch to raise it from 93 10 103, About the maxuum that can be machined from a ‘2000 head as 0.168 inch, Fornow, we are dealing only with minimal compression ratio rises lo obtain cheap and easy hor sepower increases for normal street purposes. Later, we'll discuss the mat compression for maxurium power From the laclory the the compression rahio on is altered > engines MODIFICATIONS TO STANDARD FORD EXHAUST VALVE through the crown height of the piston, RS 2000 engines already have a com: pression ratio a Little in excess of 91 Forty thousanciths off the head on these ‘would put the compression ratio close to 10.1, and 060 inch will put it around 10.5:1. Don't be oo greedy on compres sion ratios for street engines. Overdo i, and you may wlumately incur further ex- pense by either measures to suppress detonation or fowering the compres: sion ratio. One means of suppressing detonation yrith very high compression ratios 1s the use of water injection. This, and itseffecison horsepower and emis- sions are dealt with in Chapter 9 ‘To get your engine’s compression ratio raised it will be necessary to take the head to a motor machine shop and have the required amount machined off. Before reinstalling the head, be sure to remove the sharp corners from the edges of the combustion chamber left as a result of the machining opera: tuon. If this 1s not done, the possibility of prevgnition is greaily increased. A needle file is the simplest means of tak ing off these sharp comers, SIMPLE EXHAUST PORT MODIFI- CATIONS So far, ways and means of filling the eylinder and effectively burning the nuxture have been dealt with. Once the mixture 1s burnt, the gases mus! be ex pelled as efficiently as possible, Inefl LiF] 20) { 70] R FLOW crm. | 20] OTT 143.213. 234 595 426.497 19MODIFICATIONS To STANDARD EXHAUST VALVE SEAT 1.396" O1.(3.9mm) 62.13 MODIFICATION To PORT Just aeLow vaLvE 'SEAT ON SHORT SIDE (TIGHT RADIUS SIDE} OF EXHAUST PORT * Baawnnene S13, 18 Seavas shown Seawnererets Bomtas shown me Mewr wna 20 crm AIRFLOW CFM, 0} ” ‘ave waar mat? 7 TaD TiS HOA 355 426.487 VALVE LIFT cient exhaust ports not only cost horse: power, bul also cost economy. An ‘exhaust port which does not flow very efficiently causes higher pumping los ‘ses on the exhaust stroke, This saps power previously generated by bum- ing fuel on the power stroke. ‘The simplest, most effective modifi cation to the exhaust port is to reprofile the valve as shown in FIG. 2-I1. This in volves radwusing the chamber side of the valve and back-cutting the back face of the valve on a valve seat grinder to the 30° angle shown in the drawing, ‘This results in flow increases of up to eight percent inthe mid-lift range of the valve lift cycle, Airflow over .400 inch lift changes litte. This suggests that the port is limiting the flow at valve lifts of this height ‘Although its not the raving success one would wish for, a mult-angle valve seat job on the exhaust does help the situation a lite. At lifts up to. 330 inch, flow js increased a worthwhile amount However, over .330 inch, flow suffers a litle: The trade-offs definitely mvfavour of the multi-angle valve seat but t's cer: tainly nathing to write home about. Fig 2-12 shows the dimensions to cut the seat If you have a high-speed electnc dnl! or a small high-speed grinder, then five minutes’ grinding in each exhaust port will considerably aid the flow. After the multiangle valve seat has been cut, grind the short side of the port as shown in Fig. 2-13. Ishould point ow at this stage that you need a steady hand. If you ship and. gouge the valve seat, you will have to have it re-cut, The graph shows that this grinding opera- tion pulls up the mid-range and top endl flow considerably for such a simple modification. Basically, i's allowing tore area for the air to pass out of the cylinder and it's making more effective use of the area available in view of the direction the exhaust gases are moving when higher lits are attained, The tight curve on the short side of the port is so acute that the exhanst flow in thisareaat high lifts is minimal. At low valve lifts where the speeds are highest right at the seal, the exhaust is able to make it ‘ound this comer without undue prob- lems, Enlarging the throat area im- mediately under the seat helps the mid range flow. Ifurther gains in the exhaust port are intended, you'l have to get deeper into the port and make some substantial ‘changes to its shape. Looking down the‘exhaust port, you can gee thal the whole ort has a kink in it. This kink and the ‘proximity of the port wall opposite isre- sponsible for flow loss, but to remove it effectively entails grinding quite a bit of metal out of the port. A profile you should aim for is in Fig, 2-14, HOW MUCH HORSEPOWER IN- CREASE? So far you have been presented with ways and means of increasing the airflow potential of the head, But when we get right dawn to if, it's not aitflow that gets you down the road, it's how much horsepower your engine has ‘The question is, if you have done all the modifications suggested to improve the intake and exhaust ports, plus raised the compression ratio about one point, what sort of horsepower increase can you expect from a typical 2000ce en gine? Fig, 2-15 gives thus information, Curve number | isa standard Escort RS specification engine. The compression ratio 1s 81] and the engine ran on the dyno less the air filter element and with the dyno exhaust system. Asa result the horsepower figures for the standard engine are slightly above those ob tained in the as.installed condition, EXHAUST PORT RESHAPING FOR USE WITH STANDARD VALVE Tegresessune onop25" 20 a0, TEES EAnD HERR ma TT AIRFLOW CFM, 20] | Curve mutnber 2 is the horsepower out put of a cylinder head utilwing all the simple modhfications described so far ‘The compression ratio on this enaine is 10.25, This requires 100 octane fuel, or VALVE LIFT water injec BIG VALVE HEADS (O77 147.215.264.355. 426.495 n with lower octane fue ‘We will deal first with the Group 1 (or Fig245 120, 120]. consecrso-o sranoano rewr a anesaune 8 FLYWHEEL HORSEPOWER ————— 4 “STANDARD HEAD 9/1 CR 2 mooirteD HEAD 10.25/1 CR {srAnonno VALVE Sizes EMPLOYED) 50 a aS a 160) resrepay: Davo viZARO ocr 78 ‘Eriutoano Pressune DROP 26° 20 140] 120 109] FORD SOHC 2000e< HEAD BUILT TO GROUP I SPECS {1+ INTAKE VALVE 1.74 (44mm) 2 EXHAUST VALVE 1.50 (38mm) ‘AIRFLOW CFM 29] ‘1800 0.800 ‘oi00 0.200 0.300 6.400 VALVE LIFT IN INCHES algroup A) cylinder head, available from Ford in England. This is a specially selected casting machined to accept larger valves, The valvesemployed ina Group | head are 1,74 inch (44mm) diameter on the inlet and 18 meh (38mm) diameter on the exhaust, If you are going to compete in any sort of competition where Group I rules apply, you have litte option but to tun with this cylinder head. An out-of the box Group | head gave the flow figures shown in Fig, 2-16, A comparison with the flow curves given by the standard head shows that the mcrease is not very substantial I this engine is to be com- petitive, then Ford will have to develop abetter Group | head. My own flowand dyno testing has revealed a mile-of thumb formula which is useful for pre dicing approximate maximum power output from a 2000ce engine, based on the airflow of the inlet valve: Horse power 1.05 x:ntake clm at 0.600 ich hi, when intake cim is measured at 25 in ches 11:0, OR Horsepower = 1.659 x inlake cfm at 0.600 inch lit, when intake cfm is mee sured at 10 inches Had For this formula to be even close, several conditions must be met: first the exhaust flow should be about 70 per cenl of the intake flow at comparable Lif Italso assumes that everything else connected with the production of hor sepower isat least more than adequate for the job. By this I mean that there is enough carburation or fuelinjection breathing area, the cam has adequate lift andl timing for the horsepower fo be produced. the exhaust has correct length and zero back pressure, and so on, With the optimizing of all these items, the head should be left as the muting factor nthe equation. Ifitis, the formula works quite well and an exam- pile looks hke this on a Group | engine: Airflow at 0.600 inch Lit = 180 cfm at 28 inches H-0 drop. Using the formula, we have 180x 05 = 187.5 horsepower. AS it happens, even the best Group | en gine builders are hard pushed to beat the 155 bhp mark, Considering the fact that this is only {an approximation formula, ithas proved to be fairly accurate and rarely seems to be off mote than about 10 horse power. you aregoing to build a legal Group | head, (rules as of 1978) then litle ean bbe done to increase its flow potential, Hand grinding, unless originally done by the factory, isspecifically prohibited im preparation of the head. In other words, unless the factory doesa porting job on the head, you cannot do one yourself and stay legal. You can, how. ever, do machining work on ihe valve seals, by reducing valve seat width 10 a Zs (GROUP | PROFILE minimum, a little extra flow can be achieved at the expense of valve seat hte. ‘The intake valve seats can be nar rowed down to.040 inch (1.0mm) wide, and the exbaust ones to about ,050 inch (1.2mm). I you prepare the exhaust valve seat and the exhaust valve with with the same machining techniques as described for the standard head, it 1s possible to achieve similar flow in creases on the Group | head, exhaust flow mereases noticeably in the all-im- portant mic-lft range of the valve. As far as the intake is concemed, you may be able to use a substitute intake valve in some forms of Group 1 competition. Here you must check with your tulebook or tech official. The intake valve [ recommend is one of my design manulactured by G & S Valves or the 'Rimflo' valve produced by Specialized Valves. ‘Thus typeof valve is available in the US through such companies as Branch - Flowmetncs, Esslinger En- gineering and Racer Walsh, To stay within Group | regulations this valve ‘must be slightly reduced in diameter to 1.74 inch (44.2mm), As it comes from G & itis 48mm diameter, Substituting this valve for the Ford Valve in a Group head gave flow increases as shown in Fig, 2-17. 1 tried many other shapes, plus proprietary brands of Pinto valves, and could not ind one which could out 45.7 92.3 123.8 136.9 142.8 148.0 150.8flow either of these valvesin any contig: uration of Pinto head where the stan- dard port angle was retained, NON-COMPETITIVE APPLICA- TIONS OF GROUP 1 HEADS Many of you will no doubt be consid- ening buying a Group | head for no other reason than to bolster the petfor- mance of your road going machine Here I should point something out you have only to make a companson of the flow curves tosee the standard Group | head is inferior to reworking your exist- ing head to even the simplest specifica- tions described earlier. If you want to spend the sort of money involved in buying a Group | head take my advice- -don'. Spend the money on valves and have your existing head reworked. You will get more airflow and more horse: power for your money Actually, there aren't many advan: tages to buying a Group | head for any application except Group I racing. The notable ones are: (1) You get aselected casting which may be shghtly superior for modifying: may bea stronger head. casting, To some, even this benefit is of academic value only. (2) I'you are mod ifying the head yourself, you will have less work to do in the valve seat area because the head 1s already machined for larcer valves. Ifmaximum Now isthe object, a lot of work will have to be done fon the valve seats bit not as much a3 starting wilh a standard head BIG VALVE CYLINDER HEADS Does a normal engine, which is only required for high performance on the road, require the ultimate i cylinder heads? When talking about the ultimate in cylinder heads, one should consider expense as well as practicality. My advice is, f your pocket book will suretch lar enough, even for normal road applications, choose a big-valve head, You will lose nothing in low-end power, but you will gain top-end per- formance. (This assumes of course your engine ss cammed in a sutable manner.) let me give you an example Mynor- mal road-going Pinto 2000 automatic uses one of my head configurations, ‘which on the flow bench produced a lot more airflow than many current race heads. This encine works fine with the standard torque converter and pro. ‘duces almost double the horsepower at 2.13, The widening ofthe intake port starts about V4” bofore the valve guide. Because of the proximity ofthe ‘enamber wal the general direction of flow needs tobe biased towards the centre ofthe cylinder. This is vod by tak tay cil the wheels that the original engine did. ‘This 1g achieved with head, carbura hon, cam and exhausl-manifold changes, ‘This should bring home the point that Ford's SOHC engine needs every bit of breathing it can get. While producing this extra horsepower, the engine still met and even surpassed all iis orginal emission standards Moreover, it yields about 4 MPG more litle more material rom the cinder wallside ofthe port than from the other than it originally did, This rule of stav- ing for maximum airflow should be con- sidered valid only insofar as your fi nances permit. You can craw the line when weld material must be added to the ports. When you beain building completely new ports, then the ex: pense is seldom justified for a road machine, You should look for other more economic ways to improve horse- 238 DRAWING FIG 2-18 OOO GRIND TO THIS d SHAPE D, E & F: DOTTED LINES SHOW ORIGINAL PORT GRIND TS'THIG BHARE,cFM VALVE STANDARD MODIFIED LIFT ouira 0.261 0.349 0.436 01523 0.610 FIG2-18 210, TeStepav ono vizanpsute rr MODIFIED FORD SOHC 2000cc HEAD 180| 150 120] 60] 5 wea 0 a.100 0.200 0.300 VALVE LIFT 0-400 0.500 FIG 2-19 COMBUSTION CHAMBER MODIFICATIONS FOR OVERSIZE INTAKE VALVE 0.060"(1.5mm) RADIUS ON THIS EDGE AIRFLOW CFM CHAMBER CHAMBER * 47.6 48.3 97.3 98.2 130.7 132.3 172.3 173.4 180.2 180.0 187.3 186.1 »QMoht 2.14 This head represents close tothe ultimate in ‘workmanship but ite nthe way of Headmanship {or horsepawer asthe text explains. as 2.15. The Manley valve latter ofthe two shown hee, proved on elective piece. Not ony ists stem highly, (rear resstant for lang il, butts shape ase proved Superior to the high performance Ford item pitured below RADIUS EDGE SHARP EDGE POE ~S eek CHAMFER BACK FACE OF VALVE 20° fo"Probuce VALVE SEAT WIDTH FIG 220 EXHAUST VALVE PREPARATION 25Fa necrioN BAS on EXHAUST PORT ‘ABROWs SHOW THE PREDOMINANT RECTION OF ‘Birausr VaLve Snivs Most UseruL WORKING RANGE Tes NORMALLY BETEEN 0 00° fram) ORS Wa AS eae" er 2:16, Best high ft alow i achieved when most of the ‘away, 35 Soon here 2.17. Tiss the shape ofthe exhaust port atthe ‘manifold face Most ofthe low takes place atte top 8nd the righthand side ofthe port. 2:10. The centre ofthe einer is on the right of his exhaust port moulding The low direction bias shows ‘up asa ean” to theleft 2:18 20, These two photos show the side and top ‘iw of the port that gave the ow figures shown fn Fig. 2228, 26FiG222 EXHAUST PORT MODIFICATION FOR 38 or 39mm VALVE EDGE OF PORT LEVEL WITH i naa De mawirons Tun 1ST ANGLE PROJECTION VIEW LOOKING DOWN FROM TOP OF HEAD WJU000O OOOOpower. Turbocharging or adding nitr ous-oxide injection to the engine just might be considered alternatives, as might more sophisticated carburation or even a cam change. Frequently, rules for competiton engines call for a specific stage of modification and a specific means of induction. For 1n- stance, if you are competing in a nor- mally aspirated class then you mui rive for the best ways possible for inhal ing air, short of supercharging the en: gine. The rules sometimes call for heads which have no matenal added to the port which means your race head cannot be buill with totally re-modelled ports, and you must make the best of re moving metal where 11 will do the most good. All this ineans your head mod cation programs will follow several routes to comply with the various rules and Tegalations possible for forms of competition. 39mm EXHAUST VALVE nich valve di The LS the upper limit on ex ss nol represen haust-valve size, Indeed we can increase the exhal valve size usefully to 1.84 inch (9m diameter, The valve I used here 1s a machmed-down Manley 40mm Vi kewagen valve, The port development process follows exactly the same Toutine as that of the 1.5 meh valve and 1 does the shaping of the seat and the ne only caution head of the valu gested when using this size relates to the amount of it possible before the valves touch each other, If your cylin 2.21, Because the valves are angled in eat ited high enough 28 der head is equipped with a 1.74 inch (4.2mm) intake valve and a 1.5 inch (38mm) exhaust valve, then the valves ‘won't actually touch unt bfted about 380 inch (6mm) off their seats. The Pinto cam hasn't yet been built with an overlap figure which is so much that valves are .375 inch off the seats at the overlap split point, so this is not a problem, When the 39mm valve size is used, valves will touch at about .200 inch (Smm) hit. ‘Thus is starting to get close to the overlap split lift figures that some really wild race cams use, Cratie’s P. 822.10 cam has both valves. 138 inch olf their seats during the overlap period ives around 018 inch clearance between each valve head when they are at the same lift, 1don't advise going any closer than this, because the valve heads can vilsrate at high RPM, causing them to move closer together. | have 018 signs of een vertical valve engines with inch static clei valve contact afler being lumed tc ‘wound 9000 rpm Gur situation isa little more complex. With the Ford SOHC engine, theaxes of the valves do cross. In a vertical-valve engine, 1f no vibration exists, valves over cross "The point to note here is, if you! are going to use valves bigger than Thave sugaested, then you must ensure that clearance exists during the overlap penod, course, entails installing the cam and physically checking the learance. Regard ,01$ inch betw tthe edges of the valves as the minimum acceptable figure. Okay, let's get back to our 39mm valve. ‘The extra five percent of valve area isa help. Itboosts low-end low by about two pexcent and the top-end ow eases by about one percent with the same port configuration as de- scnbed forthe 1 Sinch valve. A study of the flow figures in Fig. 2-22 shows that most cams will not get into the lift area where flow is reduced below thatof the 15 inch valve, so this extra flow is help, even ifonly marginally. This is as far as I had gone at the time of whiting, but [do fee! that with further develop ment on the ow hench, a slightly more ‘clive port could indeed be pro: duced just using normal grinding techniques or any substantial gains in exhaust port performance, radical changes are sping to be necessary. Such measures 15 relocating valve positions and weld tng the exhaust ports to achieve more favourable shapes will have to be con sidered, For the Ford SOHC engine. i's down the road a ways. However, if de- velopment is 10 go of, this is the route shungs must take. HOW MUCH HORSEPOWER? AL the time of writing [ have never tested a head prepared to a big-valve specificalion on an otherwise standard engine. [ have used heads of this specification on numerous 1oad- going engines, but they have always had other modifications on them as well. Dynamometer testing indicates just what we would expect from theoretical 2.2 With 21.74" (4.2mm) ntake valve and 1.5 (38 Om) exhaust valve, Eaaet s made at about 038" (36m) ht ‘Thats us about the dapth ofthe standard chamber.FIG 2.228 140) 120| 100 - E 60] & z Te 2 ao] ae = ica a Be 2 Gt ae «0 i es ° 2 © 0.100 0.200 0.300 0.400 0.500 0.600 VALVE LIFT INCHES———— 110 ea Fig223 8 1—BIG VALVE HEAD 9.9/1 CR 2—STANDARD HEAD 9.0/1 CR REAR WHEEL HORSEPOWER 8 projections, namely that with the cylin- der head developed to as high a de- gree as possible, every other modifica tion we do to the engine pays off in a mote beneficial manner. Those carbs that give 10 extra horsepower when holtedontoa standard engine give 12to 15 more horsepower when fitied to an engine with a well-modified head. In Fig. 2-23 yousee the horsepower curve onan engine first equpped with a stan- dard head, then with a modified head ‘The rest of the engine is to specifica tions I have built several tmes with pleasing results, The engines gave satisfactory power curves for normal oad use for offroad vehicles or vehi cles with automatic transmissions. The engine produced strong horsepower from mid range right through to about 17000 1pm. The only modificationson the test engine (Pig. 2-23) pnor to installing the head were a Sig Fitson 134 cam, a four-imio-one exhaust manifold and a 380-¢fmn two-bartel Holley carburettor mounted to the standard intake man fold with an adaptor plate. ‘The i: crease in horsepower coming fiom te- placing the standard head with a mod ihed one on this engine was very satis fying ‘This test engine was installed m an off-toad race car. Achassis dynamome Jer was \ised to measure output, Cars equipped with typical off-road tyres when tested on a chassis dynamome: Jer, can exhibit a sudden drop off in the power curve, This is due to high power absorption by the tyre above a certain cnitical speed. You will nouuce that both horsepower curves drop off very rapidly. This is partially due to the fact that tyre horsepower absorption 1s 1n creasing rapidly al the wheel speeds encountered at the high rpm levels the engine was tested at. What you should consider mare than the fact that peak horsepower went up from 88 bhp to 101.8 bhp is the fact the horsepower at {6000 increased no less than 24 at the wheels Looking at it another way, peak horsepower went up by 1S percent and the horsepower at 6000 rpmn went up 38 percent, In this particular application the off-road vehicle was able to pull a very strong top end in situations where high speeds could be run. On the other hand, lower down the rev range, it had sufficient oost in torque to be able to accelerate quickly out of slow turns, 292.22.Hete are he three mostcommon ype otintake falveused Leftto ng they are Morley, Ford Grou VimOventrewnonvane ° MAXIMUM FLOW PORTS: Ifthe valves are to occupy all the av ailable space in the combustion chamber, it 1s generally accepted that for maximum power the valve diamet ers be apportioned so that the exhaust flow isabout 70% ofthe intake. Youmay remember that the exhaust port discus sed flowed 154 cfin at 600 inch lift, The est intake porl so lar unvostigated flowed 190 ctm at 600 inch bit "This means the exhaust flow is 81 percent of the intake. Ifthe head we were dealing with had super efficient ports that could hardly be improved upon, the next move would probably be to merease intake-valve diameter, even if thus meant reducing exhaust-valve diame. ter, The head in question does not have highly efficient ports, throwing away some of our exhaust flow for very min mal gains brought about by using a larger intake is unlikely to produce positive results in terms of bhp. ‘The only practical route to follow is to in- cease inlet port flow efficiency. ‘The easies! way to change port shape is 10 add epoxy-based material such as Deveon JB Weld or equivalent In early experiments, the ramp port worked well bul the critical nature ofits 30 ‘TEST ITEM: MODIFIED: 150] AIRFLOW CFM ‘e100 6.200 {FORO SOHC 2000 HEAD iho apoco maton) 0.300 0:400 0.500 0:80 VALVE LIFT IN INCHES shape led me to the investigation of more conventional port forms. ‘This brought about the development of the port shape in Pig, 2:24. To negotiate the shor side-curve, the port floor is raised, and fo mamntama reasonable cross-sex lion area, i is widened just before it goes over the hump. Looking down such a port, you will see it forms an apple-shape just upstream of the: turn foward the back of the valve. Check the drawings and photos. These show that the epoxy buildup ts higher on one side of the port than the other. This biases flow toward the centre of the cylinder ‘The extra flovr of this port statts to pay off fromm lits of 300 inch lit upwards. It doesn't do much for his less than 300 ich because below this level the avail able flow area between the valve and the seat in the head is the limiting factor not the port At S66 inch Uift the eff ciency of this port (based on valve diameter) reached 64 percent com pated with 87 percent at the same lift ‘with a ‘mmetal-removed-only” type port Increasing flow in this manner means exhaust flow 1s 73 percent ofthe intake ‘Mis indicates intake-to-exhaust ciame- ter bias is about night for maximum out ut ‘Another interesting point with this that unlike most of the portsso lar shown, the flow actually starts to drop. cof with very high valve lif. ‘This port does riot need such a tremendously high valve lift to make tt work asdo the more conventional ports, where flow improvementsare achieved by remov ing metal only. port DOWNDRAFT INTAKE PORTS In the early 1970s, when the 2000 en: gines seemed stuck on a horsepower shell of around 180, Ford Motor Com pany U.S.A. approached Jerry Branch of Flowmetrics with the idea of de veloping a superior head, Ford com messioned Branch to develop. the necessary head modifications and de- sign an induction system o give the en- «gine a 200 bhp capability. Testing on Jemy's flow bench quickly established that the standard pott had chronic bre- athing problems. Expertence aiso told hum that it might take a long time to make the stock port work (Oh, how right he was!) This, and other relevant factors brought about the decision t0 pul in a new set of ports at a more favourable angle. After a number of ex periments, 29° between the valve and port centreline was decided upon. PartFIG 2-24 INLET PORT WITH ADDED MATERIAL KNOWN AS AN ‘APPLE PORT’ BECAUSE OF THE CROSSECTIONAL SHAPE tye iit tal wyt 1 KN CRITICAL AREAS. NOTE: PORT BULGES MORE AT THIS. POINT THAN ATTHIS POINT 1ST ANGLE PROJECTION VIEW LOOKING DOWN FROM TOP OF HEAD OOOU DOTTED LINES SHOW ORIGINAL PORT OOO 3IAight 225, Smooth contours ofthe combustion chambers ‘onthe Branch developed head are evident here The Signy ferent chamber shape used could be ‘expected because ol the diferent port entry angle Below iett 2.24, JeryBraneh’stlow bench model used to ‘evolop an elective dowdratte head. This head ‘esign was responsie for producing one ofthe first ‘genuine 200 hp, 2000 ce engines Below right 226, The downdrafted Branch head wtiized a brace ‘145 DHLADellort cars Boeause ofthe new port postions a special manifold had to be made up. simaller than standard to maintain {uel suspension. The result of Branch’s thorough anrflow work, pl ne efforts of the engine buikder and cam des 1n 208 bhp and mer, result an almost sheet dnvable rev range This was probably one of the first true lus Pinto engines to be built some people had claimed 200 bhp pnor to tus, they were largely juslulled claims. Figures on the Branc headed encie were substantiated by Ford enameers. Ford of USA's sequent racing ban ended this very nising development, The head back in Heads with ports at the 32 can be made to produce more flowand more power, What should not be over looked, though, 1s that as early as realized the problem preventing this engine from produc ood power. In less than three months ne designed, developed and produced acure. Most ofthe re four years to calch up and some have aught up yet. Although Jerry yead may be out of date today, his ec jranch hi fhe worl ns valicl as was back i 8 CONCEpL dictates thal 10 achieve utn flow, the port must be move to a more favourable angle tion A the clay mock show, ports on the Branch he moved onsiderably, requiring a ke manifold 10 adapt DHLA Dellortos carburen the ead. Thi we for an expenmental ngine but hardly convenient for the jeragge enthusiast engine builder A downdrait head made by Manx Racing in England stnkesa happy com: promise. The port is raised only by about 1875 unch at the manifold face This means that a litle filing allows asin d with the onginal bolt pattern, .¢ downdraft angle s only about 4.5° stee flow figures valve-lifs. F per than standard, jain at hi how a useful225, Hownewcn, urenr ow 200 Figa2s 175! a Fic226 ‘SHAPE OF WELDED CHAMBER mS AIRFLOW CFM xg FILL THIS PORTION (OF THE COMBUSTION CHAMBER WITH WELD \ RADIUS TO VALVE SEAT VALVE LIFT IN INCHES" 2.27 Haren ay ow neh model the chamber shape shown Fg 2.26. 2:28 Hees what s welded combustion haber looks ihe ding te early ‘The addea mater aceaunted fra low increase of between 3 and ch Stages of construction. The only operation sofar has boon to milla wxcess wold from the headtace and start the layout marking, WELDED CHAMBERS good as it can be for making horse- combustion chamber, ‘The first reason power. The original design was to pro- for modhfying the chamber shape to that Earlier on, I said little shrouding duce adequate power consistent with shown in Fig. 2-26 is that i increases existed in the combustion chamber, satisfactorily low emissions. If your in- airflow. Secondly, there is. a small re- and from this point of view, the tention 1s to build holds-barred duction in flame travel distance due to chamber wasa good hasiedesign This race engine, however, some horse- the more compact chamber. Thirdly, it does not mean, however, that it is as power 15 available by modifying the produces mote squish (quench) area 332.29, Atthis stage the welded chamber is rough-ground to shape. on the side of the chamber opposite the spark plug. Let's look at this in mote detail to see why these modifications work. One af the principal reasons why airflow past a typical valve is charactenisiically mnefhy cient is that there isa sudden change in the cross-s valve. If you inspect a venturi, you will notice attention is paid not only to the approach angle and shape of the ven wn, but also the exit angle. As far as most valve seats are concerned, streamlining after the hole 1s non-exis tent. At this point itis imporiant to note that flow gains can sometimes be made by using the chamber walll to control the alr as it comes out past the valve seal, so it's not a completely lost cause. ‘As it happens, in the Pinto engine, the chamber around the long side of the port is just about where it should be, so that this area is fairly efficient. The short side of the port however is not, and in this area modifications can be made to increase flow. The drawing shows that the chamber wall moved closer to the valve. Remember, not a great deal af air comes out here, and what does come out is @ highly turbulent Dow. Placing the chamber walll closer to the austream steadies the flow and pro- duces more airflow from this side of the valve. Flow tests show that with eilher a conventional port or a port which has had the floor raised by some means or other, will usually fow between three and five cubic fect more with the chamber shaped as shown. Dealing with the second point, its a 4 cclion area night after the well-known fact thata large combustion chamber will generally detonate al a lower compression ratio than a small combustion chamber, ‘This is primatily due to the Jength of flame propagation time and the amount of compression and heat radiation the unburned charge receives from the advancing flame front ‘The longer this unburned charge is exposed to the advancing flame front the mare likely itis to deto- nate. By making the combustion chamber smaller, we can reduce the engine's tendency to detonate al any given compression ratio. Alternatively, the engine can use a higher compres: sion ratio before detonation occurs, ‘Vhe third pout is that this engine tends to require less ignition advance if thas more quench area on the side of the chamber opposite the plug, At the same time, it has also shown tendency to produce more power when the quench area on the plug side is re duced. The simplest way to reduce guench area on the plug side is a file a generous radius on the edge of the quench area. A similar but smaller radius is also beneficial on the quench area around the edge of the exhaust valve, ‘This radius allows easier out flow of spent gases loward the end of the exhaust stroke. After intual develop- ment work on the flow bench, the par ticular head you see in the photos was built by Carl Schattilly of C & G Porting, Tucson. ‘The exacting standards to which Carl Schattlly reproduced the low bench model, show the art of head modifying at its best. VALVE MODIFICATIONS ‘One drawback of a cam with too much overlap and duration is that it sac inlives low-speed engine performance For a race car, even if low crankshafts speeds are seldom used, i's nice to be able to drive around the pits or pad- dock without worryinerabout stumbling toaalt. For a street-driven machine, i's an advantage to be able to choose & shghtly longer cam for more top-end hp, if you can do so without com promising low-end power and flexibil ity for good street manners, Simple modifications to the intake and exhaust valves provide some flexibility. in creases, although the results not orally without drawbacks. ‘The principal fac: tor affecting exitubty at low rpm is valve overlap. When both valves are open, the exhaust may want to flow back out through the intake valve railier than the exhaust valve. Also, any adverse shock waves or pulses in the exhaust tract, may cause exhaust gas which has alreacly left the chamber to return just pnor to exhaust-valve clo- sure. If the intake and exhaust valves are modified to flow well in the correct direction and to have less ability to flow in the reverse direction, then loss of flexibility at low-rpm can be signific antly reduced, Recessing the mnlet valve face as in Fig, 2.27 reduces the valve's reverse flow efficiency. It also lightens the valve, which isa fringe benefit. To have any elfect on reverse flow, the undercut mm the valve face should be 0.03 inch (025mm) or more. Valves of this design are now avallable from G & § Valves ‘and Specialized Valves in England, A similar experiment was tried with the exhaust valve. The back face of the valve was undercut to de-streamline it @ nidge formed at the seat reduces ‘exhaust flow back into the combustion chamber, ‘This proved very effective with standard ports. Reverse flow was reduced as much as 15 percent com: pared to the standard valve, When this type of ant-reversion valve was used with a modified port, results were sing ularly unimpressive, Reversion was re duced a negligible amount and a pen alty was paid i terms of reduced flow in the normal direction. The anit-rever sion concept om the exhaust appears good, but for this application more de- velopment work is obviously needed16 VALVE CYLINDER HEADS Holbay Racing Engines Ltd. are well-known for designing and produc: ing race-winning engines. To give the 2000ce engine every possible chance of doing this, they produced in conjunc tuon with a design specialist a cylinder head with four valves per cylinder. The idea of using four valves per cylinder is toaccommodate more valve area inthe confines of the cylinder. Also, because the head is intended for maximum power, port shapes, valve angles, and other factors are designed for as much airflow as possible. The original two: valve-per-cylinder head was not pro duced with ultimate power in mind, hence the lack ofattention to producing tracts with adequate air fow To use the 16 valve head, pistons and rods, plus everything above the head jasket must be changed to parts com patible with the head. The use of this head also requnes special camshaft drive components. As far as mduction systems go, Holbay make a slide-plate throttle, timed fuel-mection system ora manifold to accept sidedraft carburel tor, such as Webers or Delloros. De pending on the application, cams ca be supplied for road or race specifica tons for use in thishead, Possible appli- calions for the Holbay 16 valver are wide and varied. It could be used to produce a flexible but powerful, street drivable engine or for race applications such as midget racing in the U.S, At the time of writing, this type of racing is dommated by Volkswagen-powered machines A 16-valve conversion, 1 gether with a stroked crank and a big ger bore to produce 2300cc should aive thus engine a lot more reliable bhp than the Volkswacen (040~,060—inen Sm —_= - REDUCE REVERSE FLOW DURING OVERLAP ‘There are many other applications which fall between these two extremes, ranging from rally cats to fuel dragsters. You only need some imag: nation to see its potential T would like to have shown a com: parison between the airflow of a 16- valve head and a modified &-valve head but unfortunately none of this exotic ‘equipment hias ever come my way. To give you some idea of the potential of a I6-valve, two-lire engine, just look at the power output achieved on Holbay's dyno, Fig. 2-28. ENGINE Rem 2.30. The recess on the intake valve acs as @ means {wredueo revere flow. in short an ant-reversin ip. ‘Theshallow undercut fo the ace ofthe exhaust valve Isintendedto accommodate a thermal barr coating 2.31, Here's Holbay Engineering's 16 valve head. would lke to have run this over my low ‘bench bu the opportunity never arose. 352:32 To stop the ceramie thermal bare chipping around the edge ofthis exhaust valve, the valve ace ‘was machined leaving 30018" (038%) lip around theedge ‘THERMAL BARRIER COATINGS An engine develops its power from the rapid expansion of gases trapped in the cylinder, ‘This gas 1s expanded by virtue of the heat produced as a result c burning fuel within the ga sxcappes from the gas by conduction aut through the combustion chamber walls and the piston crown is nothing less than discarded horsepower, Ifthe heat can be keplin the cylinder where itcan do work, cylinder pressures for a given quantity of fuel burned and a given compression ratio will be higher. Re sull: more horsepower and less t Jant andoil, At the time cof writing, the only company I know of that applies heat- resistance finishes on automotive paris is Heany Industries A ceramic-base coating known as jection to the Heanum is sprayed onto the compo- nents to approximately 0.012. inch (3mm) thickness. As far as. ceramic materials go, this coating is tough, but hike most ceramics, it tends fo crack at the edges Cracking is not normally a problem but it 1s « Al that need be done to slop edge cracking, i to machine the surface 10 which the coating isto be applied soa lip of0.012- 0.014 inch (3-- 38mm) is left around the edge. Photoso! exhaust valvesto be coated show what I mean. T technique should also be applied 1 pisions. Afler the coating has been applied, smooth it with 400-guit or finer 36 me 2:33. Therois considerable rejection of hoa through the exhaust port walls. Applying 2 thermal barr here effectively eliminated cooling problems that occur on high hp Ford SOHC engines emery cloth or paper but take care ‘The function of the coating depends on it retaining as much thickness as pos ble. The smoothing operation must only remove the barest iniumum of coating. Analysing the advantages given by this coating reveals some interesting possibilities, Most obvious should be a 1 increase. Coating the pi 1 be worth between three bpp. If the pis hamber faces noTSepO tonsalone c and five percent ror tons bution are done, add another one or two per cent on top of that, you havea race en: 3inié that You ate strugaling to get over 200 bhp, then just coating these parts could be worth up to another 10 bhp; that's something worth thinking abou ‘The bhp advantage 1s the obvious one but not = what happens when this coating is applied to the exhaust valve. It will have a far low hermal load to dissipate a: obvious This means t wort have much heat through the the head. Result: a nar rower exhaust valve seat can be used In turn this can lead to more exhaust flow which, of course, this head badly need On the inlet side, another advantauye ansing. I's not com: deal of the valve seat to ous situation monly realized that a are heat picked up by the inlet charge as 1 enters the cylinder is done as it pase n intake valve. It can be running temperatures up to 800° £ Coating the combustion-chatnber side of the inlet 2.338. When large amounts of metal ae face from the head, the edge ofthe sparkplug hole gets very ‘ose tothe face, Do not beak nt the pg hole leave sharp edges here muifieantly reetuce the back side of the poler, denser cylinder, Be cause less heat 1s transmitted through he coated piston crown, the piston temperature is far lower, Aluminium al oys tend ih very rapidly with increasing heat, Heat reduction or the piston is 89 stam valve lemperalure of the valve, AS a resull, @ enter the lose strenweight reduction could theoretically be achteved usinga thinner crownand ad- jacent areas, $0 as to produce a lighter piston In turbocharged engines, the heat load through the pistons tremend- ‘ous. This coating will reduce the heat load to about, or even below that seen by @ normally aspirated engine, de- spite the fact that heat enexay above the piston may be double that of a nor mally aspirated engine, it detonation starts, 4 hormél piston can be eroded through in a matter of seconds, pistons coated with Heantum have shown they can withstand detonation for maybe: 20 times.as long helore serious damage is incuned. In some mstances, the U5e of this coating has meant the otf cogter has been an unecessary iter because so great a reduction in heal transfer froma piston to ot] has been made COMPRESSION RATIOS I have eleady dealt with small changes m compression zatio when dis- cussing simple head modiicatons, Lam now doing into this very imaportant sub: ject in detail, so anything 1 said earlier must be tempered by what [have to say here. First of all, let's esiebiish one point of reference, namely the bigher the com: pression rahe tet ean be used before detonation seis in, the greater the tor ‘que and power output of this particular engine. The question 1s, just how high ‘can the compression ratio be taken be- fore destructive detonation occurs? ‘The principa} pomts m question aré- 1) fuel octane rating; 2) camshaft timing, 3) combustion-chamber design, 4} com bushon- chamber temperature; §} xgnr tion timing, FUEL OCTANE ‘The octane raling of petro] used can yange from the low 80s up to 105 plus ‘octane of racing fuel. The availabilty of high-octane fuel is diminishing all over ‘the world, 100-octane fuel is no ionger available in the US or England, and no new passenger vehicles have been built in years for which its use 1s essen- tial Whatever compression rato you elect to use in your engine, it must re- lect the available octane xating. Be cause variables other than fuel-octane rating are involved, it is not possible for me to give you exact figures on just how Much compression ratio can be used. 1107 mie22e 108| gg 8 FUEL OCTANE RATING CAM PERIOD ete ion TA wath any particular octane of fuel, The best I can do is to gwe you some guidelines. Fig, 2-29, covers possible compression rallos on a standard or near-standard engine at one end of the scale to race engines at the other. This, graph isnot made up of tests performed specifically on one engine; points on the graph were determined from a number of my own engines run al var ous compression ratios and fuel oc- tanes, Use the curve as a guide. Don't expect to pinpoint the highest com- pression ratio your engine can use without problems. CAMSHAFT ‘When we talk about the ammount of compression ratio an engine will with stand before detonation sets in, what ‘we are really trying to do is to numen- cally describe prevailing cylinder presse just before tgmition, Take a standard engine as an example a ‘2000ce unit 1n good shape with a 8) compression ratio shows about 170 pat ona compression gauge, That same en ‘gine with LI-1 CR would probably show around 220 psi. The compression pros sure that ocoms depends not only on the compression ratio but aiso on the cam timing, The standard cam closes the intake valve only @ short time aller BDC, As a result, a cylincer which 1s close to being full, a8 compressed into tart COMPRESSION RATIO iat tanta the cumbushon chamber. A longer du- ration high-performance cam may not close the valve until the piston 1s 20-per- centaf the way up the bore. Result: only 8 percent of the tolal capacity of the cylinder is being compressed into the chamber, this anving a lower pressure prior to igmtion ‘The net result of a longer daration cam is that the effective compression ratio is substantially re- duced by comparison with the geomel- rie compression rato, With long-duration cams in a race engine there is a certain amount of dynanuc filling of the cylinders stem- ming from the ram effect produced when engine rpm comcides with exist- ing sonics in intake and exhaust tracts ‘As a result of this extra cylinder filling, the elfective compression ratio moves nearer 10 the theoretical compression ratio. If the enenne achieves a full 100 pervent volumettic efficiency, the ef fective and theoretical compression ratios would coincide. To date T don’t know of any Ford SOHC engines that have achieved 100 percent or more vol- umettic efficiency. On very sophisti cated engines, the current state of the art produces vohimetnic officiencies of around 94 percent at best, This means with Jong-duretion cams, plus the less than perfect breathing ability of the head, the compression ratio must be very high to make any decent bhp, Duane Fsslinger of Eslinger Engineer- a| 2.34. You will aed these items to measure your engine's CR Starting at the lowe et and working und clockwise, ems shown here ate "thik lear plastic with twa a" dia oles init; a small bottle of food colouring dye, and ‘mixing juga bueote and some grease to seal “round the plastic sheet when its placed onthe head ing successfully uses 14.8:1R ratio on his championship-winning and record: breaking engines. This ratio would, of necessity, require 10Sociane fuel If you are Tunning very long. duration cams in your engine, unless the com pression ratio is very high, your engine ‘will not make any good bhp. A change of only one ratio may make the differ ence of 15 bhp with a 320? durationcarn, 2.35.11 you ae eng the chambers to determine the ‘GR. set the head CLOSE o evel using a bubble evel ssdemonsted Dre by Ca Seaty of C&G ting, 38 When using a race-type cam, T suggest the use of one, perhaps one and a half, ratios higher than would be used with astreet cam. Cams which are hotter than stock also require compre sion ratios proportionately higher than stock. For instance, you might expect a lypical hot street cam to require a com pression ratio of one-half io three-quar: tersofa point higher than shown in Fig 9. Its also important to note that these figures ate general in nature and can vary significantly with regard to ‘ams, {uel octane, spark timing and pis tons, as well asthe subtler influences of inlake air temperature, barometric pressure and such As a corollary 16 this, there exists such a thing as a cam too radical for a given compression ratio, For example, lefs assume that you live i an area where 90-octane fuel is the best availa ble. Under these circumstances, your engine cannot utilize a compression ratio high enough fo take advantage of the camis wilder characteristics In short, you cant run enough compres. sion to use what the cam offers, If this is 50, your engine might well deliver more power with a camshaft having less duration, because of better cylin der filling at relatively lower speeds In my judgement, you should figure on 97 100 Research octane fuel with a com pression ratio of around 130:1 before 2.38 Smear rose around the edge ofthe chamber, ine ton th ate het so hate ho ae nthe nghade This slows tapped at szeape ‘thie filing the chomber. " attempting to use a grind of 300 de: grees or more duration COMBUSTION CHAMBER DESIGN Certainly one of the most significant determinants of maximum usable com- pression ratio 1s combustion chamber temperature. Now the heat values here are nol always'static or, fo the eternal consternation of some, predictable, A cold engine having a compression ratio of, say, 15.5.1 might burble along hap: pily indeed, without a hint of detonation, However, as that same engine warms up, its combustion chamber tempera: tures will rise as well, thus opening the door to detonation, Furthermore, an en gine that gets along well with its com pression rao under normal conditions will likely prove highly sus tonation when it becoi heated, as when, for example, the cool- ing system malfunctions. Or, another slant would be the engine that operates acceptably under partial throttle open ings but detonates destructively at larger throtlle settings, preventing any thing resembling full-throttle operation On theother and, a chamber can be too cold for efficient combustion and power, Fuel within a selauvely cold chamber can condense on wall sur faces, or it might never realize atomiza tion in the first place, neither condition helps engine power, while causing ‘exhaust pollutant levels of unburned hydrocarbons to soar. excessively cool chamber can also delay the vaporization of fuel until too late in the combustion cycle, which also contributes 10 poor engine eff ciency and high pollutant readings at the exhaust pipe. And ifall is weren't bad enough, a cold combustion chamber also hurts ef ficiency by exaching from the ignited charge a disproportionate amount of heat, which results in compromised power, Another factor affecting maximum usable compression ratio is intake charge temperature, ‘This in tum de- pends largely upon how much heating of the iniake port, mamifold and car- burettor has taken place. A cool charge ina hot chamber will stand more com pression than a hot charge in the same. temperature chamber. Intake-charge temperature depends mostly upon en une running time. A 12-second drag- race engine isnt likely to heat the intake system appreciably. On the other side of the cain, the engine of a road race or rally car may be run hard for hours on end. On a long-distance race engine, figure on a compression ratio about one-half to three-quarters of a rato lower than its drag racing equiva lent Squish or quench area affects the amount of compression that can be used belore jon occurs. Indica hat too much squish exists in head, Remembering that bhp, notcompres on, its permissible to cul away some of the squish if it results in more power. Reducing the squish area as detalled earlier, when I dealt with chamber modifications, achieves the desired ef fect with thie minimum amount of metal removal. Removing the minimum amount of metal from the chamber 1s ar imporiant factor f you are amung for an ultra high compression ratio. On 2000ce enaines, fo get more than 14:1 Ihe head face may need maehiung up toa safe maximum amount of 0.168 met (4.2mm), If too much metal is removed from the chambers, you may not be able to get the ratio you desire, Heads with welded chambers, as per the de ign shown earker, are not such a prob: em. Toachieve 14:1, such heads gen erally need 0.120-0.130 inch (305 3.3mmn) rachined off he head fac ECONOMY With few exceptions, modifications which work well fo produce extra bhp from the engine ean alse help economy One ofthe best an tionsto mprove economy; 1s toraise the compression ratio. Most driving is done at part-throttle. Raising the CR. abot two points might increase fuel economy by as much as three mpg. Big exha valves ancl free flowin) exhaust POH 235 the rety part of determining how much has to come of he head is measuring the distance between also help Such yalvesand parts reciace {heheadface and the fad Maelo attocton makes crate measurements diet. Iyourengine hasa re ystem, and by this | ally enhance fuel economy is the inlet economy. mean the entire exhaust system from port Although [have not med itouton Further economy gains may be pos valve to talipipe, the effort required by the Ford 2000cc engine, my experi- sible if inlet port size 18 reduced. Re the piston to push out exhaust repre- ence with a lol of other engines has member, the bottom part of the port 3s sents horsepower lost from the power een that fully reworked inlake ports nota working area. Filling in the bottom stroke. In other words, fuel is being cause a small reduction in fuel of the port could help economy, but 1 bumed simply‘o get rid of theexhaust, economy, ‘This means the best have not ined it With a freelowing exhaust system, economy intake port is probably a stan: ppumping losses can be reduced to a dard intake port and valve. All those MODIFIED HEADS & EMISSIONS bare minimum. rough lumps, bumps and edges are ‘One of the few areas of head perfor- good for breaking up the fuel and that's Most people are aware that the oc- mance modifications that doesnt usu- just what they do. And that helps ane rating of fuel has been coming 39 mplest modiilicadown over the past few years, espe- cially in the U'S, Few people, however, realize exactly why. Basically there are three pollutants government require manufacturers to control: These are ‘carbon monoxide (CO); hydrocarbons (HO) that's unburned fuel; and oxidesof nitrogen (NOX) The first two pollutants can be controlled relatively easily by attention to design detail of the engine and regular attention to Keep the en gine in a good state of time, Carbon monoxide is dependent on the mixture ratio. If the engine 1s run with a lean mixture, carbon monoxide can be al- most eliminated, Hydrocarbon pothi- tion is not quite as easy to cure. It de: pends on how effectively the engine burns fuel. Large, ovol surfaces in the combustion chamber tend to cause {uel deposited on these surfaces to evapo: rate too late m the combustion eycle to he burned, As a consequence, these evaporated fuel dropletsare emitted as unburned hydrocarbons, Now, running the engine hotter than normal (so the: combustion chamber surfaces are much hotter, 190) usually corrects this Cetamic-coated pisions and chambers ate said to be a help in this area, be cause they tend to transfer less heat away from the chamber. But probably the most dramatic in provements can come from using a completely evaporated aitifuel mix. ‘While achieving this can be somewhat complex in practice, the resultsare 100 good to ignore, for in some tests un burned hydrocarbon levels have been reduced to almost nothing at al | ‘Also, while not promising to elie ate unburned hydrocarbons, car burettors that will dehver a well ba lanced, highly atomized mixtire have prove fo beso effective that their use-as original equipment is becoming more andl more commonplace. Reduction or removal of CO and HG. pollutants 1s not totally compatible with high-performance requirements, How ever we can live with de-toxing te quuements without sacrificmg too much power To a degree, there are ways and means of making up for cer tain power losses. In terms of road velit cles at least, meeting tight HC and CO requirements can indeed help fuel mileace, Unfortunately, the big problem as far as high-performance enaines are con- cemed 1s the oxides of nitrogen or NOX. This pollutant is formed in the 40 ‘combustion chamber as a result of high temperatures and pressure, which inci- dertally, are just the conditions com monly required by a high-output en gine. Indeed, to get best power requires telatively high compression ratios in our engines, So, while the dictates of horsepower production say we mus the government says we mustn', And if that’s not enough, there 1s another thermo-chemical nail into the high- compression coffin. ‘The compound our ‘engines need to operate with high com. pression ratios is a fuel additive called tetraethyl lead. It is the performance Duffs misfortune that this compound! is ‘woefully incompatible with — the heaviest gun in the anti-smog arsenal, the catalytic convertor, Tetraethyl lead poisons the convertor so it no longer works. The catalytic convertor isessen tial for scrubbing NOX from exhaust «qases, so the lead's gotta go! High-performance, —lugh-compres: sion engines cannot run on low octane lead free fuels. As performance en thustasts, we need to look around for an alternative means of ubizing high CR an alternative which we should, as a matter of course, install on our engines to keep pollution levels down Fortu nately there 1s another means of doing this anc that is by water injection Be fore building yourself a bigh-compres sion, road-going engine, for use m ateas with stingent emission require ments, reati Chapter 9 which deals with water mection, HEAD MODIFICATIONS FOR RE- LIABILITY VALVE GUIDES A modification shown earlier which definitely helps airflow involves shor tening the intake valve guide, Unlortu nately, though, thisals> has the undesir able effect of shortening the guide hfe Indeed, shortened guides workina with ever! moderate cam profiles will last 10,000, maybe 20,000 miles before they are completely worn out ‘There are several techniques for maximizing quide Ite that are used by vanous racing emportums with com parable success, One method favoured by such firms as Manx Racing, Swwaymar Race Engines and janspeed 15 install bullet-tapered, bronze valve guides. Using these units there is a nominal trade-off of airflow for mn- creased hife but this trade-off largely problematical. Only a small aitfow re- duction occurs at vary high valve lifts Importantly, there is _ another technique (used mostly by US. buil- dets) that works well and has no trade- off disadvantages. I! is based upon the uuse of the thin-wall K-line guide liner ‘This isa bronze sleeve of either 015 or 030 inch im thickness. ‘The existing guide is enlaraed to accept the new sleeve, and then the sleeve reamed to final size, (The use of these cide liners asdealt with inrmy .P book How To Re- ‘build Your Ford SOHC Engine. These units can be fitted pnor to grinding the port, The end of the guide conforms exactly to the port profile which is nox mally at an angle of about 30 ° in this atea Its important to note that, when cut tung valve seats, the angled end of the guide will throw off concenticity fa press: fit pilots used You can reciify this by removing a few thousandths of an inch of material from the bore of he valve guide, so that thesized portion of the guide ends hott zontally Performing this simple bat often overlooked chore ensures that the pilot ts true [o guide centte line and seat con: centricty 1s constant. Fig. 2-30 explains, VALVES Profuse quanities of oil are required lo lubneale the 2000cc engine's top. end, There tsa lot ofall siostung around up here, which contnbutes to a poten hal problemof ail control in thisatea ‘To prevent oil consumption, very ught valve seals are used. To a degree, this can Jead to increased valve wear. If you want maximum life, choose valve witha chrome-platedstem, Many oversize valves have stems longer than standard, ‘Typically .080 inch is added to the stem, This is done to maintain ac: ceptable rocker adjustment with the small base cucles commonly encoun tered on replacement performance camshafts. Extra valve length reduces valve lif and also reduces effective du ration of the cam. Asa result. the valves may have 10 be shortened 10 achieve the lif and duran figures the cam grinder mended. (Before assembling your head, read my comments on valve train geometry in Chapter 3.)ROCKET PIVOT BOSSES 1 in @ Ford ang installing a ick base cir Installing a hugh-Lift SOHC engine often 1 cam wil there remain d in the head. By the time you reach valve lifts of about 0 inch (127 mm) there are too few threads engaged to secure the pillar In tum, side- loads on the pillar pound thie hreads, which leads to prying open the hr the top of the boss. The up. hot ofall this is that the lock nut unfortunate tendency to come undone With a lit of about .560 inch, then may be only two or three threads en gaged, These wall pull out the first tir the engme isstarted isiil valve springs The cure is to use Racer Wal press-in inserts. These are installed in the head by boring out the existing jase msert inch (08mm) press fil, or the boss will rack This modification raises. the ight of the bass by ab and ensures sufficient thread engage nent for cams right up to .620 inet i CAM BEARINGS. 2:38. When high it cams are installed, most. ifnot all tthe aeker pot pl adjustment is used up. This fan be comensated for by rising the height of the thread into which t engages by means ofthese ‘threaded inserts, GUIDE CENTERLINE PILOT CENTERLINE. retin | | ANGLED END ON GUIDE TinOWS PILOT FOR SEAT RECTIFY BY CUTTING FIRST PART OF GUIDE BORE AWAY TO Fon SQUARE ENO. 1 bearing, Using a high-lill cam and undard engine heavier springs aggravates the prob there are munierous cam bearing the on the inarke! and most of them ate 2.40. Thisead has a bronze centre cam bearing installed. Such bearings give much longer fe when high It ‘ams and heavy springs are usedhard pushed to last 10,000 miles m an engine having even a moderately warm cam the valve train. The best bearing, I feel, is the standard Ford beanng. Buy it from your Ford dealer and make sure i's ina Ford box. Thus beanng will generally run 40,000 to 50,000 miles in a sanely cammed street machine Por race engines this cam bearing can be a source of problems. Normally, U's only the centre cam beanng thal wears, because it carries twice as much load as the other bearings, For a circuit car with @ high-lft cam, the standard bearing may last only a race or two. I really high valve lifts and heavy pound age springs are used, that is, 0.600 inch with springs of 120 poutics seat and 300- 350 full lit loads then under suet trying circumtances you can expect the bear ng to last sometimes as little as 20 sec onds, However, there is a reasonably sim ple solution to this problem: make the beanng from phosphor bionze. ‘This will provide a life of several hours will high liftsand heavy valve springs Now, for most racing applications, tis 1s fine. Nevertheless, certain prc aulions must be taken, Chief among them is the fact that you have to use an oll or oil additive wilh zane dittuophas: phate in it, otherwise the bearing has a good chance of seizing mS ‘One of the best additives you can get for this application is General Motors’ Engine Oil Supplement, otherwise known as EOS. Ford makes an equiva lent called Ford Oil Conditioner and Crane or Piper cam lube will also get the job done. Such additivesare esson- tial to both cam and bearing life. If you want the ultimate in.cam bear ings, then your best bet 1s to use the Holbay roller bearing conversion, This involves le boring the camshalt boar: ing housings mn the head and installing roller bearings. To be successful roller bearings need to tun on a reasonably hard surlace. ‘To da thts means running with a steel billet cam. As you would expect, Holbay make a steel billet cam. for use with their roller conversion. In case you feel limited to the 1ise of a Hol bay cam profile if you intend goes with roller beanngs, let me point out that companies such as Crane Cams, Com: petiion Cams, Crower Cams and Sig Erson Cams, to name but a few, all make steel billet cams to special orcier. Before installing roller beanngs in the cam towers of a Ford 2000¢ head, you will have to decide whether you are going to run conventional finger follow ersor roller followers. roller followers are used on the cam profile, then the re: quirement for copious quantities of o1l an the top end of the enaine 1s elimi nated and the all feed to the cam tower 2-41. Roller cam assembly on Holbay mozified head. gets around the excessive wear problem ofthe centre ‘am bearing. 42 can be restricted so that there is little more than oil mist lubrication. Ifyou in tend fo use roller bearings in the cam towers but conventional finger follow: ers, then you will.need to supply just a3 miuch oil fo the finger followers as was previously the case, even though the roller bearings could get by with a minimum of cil. With the amount of oil that comes out of the finger follower Inbricating holes in the spray bar, there is more than enough mist flymg around to lubricate the roller bearings. ‘The easiest way to restrict the oil sup- ply toa roller bearing is to grind a din- ple in theslot in tsouter diameter about half an inch on both sides of the hole, which connects the outside of the bear ing with the inside, ‘The dimple 1s there merely to key a blob of resin so it doesn't move, If it does move, oil pres- sure will force it into the bearing and there goes a roller beanrig Once the groove has been filled wih epoxy resin, and this must be done in totally greave-free conditions fo ensure adhe: sion, file the outside of the resin 30 i conforms to the curvature of the bear ng case When installing the bearing, do s0 with the oil hole on the side opposite the spray bar. The bearing slot joins the ot! supply hole with the spray bar feeding hole, 90 oil can be supplied to the 10 kets ‘VALVE-STEM OIL SEALS Because of the tremendous quantity of oil required to lubricate the cam lobes and followers, the valve-stem oil seals have a far harder job controlling ‘oll than. on most other engines, Prob Jems occur when oll seeps past the guide, contaminating the intake charge with sufficient ail to cause detonation. If the engine is reqred to cover high mileages, it can also cause carbon de- posits to accumulate on the back of the valve. ‘This can seriously impecie port flow, and thus power output ‘That 1s the first problem valve-stem oil seals have to cope with. The second one is assocraled with valve hit. When valve lifts get up to and around S00 inch, the seal can be pounded by the underside of the spring retainer. 'This quickly pulverizes the oil seal into Uselessness and the guide-oiling prob- Jem retums instantly. Many seals made for the Ford 2000cc do'an adequate job a far as oil contiol 1s concerned, but most, however, have an installed heightthat makes if difficult to use high-lift cams without interference. Felpro of fers one of the few stem cil seals com patible with high-lift cams, These oil seals add very little to the height of the guide’ 1 1s possible to use valve lifts up to 880 inch before the underside ofthe valve spring retainer is close enough to use oil-seal damage, HEAD GASKETS In my experience, the standard Ford head gasket is one of the least reliable ich units available. | have had these blow on engines with as litle as 130 bhp, although that may have been a chance occurrence. | have had several fail on engines with outputs around 150: 160 bhp. All the aftermarket gaskets I have tnied have done better than this, but I have not ined every available gas ket [ve found the most reliable head gasket to be the Pelpro item, It appears to he quite capable of holding power quiputs of about 180 or so without dras: tue unreliability, It also appears to be for withstanding | or 12,pst boost ona turbocharged engine. However, at about 15 pounds, even the Felpro gas- Ket lets go, Felpro gasket aren't readily available in England but could be purchased through such establis ments as John Woolfe Racing. Holbay Engineering market a gasket which they entirely satisfactory uptoa compression ratio of 103.1. 1 have never used this gasket but the Holbay name is for some engine bullders sulli- cient to guarantee quality merchan- When an engine reaches internal prossute levels where all conventional gaskets fail, we have to look at alterna ive means of sealing cylinder pres: sures, The simplest way 15 to O-ring the ead or. preferably, the block Ideally, this should be done with the engine out of the car and stripped to the bare block so that all machining swarf can be cleaned out after the job has been done. However, this is nol always con enient, so some companies will ve the head to take O-rings rather than the block This works almost as well but sometimes you can run mto problems with gasket misalignment, As @ result, the O-rings do not bear in the precisely right position on the head gasket. The type of (-ring mest com: monly used 1s a piece of 0039 inch (0.073mm) diameter copper wire, This is installed ina mactuned groove which 2443, Thsis the Holbay head gasket whichis claimed tobe reliable up to 10.3/1 on normally aspisted 12.44, Under this conglomeration of bars and clamps urs an extensively moi 2000 ead. The reason for ‘this paraphernaliais that the heads mounts of metal removed from certain areas. 150.015 inch (0.38mm) deep. The prot rrucing part of the O-ring bites into the casket, causing a very high local pres sure and this almost eliminates gasket blowing Ir you prefer the grooved head route you will have to take the head along toa ‘machine shop to have the work done. If ig. mactine shop that doesn't nor nally do such jobs, take along head ig pressure tested to make sure won tleak due tothe large gasket as 4 template for positioning the O-rings to suit the head gasket, Ifyou decide to O-ring the block, then Iskenderian makes a tool which makes grooving the block a simple jab for the home mechanic. (See Chapter 7) When selecting the diameter of an O-ring groove, it has been normal practice to Cut the groove to coincide with the cenlte of the head-gasket bead (lire: 43ing), Recent experience indicates however, that a hetter seal is possible when the 0-ring groove coincides with the outside diameter of the head gasket bead around the bore. So far as reliability is concerned, an O-ringed head gasket irrespective of the head gasket, involved, seems capa ble of handling around 250 HP. With Folpro head gaskets, reliable per mance in excess of 360 bhp is poss On their own race Holbay use yet another system of proven rehabilty, It 1s an outgrowth of the O-ring method. Instead of using a conventional head gasket asa basis for sealing, they use a head gasket which seals only water and oil passages, The areas around the botes are omitted Sealing of the high pressure gases in the cylinder 1s achieved by a gas-filled stainless-steel ring commonly knownas a Wills ring. Either the block or the head can be machined to accept these rings. Holbay can supply the special head gasket and the four rings required to uso this sealing system. Along with this, they also supply a drawing show: ing the required machining dimen- sions. If specified tolerances are adhered to, tlus system appears to be the nearest thing to 100 percent reli able BUYING A MODIFIED HEAD ‘To avoid buyinga dud head, therearea number of things you can do. There are many good head-qrinding companies which do not know about SOHC Ford heads simply because they have 1io ex perience with thistype ofengine. In this instance, take this book along to such a company and have them grind your cy linder head to your specifications: If you are buying a head nat neces: sanly produced to any of the specifica- tions in this book, buy only from com- panies with a proven record on these engines If you find you cannot readily locate a company of proven capability then deal with one of the companies mentioned m ths book Companies such as Esslinger Engineering, C & G ing, Holbay, Swaymar, Manse Rac ing and a few others know what 3s needed, But be wamed, many more do not. Also, jas because I have not men- tioned a particular company within these pages does not mean itis incapa- ble. What does mean is that lam leav ing you to decide whether they are capable of producing what you requite. A FEW FACTS ABOUT AIRFLOW MEASUREMENT ‘Many of you will not be familiar with flow bench techniques and you may wonder why two formulas were used to estimate the horsepower output from the intake-port airflow potential. One formula was for 25 inches standard pressure drop and the other was 10 inches standard pressure drop. What is meant by standard pressure drop? When we attempt to ‘measure airflow, it should be taken into account that we are dealing with @ highly expansible and compressible gas. The situation is much like trying to measure a piece of elastic with a ruler. You will notice that the standard pressure drop is always quoted on the graph or chart. This is the amount of suction or pressure used to make the air flow through the port being tested. More air pressure or vacuum, depending ‘on whether its an intake or exhaust being tested, would flow more air. But it must be remembered that the {dea is to get more air through the Ports due to port improvements, rather than to see how much we can squeeze through due to increased flow bench output. Going back to the elastic analogy, we can say that fixing our pressure drop is about the same as putting in a certain amount of tension into the elastic. This means our ruler measurements will reflect whether we have a longer or shorter piece of elastic, not its ultimate elastic capability. The procedure for air-flowing heads is far from standardized, and test pressure ranging from five inches H,0 to five inches mercury (ig) (67.7 inches H,0) are used. Generally speaking, the vast majority of flow benches operate between five inches and 30 inches H,0. If you want to compare cfm figures done on the bench at one test pressure drop with another bench at a different pressure you must correct all figures to one standard test pressure drop. This is done by applying the following formula: test used t pressure being converted. Let's do an example. Say we want to compare cfm figures of one head measured at 25 inches and one measured at 10 inches. Convert the 10 inch figure to 28, or the 25 to 10, For the purpose of this example Iwill change the 10 to 25. S0 we have a of = VIB = 198 10 If all flow figures measured at 10 inches are now multiplied by the 1.68 factor, they will be directly comparable to those measured at 25 inches, 44HOW TO MEASURE AND SET ‘YOUR COMPRESSION RATIO What is the compression ratio? It is the ratio of the total volume above the piston at BDC divided by the total volume above the piston at TDC, To define the total volume above the piston at BDC we must first establish the swept volume of one cylinder. This is calculated from the formula Bx Bx 0-785 x Stroke 1000 where all dimensions are in milli metres. After determining the dis- placement of one cylinder, your next job will be to calculate the volume remaining in the block above the piston when the piston is at TDC. If you make all the measurements in inches, the formula will be BxB x 0.785 x DH x 16.39 and the answer this produces will be in cubic centimetres. If you take all the measurements in millimetres, the formula to use to get the answer in cc will be BxBx0.786xDH 1000 In these formulas, B = the bore diameter and DH = the deck height, that is the amount the TDC piston is below the block face. ‘The next step is to calculate the volume of the gasket. To do this we use the same as previously, but B will be the bore ofthe gasket and DH will be the compressed thickness of the head gasket. The only other calculable volume remaining is the volume between the top edge of the piston crown and the top ring. Thisis, normally 1-1¥2 cc, depending upon the piston design. To give yourself room for measurement error, assume this ring land volume to be | cc. If its slightly more, your compression ratio willbe fractionally lower than you calculate ittobe, This puts you on the safe side of the fence. We have now covered all the easily calculable volumes, From here on, a burette or pipette will needed. Volume measurements will be done by pouring fluid into the spaces to be measured. Here, accuracy is essential. At the highest, ratios an accumulated error of 1 cc ‘could mean as much as 0.4 ofa ratio off the intended figure, Effects of surface tension can upset measurements unless precautions are taken. An easily brewed mixture for the burette or pipette to minimize errors is 80 percent water and 20 percent alcohol and two or three ‘drops of food colouring, If you have to fill the measuring instrument by sucking it in your mouth, forget the poisonous alcohol and substitute liquid soap. ‘Tum your attention tothe cylinder head, Install the spark plugs, then set the head on blocks such that itis just a little way off being level. Apply aa smear of grease to the valve seats to effect a seal and install all the valves in the correct position. Smear grease around the chamber to be checked, then press a sheet of glass or plastic with a hole in it over the chamber tobe checked. Position the hole at the highest point of the chamber s0 air displaced by the entering fluid can easily escape, Fill the chamber to the bottom of the hole and note how many cubic centimetres of fluid it took to do so. Do this with all the chambers to see they are all the same within ¥2 co. ‘That Ya cc is a little more than the limit of accuracy with this method of measurement. If any "greater difference exists on a finished head it should be rectified by enlarging the smaller chamber tothe volume of the largest, Once the chamber volume is established, use the same technique to measure the volume of any valve cutouts the pistons may have. With this chore done, you are in possession of all the figures you need to make final compression ratio calculations from the following formula:- ona iam san amb ‘The cylinder displacement we have already calculated. The chamber volume is the sum of all the small volumes that were measured or calculated. This figure is obtained ‘by adding together the volumes of the combustion chamber, head gasket, piston-to-deck clearance volume, valve cutouts and the ring land volume. MACHINING THE HEAD FACE HOW MUCH TO REMOVE So farall youhave been told is how to measure the existing compression ratio, The burning question for most hotodders is, “How much must 1 machine from the head to raise compression to a new level?" Here the problem must be worked the other way around. Okay, so you know the ratio you want. The unknown factor and the ‘one you wish tochange isthe volume of the combustion chamber. As in the previous case, you need to know cylinder displacement and the volumes contained in the valve cutcuts, pistonto-deck clearance and head gasket. These parts of the total chamber volume are fixed. Subtract them from the total chamber volume required. This leaves the volume the combustion chamber must contain to give thedesired ratio, First of all, the forumla for the total chamber volume: Total chamber volume = cylinder displacement ‘compression ratio ~ 1 Example: an 11:1 compression ratio is required on a 1600cc engine Total ‘chamber volume to acheive this is 1600ce + 4 = 400 1 10 40cc Say that 12cc of this volume is contained in the pistor/deck volume, valve cutouts, etc. To achieve the desired ratio, combustion chamber volume must be 40-12 = 28cc. The head must be machined until it contains 28cc inthe combustion chamber to produce the required 11:1 compression ratio. To determine how much must be removed from the head face, we ‘must first set the head as close to perfectly level as possible; a spirit level is a valuable tool here. With plugs and valves in place, adjust the head level with shims until the head face is level. Using a burette or pipette, carefully fill the largest chamber with fluid of the exact volume required of the finished chamber. Place a rule or straight edge over the chamber and measure from the edge of the rule to the surface of the fluid with the tip of a vernier calliper as shown in the photo. Subtract the width of the rule from the measurement just taken. ‘The figure left isthe amount the head face must be machined. The procedure is simple but be aware of two things: when the end of the dial or vernier calliper gets within 0.005— 0.007 inch (0.13-0.18mm) of the fiuid surface, the fluid will rise tomeet the end of the calliper. This, phenomenom is known as “Molecular attraction”. This means precise measurements are difficult. In practice, you usually end up takeing a speck less off the head, ‘because in reality the measurement comes out a little short of what it should be. On a road machine, where the very last bhp isnt that important, use this factor as a safety margin. On a race head where the compression ratio is required to be on the dot, ave the head machined by the minimum amount indicated by measuring. After measuring, check the ratio again. If it's less than you require, machine a few more ‘thousandths from the head face and recheck volume. If you are attempting to produce very high ratios without overstepping the mark, accuracy is essential. As little 2s 0.002 inch (0.05mmm) can make. 1/ 10 ratio change. If you are already working on the limit, that tenth of a ratio could mean severe detonation problems. Whatever time it takes to check and double-check, do so — it may save you a lot of time and trouble later on. 46CHAPTER THREE Cam Drives, Cam & Valve Trains In this chapter I begin my discussion at the crankshaft and work my way up e engine through the cam-dnive sys tem to the camshaft, and then to the valves themselves Lets start with drive belt reliability ‘The belt that drives th rarely breaks, but this does: does. Three therec age, If the b then it could be pending on the [have seen belts break at 20,000 miles in hot cli ates while in cooler climates, belt breakages may not occur until 80,000 miles or so The second akacje pose more stresses on th to earlier breakage A third factor Many Ford OHC engimes find th into off-road machines, Volkswagen transaxle with the engine mounted at the rear. If this 1s the case you must ft some prevent sand, grit being caught between the crank sproc- ket and the belt, Do not take this point lightly. You may not make 20 miles ina itive offroad event with adequate belt protection. And wh the belt breaks, bent valves result. It quicker to fabricate a shield to prevent this than it a8 to pull the place valves and maybe a piston or two Based on my expenience, I sugges you use the following recommenda: ons asa guide. The standard Ford belt ts the best quality available and [ have tried most brands but not all, Of the brands I've tied some have had a dis appointingly short life on race engines on occasion as short as 10 minutes Granted the engines in queson did imately things, or a combinatior se bell breal It has seen ay Io sh mileage, break de factor alle bi spring pressure tandard vi ive springs un- beltand lead fort of deflector to and stones from head and re- ing pres 300 Ib. at full open, but this spring typicall mance SOHC avery hot USA. or onger thet belts change engin Limates, Incooler clin belt breakage when very hea y used or th valv standard, Jo yourself very 100 CAM SPROCKET. he cam rocket offers sort of high-perfor- Tryou liv imate suchas the southw lia, then rings « advisabl Ie it to ‘dial in’ the cam, This can produ the best overall cam timing for yo particular engine tune, Cam timing can be altered by filing the slot in the sproc ketand taking up excess slot width with shuns, or by using an adjustable cam sprocket. [have personally used Burton Engineering, Holbay, Eslinger En: jineering and Racer Walsh adjustable prockets uused one or two lypes which were of flimsy design and hoddy workinansiip. When selecting n adjustable cam sprocket, assume that the bulkier they look the better they will withstand repeated cam tim alterations, Sprockets produced by Burton En: gineering are produced ta a very tight standard and utilize a vernier design to am timing changes in precise 4 2. adjustable ca sprocket a wise investment anytime cam anges made On ozesions the Standard cam can enough outright rom the factory to warant using on adjustable ‘orrection Some adjustable sprockets wil net car the standard belt easing so check tis out before you buy. item shown here s made by Holbay 22, John Shankle at Shankle Automotive uses this large protractor to sot up cams on his dents’ race engine. Here TDG has jst been established, 47‘Shown below i an Esslinger adjustable cam sprocket. This sturdy design has much to commendit 123. Precsion degree pulley inthe mle photo s markedin increments of one degree, Produced by Essinger Enginoring, Ia very useful em forthe serious engine bulder Once you have adjusted your cam and ignition timing for maximum power, oucan acaratly determinethe settings When uildtume comes ound there ‘llbe no need to guess where the cam or ignition timing should be. Lower photo shows adjustable sprocket {and degreed erank pully Wom Manx Racing 48 ink angle increments. This pre- requires about two minutes to alter the cam timing than ventional adjustable sproc: have used an Eslinger En- gineering sprocket on may cams and with many cam timing changes, and it always operate as smoothly new every ume CAM TIMING FOR POWER. Pinto or Capri fanatics will likely have read in performance magazines that advancing cam timing doesall sorts of wonderful things for engine power. Well, [hate to disappoint you, but this is only partially true. Thave tested the ef fects of advancing cam tumun least three different two litre engines stock or near-stock form, A standard cam was installed, sel fo factory specill- ations and a power curve was taken off the dyno. Then the cam timing was ad vanced. (See Figure 3-1.) Normally, ad vanced cain timing yields a little more low-end power al the expense of high rev power. On a manual transmission car, where engine speed can be kept high, standard or near-standard tuming seems best. However, in an automa cally shifted car, low-e1 considered, more important, Advance: ing the cam six to eight degrees from liming will normally shed. .10 second or so in ET while raising quar ter-mile trap speed by one or two mph, In some respects then, the advan tages of advanemg cam timing seem slender, suagesting that the adjustable sprocket isof questionable value. Well this would incieed be true if production tolerances didn't mfluence the equa tion, Yousee, often the cam timing is not where i's supposed to be. [have heard of cam tuning being a3 much as eight or nine degrees out and six is not at all un common, Under these circumstances, an adjustable cam sprocket can result ina worthwhile power increase. Typ! cally going from, say, six degrees re- tarded to somewhere between stock and two-dearees advance can yeild up to 11 bhp. Although it can provide increased horsepower, the true worth of an adjust able cam sprocket is its use with a high performance camshaft. A particular cam may require different tuning for various engine specifications. If you make a change in carburation, exhaustot cylinder-head specification, you may find optimum cam timing needs change too, Cam timing giving best re sults may be considerably different from timing obtained by ining up the ming dots or setting the liming to th cam. grinder’s specification, pint is probably the mast important as: pect so far as an adjustable sprocket is concemed, For instance, when testing a Ford cam of US. origin, I found the best power curve with the cam occur red eight degrees away from the dot aligment position, When initially instal ling the cam, [used the tuning dots asa starting position and began power | ing. [found out that power achieved t optimizing cam timing can often be much as 26 bhp more n certain parts of the rey range, as compared with merely aligning the dots. (See Fig 3 IA) VALVE TRAIN GEOMETRY If there is one aspect of this engine which produces a love/hate relation ship, it 1s valve uain geometry. Al though ils concept appears simple end traightforward, the geometry of & pivoting rocker and SOHC is anything but simple. Five factors affect maximum valvesift nd the shape of the valv see how each factor relates to valve lif, assume the hit profite mains unchanged, If this is the case valve-lft is affected by pivot- pillar height (arrow | of Fig. 32), cam base circle (arrow 2), radius of pad on fol lower (arrow 3}, radius of pad bearing on the valve tip (artow 4), and the valve length (arrow 8) Dealing with point 1, in pivot pillar height within a reasonable Tange of the normal, produces creased hit, However this is not of great value because pivot height depenc upon the cam's base circ positions of the two paclson the follower and the positon required far correct inning clearances. Keep in mind that increasing the pivot pillar height in creases valve lift Moving on to arrow 2, the pad on which the cam profile bears is cntically important, Wear life of this item is de pendent not only on the metalluray of the cam and follower combination but also on the relative geometry of these two components. Geometry-wise, tree things can happen to the pad to sroasing the 34. The typea range of adjustments for adjustable cam sprockets is about 10° either side of the “straight up and dows! positon. On the engine shown here, the sprocket needed adjusting to 1! advance to put the cam inthe correct poston. ' | wt FIG31A EFFECT OF CAM TIMING ON HORSE POWER 7 2 a Tiwincoor ADVANCES ADVANCED Rea “ALIGNED ” He He He 2000 26 ma uaz 3000 563 563 647 ‘4000 65 1000 1043 5000 ws 250 | 193 6000 080 95 wz L NOTE: With timing dots aligned cam timing was due to manufacturing tolerances approx’ retarded Final timing ae column 3 was’ advanced over cem manufacturers specications and produced best power'35. When you buy a cam from any reputable cam company you wil get acam data sheet like this. READ IT. FG22 ailect lift Ifthe pad radius remains un changed, but the position of its surface 1s moved up or down, a change in valve iftoccurs. Ifthe pad is higher on the fol lower, valve hift is teduced because the pivot pillar has to be adjusted down to achieve the necessary clearance, This 50 DRAWING COURTESY FORD MOTOR CO. loses lift. If the pad is lower on the rocker, the reverse applies because the pillar must be adyusted upwards to achieve clearance between cam and follower. ‘The next factor subject to change on the follower is the pad radius, The smal ler the radius, the slower the valve opening rates. The larger the pad radius, the faster the valves open. Ifthe ends of the pad remain untouched, but the entire pad is machined flat, more hft is achieved, because a flat surface can be regarded as a radius of infinite size Ifa flat pad is used on the standard fol lower, the pillar adjustment moves up, causing more lift Fig. 3-3 shows the ef: fect on the lft curve when a lat-profile follower versus a curved follower is used against a standard cam. The htt curve produced is typically as radical ‘asa mild street grind cam, or if you pre fer to call it such. a Stage | cam, ‘Shufhng from theontes to practicalities for a moment, let me say that | have never med ninning a fat follower against a standard cam to see the effect on rebabilty or horsepower. You may like to try such a move, so a few words on both the pros and cons are in order ‘The obvious advantage of the fat fol lower is the increased hit and opening ales, Directly opposing these advan tages in the fact that the mcreased opening rate imposes higher surface stresses on both the cam profile and fol lower his will wear out these items quicker, but offsetting that is thie fact that the surface stress seen by either the cam or the follower 1s partially de pendent on the mstantaneous radius of curvature of the two components. Flat- tening the follower cuts down the im Stantaneous radius of curvature at any point in the lft cycle, Ifall other things are equal, surface stresses will be lower. This factor tends to offset the in- creased stresses and increased accel eration rates of the valves, Whether or not it will entirely offset 1t 1s another question. I dont believe it would, but it would certainly help the situation ‘Taking thisone siep further, ifthe fat follower helps the lift profile on a stan. dard cam what will it do toa more radi- cal cam, profile? This is where I should ‘warn you to tread very carefully. [plot ted the lft curve using a fat follower on a Crane P332-10 cam. The result was al most instantaneous valve lift just off the ‘seal, The surface stresses and stresses an the valve train here would be so se- vere that the cam would annihilate it self. My advice here is: use fat follow- fers with caution if you intend trying themat all ‘The third factor which can affect valve lift and opening envelope is the relative angle of the pad. Look ata padand you willsee it's tipped at an anale to the rocker. If the pad is flattened ar in creased m steepness relative to the position of the pad on the upofthe valve and the ball pivot socket, it will alter cam hming, Tipping the pad will cause the valve to open later or earlier. Im agine rotating the follower pad about its centre £0 the pad end nearest the valve 's lower, and the end nearest the pivot point higher under these car cumstances. ‘The cam has a slightly quicker off-the:seat acceleration and the valve will open sooner. This in ef fect advances cam timing, If the pad slope is altered in the other direction, the opposite situation will apply. Variable number 3 — only controlla ble by the cam gnnder, 1s the cam's base circle diameter, If the base circle gets smaller, lif starts to increase, and ata cerlain point, no further gains are mace, Further reductions in the base circle reduce the valve lft. The point at which tis occurs 1s smaller than you are bkely 1 use, While we are on the subject of base cencles I should point out that 2s the base circle is reduced, all radii on the cam are correspondingly reduce’ any given cam profile. ‘The result 1s higher surface sires thing you do not need for this camand valve train as itonly roliability. Ths 1s one of the major arguments against cams reprofiled froma used cam, Mowing on to the valve-tip pad, as in dicated by arrow 4, there is only a lt mited effect due to changing in profile ‘The curve on the pad is designed to give a rolling action actoss the end of the stem. If the pad were lat, 11 would cause the valve to open quicker. It would also create a tremendous side Toad on the valve, greally accelerating guide wear, 'The standard valve pad on the follower has curvature across its width as well as down its length. This al lows the follower a certain amount of side-to-side rocking movement, This in unr allows the cam-follawer pad to sit squarely on the cam profile without being influenced by parallelism errors between the np pad and the valve stem, Fig.3-4showsthis.Itsonly asmall point to consider if yau are looking for Jong life from your engine but itis im: portant Valve lenath, arrow Sis the most im portant aspect so far as the encjine buil: der is concerned. The effect on lifl and acceleration caused by valve-lengih £16, Checking out the valve train geometry to stabi basi parameters doesnt need a lat of equipment. {YoU are carl, meaningful measurements canbe made with the simple equpment shown here Fe OS SSMS ES ARs te peas Om Fuxr AND WADIUS FOLLOWEnS 500, LL PADFOLLOWER g ‘STANDARD RADIUS. 3 BAD FOLLOWER 200), 320 340-020 -a0—~—SO SOR HO TO DEGREES OF CAM ROTATION e40 690 «0a. 8120” 100-200-240 280320 DEGREES OF CRANKSHAFT ROTATION rigaa 51changes is not commonly realized. A small change significantly affects how a valve luts: ‘The shorter the valve be comes, the more valve lift is increased, ‘This 1s partally due to the valve up moving down anc partially due to the pivot point (the pivot pillar) moving up on the other side of the cam. The geomelry involved is difficult to ap preciate, but Fig. 3-8 should help, When you have digested that, you should be in good position to under- sland for yourself why Ford's SOHC valve train is notas simple a system as t first appears. SETTING UP THE VALVE TRAIN From the engine builder's point ofview the most important variable in valve train geometry is valve stern length. Al though all the other factors may have an influence, most of them are beyond our ‘oniol since most of us.do not have the necessary machinery to change these factors, Valve-siem length 1s another natter. Any lathe or machine shop valve-stom facer can be tused to set the valve lengths to whatever is required On an engine usuig standard-length valves, the practical limit for valve shor ening 1s around 0.075 inch (1.9mm), Shortening the valves this amount in creases lift of approximately 0.025 inch (0.68mi). Generaily speaking, you can gure on a 3-1 ratio between the amount the valve 1s shortened and the amount the hit is increased, ‘The 0.025 ich (063mm) bit represents around 4 seven percen! increase in area under the curve (See Fig. 36). thts qraph also shows the Lit envelope biased toward the opening sice of the curve, which means faster opening ramps with slighily less increase on the closing side. Ifanything, thisis moread: vanlageous to us than an even spread, as it ge alve off the seat quicker and allows the air an easter passage Into the cylinder during the intake stroke, To shorten standard-length val: ves by as much as0.075 inch (029mm) ies other moddfications to ensure companbulity with the rest of the valve tian. The most obvious problem is that the ears or tabs on the side of the valve stem pad on the follower contact the valve sping retainer. Ifthey do, it may Cause the spring retainer ta separate from the valve, and a valve could drop Info the engine, To avoid this, you rust keep a close watch on the clearance 82 Lf Hotei the omar fh increased le due to va stem shartening. As the stu is shortened so he iat point othe ~ocker on the frum mast gop. Ae 008 up. 80 the stance Between the amchatt canine C1 and he frum pila pivot paint becomes les Take the "wo pivot pints PI and PW iat P2 Chri Rf shorer tha heads RY sive with pve PL the pivot pin was ‘moved up to PS impossible in proce! F038 & thontheditaneaCTtoPDeanbeseontabe © tach sorter than PY By shetsing 8 “¢ Eecescaeee bs Hi tao which int aes us more Ht mths ae a Schematic example tan be sn —# Ee ‘we horton the valve by the amount X we vy 38 a3 the other end ofthe valve travel the B enone Ted Xone Y E Tepamvanet 8S ‘ — 3:7, When the valve stems shortened to getthe 3.8 This rocker hasoen bled, st up with 0580" design of the car or more teers on the ifm: Note how te wiped area between the two follower may need tebe shortened you haveto do srowr i towards the ucrum end ofthe pod. Any. th weil trnthe ob no'ightening more shortening ofthe valve cout have caused the eft shows the ‘miped ares come of the pad. This would have Fapidly modified the cm profile to alow it form! 5G 3.5 Ts Ganou sows How VALVE LFTIS AFFECTED BY VALVE LENGTH, MEASURED ON WTAREDALUE HITH OOF CLEAMANGE VALVE LENGTH VERSUS VALVE LFT Max LF 0.412 irr wir vaLve STEM SHORTENED BY 0.078" (90mm MALE LiFr wir ‘STANDARD LENGTH VALVE: 200] VALVE LIFT INCHES ol 320 20 ao DEGREES OF CAM ROTATION 0 0) 120160 DEGREES OF CRANKSHAFT ROTATIONbetween the earsor tabsand the spring retainer. | is pertuissible to shorten these ears, but regard 0.09-0 1 inch (2.2 2.8mm) as the mummum length of the shortened ear. Moving the valve lip closer to the valve spring retainer may also cause the follower to hit the spring retainer ‘The last detail you need to bear in mind when shortening a valve, 1s to keep an eye on the wiping patch of cam lobe on the cam the valve isshortened, the wiping patch moves progessively nearer the fulcrum point, Ifa valve is shortened too much, the cam will actually come off theend of the pad and edge-ride on the corner of the pad. This will quickly destroy the cam and follower, When shortening a valve, do so progressively. Reinstall belween each shortening operation to lind out how much farther it 1s possible to go before prob Most dif ficult to compensate for if you go too far is edge-niding caused by moving the wiping area too far back on the pad. To avoid this, blue the cam-follower pad and check the area that the lobe is wip- ing, When it gets within about 0.015 inch (.006mun) of the end of the pad, stop shortening the valve stem, HIGH-PERFORMANCE CAMS AND VALVE LENGTH I've touched on this subject brielly in the previous chapt WL will deal with it m more depth. Many re ment, large diameter valves hav longer dard valve stem. Thi reduces the effective lift of any cam. In simple terms, the more radical the cam you intend using, especially from the lift point of view, the greater percentage of 5-10. These “lash caps” are used to give adéed valve length so that the correct eam/rocke clearance can be et up without running out of threads onthe ‘ocker pivot ilar when adjusting The drawback to sh caps" is they reduce valve rons FiG37 CAM FOLLOWER TO SPRING RETAINER CLEARANCE 2:5, When very high it cams ate used, the rocker starts to move ff the end af the valve as shown here. Apart 42:11. am pre-ube is VERY important the cam st funetion without wiping tse out. Special lubricants are ‘sualy supped in the eam Kit so use them 83valve-lft loss thete will be due to a longer valve stem. A longer valve stem has been used im most cases to allow setting the correct running clearances with a cam havinga smaller base circle. Without this extra valve length its pos e to run out of pivot-pillar adjust ment, With some very high-lift cams, typically in the .580 inch (1mm) and above range, the base circle is so small that the pivot pillar runs out of adjust ment before the correct running clear- ances ate achieved. Some cam com panies market lash caps which fit onto the valve stem to effectively lenathen 1 Althougi these may give you pillar ad- justment, they effectively reduce valve Iif. In other words, lash cap are really only acrutch to construct an operational valve train, The corect way to tackle the problem of insufficient pivot pillar adjustment with small base circle, hight Lift cams isto install Raver Walsh press ininserts. Using thest lash caps can make the difference bet ween Your cam lifting 0520 inch and 0.890 inch, (132mm and 1Smm), de- pending on which route you ao. When using such high-Iiftcams, you will prot ably be using deeply dished spring re fainers, These, even more than stan dard spring retamers, suffer carn- fol lower clearance problems typically at the points indicated in Fig. 3-2. Also, with high-lit cams it is easier for the cam contact patch to run off the end of the cam-follower pad, As a matter of course, check every one tomake sure it snot edge-nding. CAM FOLLOWERS Cam followers are a sore point with many SOHC Ford owners, The follower and cam-lobe wear problem has spoiled many an engine. Butitisa prob: lem which can be overcome. You only need to follow a few rules to almost guarantee a reliable cam and follower setup. |. Whenever you use anew cam shalt, use new followers, 2. Ford has made several follower types over the years. Latest is best. The latest follow: ers, a3 of 1979 are easily recognized by thei shiny tumbled finish. These roc: ers also have a slightly longer pad than the earlier black-oxide-finished followers, so if you are using @ high bit cam, these are a definite must.3. Lubri cation is also.a key factor to the life of the cam profile and the followers. Since using General Motors Super Engine Oil 54 3-128 2-13, Manx Racing role cam follower aliminats the cam and follower weat problem. Some changes invalvetrain geometry occur but these are easly accommodated asthe nearby testexplans Early type shown ‘onleft,curent type on right. Fig 3-8 ‘COMPARISON OF LIFT CURVE GIVEN WITH STANDARD FOLLOWER AND ROLLER FOLLOWER, ‘CAM PROFILE: RACER WALSH STAGE III [ROLLER FOLLOWER — Max LIFT 0.458" STANDARD FOLLOWER rn a a a a a aD DEGREES OF CAM ROTATION. ex 00 at dD 160 «20028020820, DEGREES OF CRANKSHAFT ROTATION Supplement (EOS) or Ford Oil Con- ditioner, I have not suffered a cam-to follower wear problem on a race & gine, and that’s using cams of up to 0.6 inch (16.Smm) lift ‘The last step and probably the most important is to hardness check each [o- lower. Generally they range from 49 to 55 Rockwell C, Avoid anytung under 81-82 and if choice permits, 64-85 RCs preferable. ‘The rest of the precauitions to ensure reliabilily have already been covered an the section on shortening the valve stem. Heed these points, and your en- gine will probably not have cam wear problems. If you want to be 100 percent certain of maximum possible life, there area couple of routes youcan go. Othe more conventional follower design, Piper produces one with a stellite-type pad. These are virlually indestructible but good lubrication must still be supplied because although the follower may survive, the cam may not Shill on the subject of cam profile and follower reliability, he latest cams from Ford are bored hollow and a small oil ing hole is drilled into the loaded flank ofeach cam labe This applies oi to the follower just prior to ts maxtumum load point. Hollow cams, in conjunction with the late tumbled-type follower appear to have minimized the wear problem,ROLLER FOLLOWERS The surest Way to eliminate wear at cam-lobe and follower interlace is ‘0 use a roller follower Thisalso allows teducing the quantity of ail to the tap end Remember, most of the oil up to lubricate the cam and fol onventional follower i The simplest roller-tappet con jon uses Manx Racing followers. ne | know who has used these rollers has found they are 100 percent reliable in street or race applications uup to about 0.520 (135mm) hft. The followers can be used as a direct re placement for the standard items, but a direct swap loses lift and effective tim ing, Thus 18 because the roller has a smaller radius than the standard fol lower pad. Fig, 3-8 shows the typical loss of lift when a direct swap ts made when you change from a con follower to a Manx roller fol: 1 should shorten the that ventional follower rention: lower restore the lit valve te ipiained with the ‘Then the roller > the standard fi that valve acceleration nally slower. A » discern Wer eXCEE off the seals n n the dync ble difference in the horsepower out put due the slightly slower opening rates of the roller follower. With roller followers the torque require to turn th am. is noticeably less than with a con. ventional follower. Dyno result suggest the reduced Inction compen the slightly reduced valve- Ing rales Although an effective means of en. hanced reliability at any stage of the ‘game, the roller followers really come into their own wilh wild cam profiles and profiles designed especially for roller hiters. Some of the big Crane cam profiles lifting tc 0.580 meh (14.73mm) or more, fall into the “wild category. These profiles are sometimes re garded as "shaky" for a road race event ofany lenath but can usually be made ve (or a race or two with roller follo ers Some compames such as Racer Welsh, Competition Cams and Manx Racing in England offer profiles de signed to work with these roller fallow: ers. As yel, the Manx Racing prafiles are somewhat more conservative in lift than thew US counterparts, In. 1979 Racer Welsh had profiles giving over 0,600 inch (18. 24mm) bit with the roller followers 3.14.When attempting to use Man toll ollowers with supe high iftcams(0,600° or mre) check to see that ‘the tip dacs nt pas thecante ofthe valve as seen here (rowed). Wit does, check with Manx Racingfor ones with fonger valve pads. 295. As can be seen hore the Hobay ole fllower differs considerably from the Manxitem ands designed Specialy for use with the Holbay roller eam, HOLBAY ROLLER FOLLOWERS Equally effective but more complex and costly are the roller followers pro- duced by Holbay Racing. These are designed to go with their own roller bearing steel camshalt. Installing the Holbay roller bearing conversion en tails replacing the total valve train as: sembly. Setting the cam follower tun hing clearance or valve lash 1s uncon ventional. ‘The near by photo shows th roller follower conversion. Stud (A) 1s screwed into the head. Pivot-cent height adjustment in the pivot pillar (B) is achieved by placing the required number of shims (C) over the stud in the head. ‘The shims set the clearance close enough to allow the final fine set ting achieved by adjusting the eccen- incally mounted raller (D) and locking Mp parance is set, The Holbay system appears reliable. The only snag 1s that as of 1979 Holbay had no really Ingh-lifl cams. Although the cams they offer work well, [feel, in view of the head's flow charactensucs, they need a lol more lift than 0.460 inch (1.68mi) 55SPRING RETAINERS When considering valve spring re- tainers, the following three points must be borne in mind: lift available before the valve spring becomes coil bound, reciprocating weight, and cost, The first is most important, When an in crease in lit or rpm or both is requied, heavier valve springs are needed. To achieve the increased spring pressure, thicker gauge wire or an inner spring or both are used. This inevitably in- creases the stacked ar fully compres. ged height of the valve spring. Depend- ing on the type of spring used, at valve lifts around 0.480--0.500 inch (12.2--12.7 mm) the spring can become coil bound. Attempt to run the engine under these 318.The Holbay role kit comprises of these parts, conditions and you will wipe out the — Relertothe nearby textforan explanation ofthe installation cam and followers within seconds, If there is any doubt as to whether coil- binding will occur, check the coil- to. coll clearance of the sprig with the valve at full lit, Coil-to-coil clearance should be about 0.010 meh (0.25 mm) minimum, When coil-binding becomes a problem, two courses of action are open: first you can machine the spring platform, Malerial under the spring platform ss typically 5/ie-¥ ch (18-94 mm) thick, so it can be machined Y¥ inch (8.2 mm). As an alternative, dished retain: ers can be used to givea greater instal- Jed height to the spring, ‘Phis is usually preferable to machining the spring platiorm as dished retainersare usually 3-17 spring eal binding i tobe avoided when high ts are used is imperative tat the correct sri Trade of aluminium, which is lighter Taine are used The Crane retainer on thet gives about Ye" more installed spring eight than he than the standard steel retainers; and "™#aeenthe ight. This allows greter valve Bt before spring collbinding occurs are cheaper to buy than machining your spring platforms. If the valve spring that must be used will nol fi the standard retainer you may have to buy other retainers. When buying a cam which is anything more than @ mild re- grind, it is a good idea to buy the springs and retamers with the cam. Moving on to point 2, reciprocating ‘weight, this is not as imporiant as it would appear. Reciprocating weight of te follower and oping plas lal ala Wein accuser mete ta 9 pr valve train. Less than 10 percent is ac- Sourted br oy the ering fetaion You could deign's woighocs spring sow we Pot m Cour iettes Rien Sit item nme a vr meinen Si beside Se Ne oa ela a Siumsnes Ses eee ata a eek ee ite fon idperoen ts Geet ro nean git Ave vowghtreters don have hel pace: 313 mumeneaaradit ante ta ae ifs just a question of perspective. A nocdshed enought allow spring heights thet wilrork with gh it cams Ths could be para remedied Tehtweigh! soring rover naps butt Bisemeneesanreen a 36won't give as many extra rpm before valve float occurs assome think. Using a live example to illustrate the point, if ‘you have an engine which runs to 9000 1pm belore valve float occurs with steel retainers, then using aluminium retain- ers of half the weight may give another 150 rpm before valve float. If you use blanium retainers one-third the weight of steel ones an extra 200 rpm may be available. Looking at cost, figure that gold, black or silver spring retainers look fancy, but do nothing for the power out- put ofan engine which peaks out at less than 7000 rpm. Such itemson an engine like this are a waste of money. The stan dard steel spring retainers are as good asany. VALVE SPRINGS ‘The standard valve springs are typ! ally 45-55 Ibs. (20.49--25kq) pressure on the seat and 100-110 Ib (48.550 kg) ‘open. With the standard camshaft, they are good for about 7000 rpm before valve float. Compared with pushrod en ines, averhead cam engines will rev higher fora given spring poundage and valve lift becaus rocaling weight and increased valve tran stifess, Many cam manuiacturers take advantage of the valve train's inhe- rent stiffness and design profiles that lift and lower the valves at much faster rales than are possible in a pushrod en gine. Controlling the valve motions pro duced by such cam profiles, requires high-poundage springs. An example can be seen in a popular street cam with 10° more duration than the stan: dard cam and a lif! of about 0.480 inch (22,0 mm). For normal applications it uses valve springs giving 90-100 Ib. of seal pressure and 180 Ib. (81.8 kg) pres sure at full lilt Valve float occurs at about 7500 pm. The extra 80 percent or 80 spring pressure gave only 7 percent Increase in rpm before valve float sim ply because of the higher valve accel erations imparted by the more radical cam profile, A reasonably conservative road/race cam will use 100 Ib. (45.4 kg) on the seat and 250-285 Ib, (113.6--128.5 kg)al full lft~-providing about 8500 rpm before valve float, For an all-out drag- race cam, these figures would run in the ‘order of 100--120 ib. (45.5--54.5 kg) seat pressure and 320-360 Ib. pressure at full lft. Rev capability for such a cam and valve spring combination would be g 5&2 520, When spring pressures of 10 Ibs or LESS over the nose ofthe cam are required, single springs with lat Above ett ‘wound damper appear tobe periecty satisfactory, “Above right £421, Double srings with opposite hand winding onthe spring cols tnd to damp out unwanted vibrations tbyvirtve cf the friction between ther When over thenose spring loads of 20 Ibs or more are required, akways 90 for double springs. around 10,000 to 11,000 before valve oat Thave given these figures so that you will be aware ofthe sort of spring pres sures required, When buying valve springs, don't think you can out-ques the cam manufacturer. Always seek hus advice and go along with his recom mendations. If a flat wound spring damper is recommended, be sure to use il, Leaving it out can cause spurious vibrations which may allow valve float at lower rpm than would occur with the daunper. If you have a choice between using vanable rate springsand conven: tional springs, choose variable rate ones, because they usually require slightly less spring pressure to reach a desired rpm. Looking at it another way, slighlly higher xpm_can meved with similar overall spring poundages ‘The reason the variable rate spring works better is thal itis nol so prone to resonate at a specific vibration fr quency as a conventional spring. You can recognize a variable rate spring because the coils are spaced diffe rently over the lenathof the spring, The close-wound coils go next to the head with this type of spring. be acl 2:22. High it and long timing are the ingredients for thisCrane3338 cam. The components shown ae supplied ‘when the entre cam “Ai” fs ordered. The Cane Super lube inthe bot, contain the seemingly vital ingredient 2 Dithiophosphate whieh san ad to curing rapid cam and follower wea 87CAMSHAFTS Choosing a cam is often a tajor stumbphng block for the amateur engine uilder. An error of judgement mace here can produce the wrong type of power curve, making the engine less than suitable for the intended applica: hon. Having some idea of the engines hikes and dishkes helps to make a more effective cam choice. Many oj the cam shafts required characteristics are in fluenced by the cylinder head. Refer to the flow curves in the cylinder head chapter For conventional ports airflow continues to increase with valve if. For use with some of my early heads. | had cam profiles ground to 0,780 mch (19.05 mm) lit, Fortunately, developing the ‘apple inake ports produced elfective results with less lil. On such ports. re gard the maximum valve lift recpuited as being in the 0600-0 650 meh (152-165 mm) range. On ports when no material is added, work on the assumption that the tore Jif, the better the resulting power output, Unfortunately, ths re: quirement must be tempered by the fact that as valve Lill is increased, 80 18 the mechanical stress on the compo: nents involved, Ila cam is substituted for another having the same timing but ‘more lif, you rum into a less thari desira ble circle of events ‘lo allow operation at the same 1pm as. with the previous lower lift cam, a new high lif cam must be used with heavier springs to avoid valve float. Increased If! results in bet ter tgh-rpm breathing and the engine has a higher rpm capabaly. Therefore needs even stronger springs. Unfortu rately, the spring pressure requited is not proportional to the rpm required but proportional to the square of the pin, To see how this works, equate the onginal spin capability to 100 percent Next let's assume you require the en ‘ine to turn 41 percent more rpmn. The new rpm will be [41 percent, But the valve spring pressure will be 141 x 1.41 Greater. The answer to that minor bit of maths tums out to be @ or more accu raiely, 1.988. In other words, twice the spring pressure will be needed for 41 percent higher engine rpm. As you can appreciate, with extra valve lift requir ing very much more spring pressure, the valve train can quickly become Grossly unreliable: Because of this, the valve lift must take into account both the metallurgical and dynamic stress limits of the valve train 58 By extending the overall valve-open petiod of the cam, the amount of time available to open and close the valve is likewise increased, In the long run this benefits us by allowing comparatively Jess spring pressure to achieve a given Ipm or a given spring pressure to achieve a higher 1pm, On race cams this i fine. Onstreet cams, an increase in opening period is detrimental to the power curve al low rpm. The umplica: tion is that although the engine could benefit from a street cam 0.600 inch (183 mm) lif, the short opening period would unpose stresses too high for re hhatibty. On the other hand, a race eam, withats longer duration and lessor noed of reliability can successfully use as much as 0.650 inch (165 mm) if Equally important as hii are the accel eration tates imparted to the valve by the cam profile Because high itis what this engine needs it also follows that the sooner the valve achieves full If, the better. ‘This means cams with high aceeleration rates. The higher the acceleration rates, the more the stress ‘andi the less the reliability. By good de sign a eam manufacturer can minimize the destructive effects of dynamically induced acceleration stresses, yet shill allow the cam to make the most of rapid valve opening and closing rates. Be cause ofthe criticaland complex nature ofa cam profile which makesthe best ot all these variables, mos! competent cam manufacturers use a computer cal: culated profile CAM TIMING Varying the point al which the valves open and close in relation to the Crankshaft motion has a profound effect on the power curve. As with almost any engine, the longer the duration of valve ‘opening, the less low end power the engine produces In relation to the rpm the engine will tur, the Ford SOHC en. ine does not need as much valve dura thon as a typical pushrod engine. his is mainly due to the faster acceleration tates possible with an OHC layout, One of the biggest mistakes made by amateur engine builders is to put foo such cam duration into these engines. Although tt may thrive on al the hit you can give it, tread very carefully when it ‘comes to duration. Depending on cam lobe centres, which will be discussed shortly, increased duration yields in- creased overlap, If you are lookina for low speed drivability, avoid cams with much more overlap than standard cam, Overlap destroys low-speed dnivability and power quicker than any other fac tor ih these engines, especially if the head breathes well. Where bhp is the major factor, increased overlap brought about by increased opening can be an asset, If a tuned-length exhaust system is used, the exhaust ex traction effect can start to pull mn the fresh intake charge through the intake valve even belore the piston hasstarted the induction stroke Known as chamber scavencing, 1s is very bene: ficial as far as power 1s concerned Many competition yehicles do not have exhaust systems which provide any ‘worthwhile extraction effect. A typical example is a rally car which must pass certain stringent noise level tests die 10 regulations. Usually, silenced exhaust systems have a certain amount of back pressure, This back-pressure exagger ates the effect of the overlap because exhaust blows through the intake port pnor fo the start of he inchuction stroke. When the induction stroke starts, it draws ina mixture of fresh charge and exhaust and that's not dood for bhp. If back-pressure is hkely to be a prob: lem, think im terms of fess overlap, When building an engine strictly for race applications it 1s best to choose a ‘eam himing which will take advantage of this engine's high-rpm potential, For drag, road and most other forms of com petition on asphalt, you can tse a dura: ‘ion sufficiently long to allow the engine to produce peak horsepower at 8000 rpm ot higher Such cams. typically have 300" or more ofduration measured at the seat For off-road race vehicles, you should choose a cam with a lot less du Tation than for its road-tace counter part, Most off-road drivers agree that engine flexibility is a very important matter when racing inthe rough. Under such conditions, some of the hotter street cams produce the quickest machines. LOBE CENTRES ‘The subject of lobe centres is rately dealt with m performance books, be- cause its effect on the power curve is not generally understood Although less dramatic than the effect ofduration, the effect of changing lobe centres is important, A definition of lobe centresFIG39 DEFINITION OF LOBE CENTRES or displacement angle, is probably im portant here. Look at Fig. 39 lobe centres or displacement is a qood de seniption. The term means the angle between the full-open position of the inlet and the full-open position of the exhaust. This is the only valve event measured in cam degrees. All other valve-tming ficuress siven in crankshaft degrees, For the strongest power curve, lob centres around 104°-106° appear ideal With these lobe centres on anything more than stréet-type duration figures, the engine comes “on the cam’ yery sharply. Precisely where it comes on the cam depends on duration, Spread ing the lobe centres makes the engine more flexible so 11 can produce power at relatively low rpm. On the negative side, this increased flexibility is paic for in reduced power output. "The basic reason why flexibility is increased 1s because spreading the lobe centres re uces overlap. AS I said previously, overlap 18 probably the single biggest factor affecting low speed drivabilty, If there is any unavoidable back-pres sure in the exhaust system or if you are going fo run an automatic-transtnission vehicle, then slightly wider lobe centres can be beneficial, As a guide, the following should help you with your selection of cam. Where power alone is the main consideration, lobe centres between 104? and 106° work best. any exhaust back-pressure is present due to any fortn of exhaust restriction, choose 108°to | 10° lobe centres. On oc casions, cams with 112” centres have produced satisfactory results but mor power was gained by making the exhaust more efficient and staying with tighter Jobe centres. Automatic-trans: mission vehicles, especially those with Jow-stall-speed torque converters need power right off idle. Camis with only amoderate increase in durationon tight lobe centres tend to develop a hole in the power curve justoff idle, An automatic-transmission car can. fall night into this hole and the result 15 a nighmare street machine. This ten- dency can be reduced by using lobe centres close to 110°, Some cams espe: ually those produced by the factory have lobe centres between 112° and 116°. Although cams on these centres can be made to work, they seem togive away loo much power for the sake of a smooth idle and increased low end flexbilty. The standard 13 and 16 ‘cams from the factory have 106° lobe centres and the 1.6 GT/2000 camnss have 113". The 113° lobe centres probably account for the good low- speed man ners of the 16 C1/2000 engines. On vehicles I owned [could floor the throt- tle at 1200 rpm in high gear. Accelera tion was slow but unfalterina, SELECTING A CAM ‘The most difficult machine to select a high- performance cam for is a sinall displacement, aulomatic- transmission vehicle. An automatic Pinto, Cortina, Capn or whatever else your SOHC Ford engine may propel, usually falls into this category. For such vehicles, useful power must be dolivered from just above idle to as far up the rev range as possible, To give you some idea of what you are looking for, let's take the standard 1600 G1V2000 eamasastarting point. This cam has a theoretical lift of (0.399 inch (10.1 mm) but in pratice it is usually nearer 0.387 inch (94 mm). Du- ration i 268" for both inlet and exhaust, Lobe centres are 113" and wning 1s: inlet opens 24” BTDC, closes 64° ABDC, exhaust opens 70° BBDC and closes 18” ATDC. At 0,050 inch (1.27 mm) lift, the measured timing 1s T ATDC to 33° ABDC, Exhaust is 39” BEDC to 13° BYDC. Duration of both inlet and exhaust at 0.060 inch (1.2? mm) hit 1s 206. Lift when both inlet and exhaust are open the same amount ator close to the TDC point is 0.090 inch (78 mm). A am for anautomatic-transmission vehi cle should closely resemble these fi ures onall counts except lif. Avoid too much duration like the plaque and con. sider 10", orat the very mest, 15° extra duration’ measured al the seat as maximum. More important is the amount of extra duration at 0080 inch (1.27 mrn) lit. My own experience has ‘been that cams of around 200-210" work out well. It 1s possible to make ca with as much as 225° duration at 0.080 inch (1.27 mm) nun but the velucle 1s lazy olf the line, As stated before, 110" lobe centres work well with aulomanc, Do not pick a cam which has both val ves open tao much during the overlap period. The amount of lift when both valves are open the same amount should not exceed 0,050 inch (1.27 mm) and ideally it is best to keep il nearer the figure of 0.030 inch (76 mm) of the standard cam, When it comes to lif, go £22, The Eron 134 grind cam, Proof that high Ht short cams realy do work for street use Refer tofig. 3-10for before and after power curve 89for everything you can get. Because of the short duration iwvolved, mechanical reliability considerations limit the maximum feasible bit fora street cam to around 0.600 inch (127 mm), I that seems like a lot of ground rules for choosing a cam for an automatic-trans mission application, ifs not without good reason. Deciding on a cam for such an application is one of the most difficult choices to make. ‘This is farther complicated by the fact that there are not many cams that fit this bill. One such cam that fulfils the requirements 1s Sig Ersons number 134 gnnd. ‘This grind was designed to cover such applica- tions and has proved very successful As a result of the generous increase in both torque and bhp, this cam has found its way into many manual-transtmission slreet machines and off-toad race cars. Fig. $-10 depicts a back-to-back test of the standard two-litre cam versus the Erson number 134 cam. ‘Torque in crease is between four and 16 Ib/t from 1800 to 6000 rpm and peak bhp 1s up from 98.2 to 1223 ‘The design has ‘only 202° duration at 0.080 meh (1.22 mm) bit. That's Jess than the standard ‘cam, The lif when both valves are open the same amount during the overlap period is 0.090 inch (.76 mm). the same as the standard cam, Valve hift on the test engine was.a true 0,490 inch (1245 min) as opposed to the true 0.387 inch (9.83 mm) lif of the standard cam it was tested against, Fig. 3-10 shows tests are ona relatively standard engine. On en gines where hig-valve modified heads and additional carburation have been used, power outputs well in excess of 150 bhp have been achieved, with peak power occurring in a 6200-6400 K P.M. range, ‘The number 134 grind has been used in steet-dnven manual-transmission vehicles with equal success when good low-speed torque and power up 10 6000 rpm have been required. Ifa free-flow. ing exhaust system 1s used, | recom: mend having this cam ground with 106° lobe centres as opposed to the 110° lobe centres for an automatic transmis: sion, Fora good all round street cam the Piper Magnum 270 HR is to be recom ended. It produces 18 or so extra horse. power with a useful torque increase ‘throughout the rev range. Along with thus cam and follower hile seems to be excellent, If you don't mind buzzing up and down the gears and are prepared to sacrifice power below 2000 rpm, 60 190, 120] 10] 100] 0] 70 CORRECTED FLYWHEEL HORSEPOWER ————— 1000-7000. 3060 ENGINE APM then you can use a longer duration cam with a manual-transmission vehicle. Under such circumstances, consider 290° of duration as maximum. A Piper Magnum 286 HR fits this bull and results mateally high reving but street diva ble power unit, ‘Translated into typical duration figures at 0.050 inch (1.27 mrn) ‘uf, a. cam of thas ilk this runs out about 290° — 235°. Any more duration than this and you will quickly grow tired of driv ing your car in the city rush hour. Atthis stage of the game you must still con sider valve lif as a more important fac torso far as producing usuable power is concerned. STREET/COMPETITION USE ‘Choosing a cam for a dual purpose ap: plication is always a litle dicey be- cause it almost always falls into the category of ‘Jack of all trades, master of none’. The disadvantages of sucha cam are that if is never drivable as a true street cam, nor does it produce the Power of a true race cam. On the plus side, with the right cam and other en: [NGINE: 57D Less AR LEANER GNIS orm Man ” Max POWER NACH TEST ona o $QBREGTEP To sTaNDATO TEN & ATED FOR 1 STANDARD 20.CAM TIMED FOR MAX. POWER. 134 cAM TIMED AT 32642672 7000 5000 6000 Too gine mods to suit, you can build an en- gine with 1600 170 bhp. Figure on 300° measured on the seat or 246° at 0,050 inch (1.47 mm) lf, Duration about maximum, Even in the range of cams wath this sort of timing, many do not have adequate lift If you narrow your choice to a few cams, use the one with the most lift. A cam with 280° (seat) du: ration and 0.500 inch (1.27 mm) lift, al: most always makes more power than one with 0,460-0.470 inch (11.7-11.8 mm) lift and 300° duration, The longer the cam-opening period, the more static- compression ratio the engine will need. ‘A300? cam needs a ratio of 1:1 or more before it star's to perform properly. Such high CRs are a problem because of fuel availability, so you may want to change your ideas about the type of cam you are going to use. If you have Jots of high-octane fuel available, then you can use high CRs. RALLY/OFF-ROAD Ive grouped these two categories to gether because they are essentiallybothot-oad type events, Cam require- menis are somewhal different because each races on a different basi¢ terran European-style rallies are usually run ‘on rough crt roads and relatively high speeds are maintained. Engine 1pm should rarely drop below 4000 on a cor- rectly geared car, so power below this isnotabsoiotely necessary, Atthe other fend of fhe rev range the enaine needs good overspeed capability where the dniver date not let go of the steering ‘wheel to arab another gear. For an en- gine Ike this, pick a cam wath 295-305° duration ane! around 240-280" at 0.050 inch (1.27 mm) lift, Whatever cam you cheese, ask the com manufacturer ifthe cam can be used with springs to give lbout 8600-8200 rpm before valve foat ‘This wll typically require spnngs aw ing 280-280 Ib (113-127 kg) at full Mt ‘The golden rule is the moze hit the bet- ter! Within this zange of cam timing, cams are available with vaive hits up t© about 0.880 inch (4 mm) with a minimum of 0900 meh 27 mm) ‘Again, CR must be high in the region of Lor 12.1, Minmnum-restaction exhaust is required, as well Pot an off-toad velvele, the terrain 3s usually much more severe than that confronting a rally driver. Speeds are often down to hile faster than walking, Asa resull, torque guiput over a wide rpm range, typically from as httle 23 1500-2000 rpm up, is moze important than peak power. The more successful Puvo-powered machines are using some of the best streot-cam profiles. With the rest of the engine modified this produces all the bhp they can nor- mally use, together with good low. speed imaging ability DRAG AND ROAD RACE APPLICA- ‘TIONS ‘The only difference between toad ancl drag racing is the length of the race. Both situations demand maximum power. The only problem is, the more radical the cam, the less rehability it may offer When all things ate considered, ua cam profile 1s properly designed, the two reliabibity-leniting factors are ft and spring pressure, Fortunately you have a certain amount of contol over bath, $0 113s possible fo tailor the cam to sunt a particualr requirernent "The one factor youdont have much control over 45 cam curation, so for an all-out race cam, choose one which has @ mea- DEGREES OF CRANK ROTATION sured off-the-seat duration of 300- 330% "This can_work out to 260-286" at 0.050 neh (1.27 mm} lft So far as lift is concerned. select one with an advertised lif of at least 0.625 inch (13.3 mrt) bul preferably nearer 0350 inch (139 mm). 1 have tried a umber of race cams, and three I re: commend are the Erson 308 AS grind anc two Crane arincis, numbered PIS Dana P322-10 Let's take the 2332-10 Crane cam as an exatnple, and I will explain how to tailor © your race requirement, The basic spec of the cam is: inlet opens 63° BTDC. closes 29° ABDC. Exhaust opens 98° BBD, closes 87° ATDC. That 1s off- the-seat-timmng Timng at 0.060 inch (62. Tm) hf is 38° BTDC. 62" ABDC for the inlet, and for the exhaust 70° BEDC 30° ATDC. Liftts 4 theoretieald.586 inch (149 mm) measured at zero valve lash, ‘Assume you intend to run long-dis tance race, say, 300-500 miles, Having lo race thase distances, you may be concerned that the cam lile will be a problem. The simple solution 15 to set ihe valve-stem length to give, say, 0.52060 540 inch €13.2- {3.7 mm) bf, de- creasing the toads on the cam iollower and cai profile and hopefully extend sng profile life For the shatter road race, say 25-80 miles, you may choose valve lengths re sulting in a higher hf, say 0.540-0.880 inch (137-142 mm), For drag rac, you have only to make enough passesof the stip to win the final round, in which case catelul selection of cam followers ane! valve lengths cen result in hits a much as 0.620 inch (15,25 mm} from this cam, For what i's worth, my experi- ence with ihe P3%2-10 suageststis cap- able of atleast $0 racing miles when set to produce about 0.580 inch (147 mr) lit’ Comeclly set up cama producmg ‘round 0.525-inch bift seem fo be goed for up to 1000 racing miles. AD I have just sad assumes using the standard ‘cam followers. Indications are that rol Jer followers, on cams up to 0.580 (140 tn) valve bits, have a long racing life CAMS FOR TURBOCHARGED ENGINES | will relate some of my own exper: ‘ences, plus those of Duane Essinger of Esslinger Engineering. Duane's expert ence of builcing many $00 bhp-plus turbo engines puts him in @ position where he can best be described as having very valte opinions; Dealing with sireet appiicahons first, we can say that whatever works well in a nommally-aspirated engme also ‘seems to work well n 3 turbo engine. If you are choosing a cam for a street roe engine, cet one that produces good low-end torque Don't worry too much about top-end power, the turbo ‘ill take care of that, To get low-end torque means using @ cam with short duration, Because of the turbo, back pressure 15 produced in the exhaust mamfold and i's a good ickea to keep overlap te a mirumumn. Wider lobe centres will, or a given duration, 1e- duce overlap. Figures between 110 and 114” between lobe centres have been used with success. With @ turbo engine valve lift is important, but not 30 much as with its nonmally-aspirated counterpart The rain reason isa good urbe instalistion builds a lot of power, 61typically 10 bhp or more over the stan- dard output, Struggling for another five bhp by means of .080 inch or so extra valve lift sn't quite as important. When choosinga cam fora normally aspirated engine, f cam A gives 15 bhp and cam Baives20 bhp by virtue of a higher lif, ‘which will you go for? The turbo engine on the other hand, will probably supply youwwithall the top-end power you want or can use. An extra five bhp al 6000 pm is almost irrelevant. So far as recommending street cams isconcemed, both of the standard Ford cams work well witha turho, 50 don tas- sume it essential to rush out and buy a trick cam. Generally, an alternative ‘cam wath increased valve lift and poss: bly mote duration will help, only in cir- ‘cumstances where you are attempting to-extract the most power for the least boost, It may also be worth considering an alternative cam if boost is likely tobe limited because of the fuel octane con: siderations. If you do want to pull up low-speed torque and get more top end power as well, then Eslinger re commends the Crane number 274 turbo grind But for my own part, Til once more recommend the Erson number 134 grind, Should you need a power curve to fall between street and race, then try a cam with the same sort of timing you would expect to use in a normally-aspirated engine When using a longer duration cam in a turbo engine, don't expect to see the same proportion of power increase that a cam change an a normally-aspirated engine produces. A inend, Doug Some rville, bult a turbo engine for his sand car. Once: built, the engime was tested on the dyno with different cams. Results were not totally conclusive but some valuable mformation was gathered, ‘Tests were conducted with cams from 270° to 300° duration. In essence, these ranged from a hot street grind ta a mild race gnind, The 270” camsstarted to run ‘well from 2000 rpm. On the other hand, the race cam did nothing but splutter up to 4000 rpm. At 8000 rom with boost figures the same in both cases, the race cam produced only seven bhp more. At 6000 rpm the two cams differed by ap proximately 18 bhp. This is about the same difference one could expect to see between two similar cams in an un blown engine. The moral of the story is, too much duration drops bhp at low rpm without necessarily giving a cor: responding increase 1m power at the top end, Making a statement like this 62. could be unwise, but let me qualify it further by saying that future develop ‘ments in intermediate street cam pro- files for turbocharged engmes may ‘well prove this statement wrong. If you intend to go racing, then choose a cam along more or less the same hnes as I previously described for @ normnally-aspirated engine. On Essiingers recommendation, I tied a Crane P332-10 catn i a turbo engine running on petrol’gasole and it pro- duced what can be best described as dazzling results However, I know that Competition Cams also has a well-de veloped race turbo cam. In the Esslinger Engineermg turbo alcohol engines, a Crane P332-10 cam is used with 45 psi boost; these engines nan 10 ‘over 10,000 rpm and produce over 500 bhp, COMPARING CAMS ‘Wading through cam manufacturer's specifications, comparing one cam with another to see what will best suit your needs is tiresome, Comparison of some aspects of the specifications 15 easy olhers are not. So you ean make such comparisons; a bref rundown on the way various cams are measured will help, Til start off with an easy ene; makina, comparisons of ills 1s generally straightforward. I's just a question of looking at the number and deciding whether i's biager or smaller than another one, ‘The only snag you are likely to run into is, some cam manufac turers quote the lift with zero running, clearance and some quote if with run hing clearance. Also, some manufactur fers assume the rocker ratio ona Pinto is, L6 and others assume 1.66, So even though its easy to compare the num bets, they may, in fact, differ by as much as the difference m rocker ratio used and the difference in the clear ance ramp. Next in line are timing figures, Most cam manufacturers quote off-the-seat timing figures, so you can compare: these without any great difficulty. Un- fortunately, comparing off-the-seat tim: ing figures gives you no indication of how fast the cam is iftig the valve but comparison of timing figures at 0.080 (27 mm) lif will give you a much bet ter idea of what is going on, So the next stage is to make a comparison of timing figures given at 0,050 inch (1.27 mm) lift. The lonaer these are, the more the ef fective duration, Generally speaking, @ racy cam with quick opening ramps ‘will have the 0.060 inch (1.27 mm) dura tion figures shortened by 22 °-25 ° as compared with off the-seat figures. Cams with milder acceleration rainps, where noise during operation is also a factor considered by the can de. signer, may have the 0.050 neh (1.27 mm) timing figures shortened by a3 much as 3) °-34 ® Off-the-seat curation is usually given inthe manufacturer'sspecitication but it you want to, its an easy one to workout ets say, for example, you want to cal- culate duration Take the figure the inlet valve opens BTDC and add this to the figure the inlet closesat ABDC. Add 180° to this number. ‘The same technique is applied to the exhaust Add the degrees BBDC the exhaust valve opens to the degrees ATDC that it closes, and add 180” That's the curation of the exhaust opening. To calculate the angle between lobe centres: is more long-winded but its sill straahilor ward, Basically what you do is deter mune how many degrees ATDC on the induction stroke that the inlet valve 1s fully open. Alter that you determine how many degrees BTDC on the exhaust stroke the exhaust valve was fally open. You add these two figures together, divide by two and voila, you have the lobe-centre angle. Here's an example Cam timing is 10,44" LC. 76° Intake duration = 44 + 76 + 76 + 180 = 300 Maximum valve lut will occur al Intake Duration divided by 2 = 180" Crank angle at which intake is fully epen = 180° 44” = 108 ATDC. Ex, 0, 78° Ex. C. 42° Ex. duration = 78 + 42 + 180 = 300? Marimum valve: lft will occur at Ex, duraion divided by 2 150° Crank angle at which Ex. 15 fully ‘opens 180° 42° = 108" BTOC Lobe centre =106 + 108 07° aM 2 Well, that's about it. Armed with the information Tye sel out, you should be better able to choose the right camshaft for your applicationCHAPTER FOUR Air Filters, Carburation & Manifolds AIR FILTERS m7 very ar learriilter 1 the mark ibe a mammoth have tested many and those di ussed here ale a. representative an nes tesieck, Bul m | nething has peed Equipment” stamped on 1 doesn! necessarily mean it 4 Go-last 41, Theairfilter and eae on many Ford SOHC engine installations can be a measurable source of airflow ‘em tesiton The vr eot rection youstouldtakeeresto use a can ter demon of aype that ree lowing. G.£1 FILTER COMPARISONS: FILTER FLOW EFFICIENCY MEASURED WITH STOCK CARBURETOR AND FILTER CASE function of atiair cleaner seo new MOTORCRAFT Faw. Ac zm | the longer the air cleaner o#% 78% 92% ES s72% “These filters were purchased fom a discount pats store and the manufacturer couldnotbeindentilied. Apart ‘rom this, such stores buy from the cheapest souree so the origin of ites so aquired wil vary, es ne FILTER POWER OUTPUT COMPARISON ON CLAYTON CHASSIS DYNOMOMETER lier since it was installed biter as - mounted. in a standard air fil HORSEPOWER HORSEPOWER ase on a standard carburetor | REM, USED ALTER (94% EFF) [NEW MOTORCRAFT FILTER (982% EFF) which, i turn, nounted on an sdaptor onthe flow bench Flow figures | 2000 190 190 | wore then taken through the air filter, | 3000 20 Bis | Thisfilter was then replaced withanew | 4000 ss a ar filter of the same brand and the | 4500 s ae Seine ait Now tests performed Ut you |_$%®_| i t = | refer to the chart Fig, 4 Test vehicle 2000 cc Pinto 1973 automatic transmission all figures taken in second gear. Tested by Joe Antonell/David Vizard, January 1877, that the duty air fl 63having covered @ maximum. of 5000 miles, was only 94 percent efficient, ‘This efficiency, by the way sured by comparing the az flow of the filter being tested, and no air filter atall im th The comparison of the t numbers oblaned then gives an idea of just how much the arr filter impedes the flow A new ait fiter of the same brand ted, proved to be 97.8 ent. Te you some idea of what can be achieved, I have added fis well Another note: sine measuring the air flow efficiency of the Fram atr filter, a design change w that incorps rales a Cotton belt fitted around the 01 side ofthe paper filtering element. This flectively reduced the Fram filler from 3 joint best, with the Motorcraft fi n to the same flow efficiency as aller. Thus, ify yoing to replace the air filter with a new paper one, ise Motorcraft filters (available an is mea percent res for other brands a the U.S), or Cooper filters (available ut England), ALTERNATIVE FILTERS Dn many vehicles employing the Ford SOHC enaine, the proximuty of the filter -ase lid to the mouth of the carburettor ‘a restriction. Very often, however this restaction can be substantially 16: duced by selecting anart hilterabout nich laller than the case. ' things 1t yields. a bigger area through which to draw marr. Secondly it allow ait to come into the filter case around the amular space at the edge of the fi jer case. Let's take the Pinto as an example, With the standard Motorcraft air filter installed, arr flow measured at 26 inches of water pressure drop was 199 cfm, With the air iter removed and the lid “ase still in position the aur flow was 200.8 clin, With the lic of the case removed, the aur flow was 221 cfm, thus showing the air filter lid was responsible for a flow loss of 26 § fm. A filter Ye mch taller was mstalled in the air filter case. ‘Phe air flow given with this taller filter was 220 cm, Amin sting thing to note here ss that if you lake the whole air filter case off anc just the carburettor bare without any case surrounding 1tatall, air low 1s only 2138 cl, thus showing that the be the air filter case aids air flow in carburetor, 64 ‘TRICK FILTERS Beware of the so-called trick filter. Its easy to boltona negative bhp change. | mill give some positive guidelines 10 steer you clear of modifications that wor't work. These rules will apply es lly to almost any two-barrel down- draft carburettor, be it the stan dard carburettor, 390 or $09 Holley, a different kind of Weber, of whatever As far as filtering elements are con srned, foam element iltersare less ef ficien! than the same size paper filter Indeed, some foam element filters have such an open cellular structure of foam that they do not filter. Therefore, f you nsist on running with a foam filter, you must have at least 20 percent more area of foam to filter than the original paper ye toa learn mickly ied and element. ‘The only advant filter 15 that it does not clog as and be clea 442. The Motorcraft iter show on te et onsistenty proved to be the bes lowing PAPER ‘lement iter tested. The cottn belted Fram iter on {height was the worstflowing filer the author could fina 443, Many old handsat hotroding use this simple trick of ting thefiterid upside down toinerease alow {othe carburetor Making this move with typical Pint iter ease as Seen here achieves Iti the now concave frm ofthe inverted ld restricts the low at the mouth ofthe carourettor reused, Beware of the open cell foam filter allt will do 1s reduce your engine ie, Ifyou want to buy an altemative fi tering element, the K & N filer isabout the best you can buy, (See chart 4-2 ‘This fiter isa wrasresis tance to clogging is concerned. On a typical Pinto, installing a K & N filter means the filter could run the entre life cf the car without cleaning and still flow better thana brand new paper element filter The size of the filter and the case di mensions all have an effect on the amount of aur flow into the carburettor ‘Tests have shown that in genezal, filters under eight inches diameter, respec: live of the air filler area involved, re duce flaw drastically. There seems be a turning point at about nine inches. ‘At this size and above they can be made very efficient. The rule here 1s: never use a filer less than eight inches diameter. in fact regard nine inches asFIG.¢2 AFTER MARKET FILTERS FILTER FLOW EFFICIENCY WITH 8” AFTER MARKET CASE ON STOCK CARBURETTOR FOAMELEMENT a75% TALL PAPER ELEMENT 38, + Thisfter gave the same fiter ares of the stock fier but flow s stil below best achieved with the stock ite. FILTER FLOW EFFICIENCY ON 350(C FIM. 2 BARREL HOLLEY 8° CASE PAPER CASE FOAM ELEMENT ELEMENT 922% 8.1% 9°CP.CHROMECASE | 9°CP.CHROMECASE PRPERELEMENT | K&/NFILTERELEMENT 300% Nomeasurableflow loss. + This is the same tl element as used for the tet with the stock cab, away fier ease the minimum. An oval fitter 8-9 Jong ils principal length will wor you intend using a Holley four-bar rel carburettor on your engine, there re a few effects you can take advan mn the air filter department. Be suse a four-barrel carburettor draw: air over a wide area due to the spacing of each barrel of the ve to the proximity 1 as shouding 1s concerned, In air filer lid is positioned ata id, as fact, it certain tually ads 0 the placement of th carburettor throats, does 1 be that critical, and typically any low profile air filter helps the flow. How listance away > mounting face, the att filter top auburetto the i, relative extent this is lady slighty restited when the lid is up the ight way ass ilustrated by this ct ver, il 18 6 n diameter. ¥ nould regard 10 inches minimum, Tris possible t nine inches but you are st abou ing to lose it. As far as the air filter element 1 ncerned, I recommend either the ndard Motorcraft or Cooper paper IK EN. On engines equipped with one carb barrel per cylinder, the aur filter situa ton becomes critical. While testing 0 Oselli Engineering's dyno, engine buth r David Ray found that on a Group 1 RS engine equipp olex rs, the air filter system was ra drop of 10 bhp. Sucha p in power almost invalidates > one barrel per cylinder sarburation, This substantial dror element filter or best yet in power, due to the air filter system, seems peculiar to Sroup he later Group downdrak Weber carbure! Solex carburette Tt would appear that setup engines mpioyin aw filer box, overcam 6 problems. If you are in stalling side-draft Webers or Delortos he quickest and simplest air filters ar the foam element filters that bolt di Although 1 1 rectly to the carburettors. have not ttied every brand on the me ket, those [ have tried range mance fom average uurther, most, if not all, basic flaw in design, sulfer from oni the carburettor ram pipes have to be removed to allow the installation of the aur filter. This as yadl, Whatever filler you use, try to 1n corporate some form of curved entry Into the carburettor Having a sharp enlry loses air flow. This can lead to er ratic carburation at lower revs. This fell on a manual transit sion car, but it certainly does show uf onan aulomatic transmission car, spo may not be ing the whole drivabilily of the machine, Ifyou are going to the trou and expense of side-draft carburettors take all steps to equip them witha lara ir box, or large K & Nair filtersand K NS ram pipe The ideal setup for a side-draftc: buretior isan airbox on the carburett ani air filter drawing cool ai from the front of the car to feed the air bo ble dunensions 1 ir filler system on your wally ancreas Aerodynamically,. i alr box 1Sof rea ible to have an uur box with proper volume gives the shock waves within the impression that they have struck open air. In tur, this yield more positive filling of the cylinders at certain parts of the rari 1ange ‘The Manx Racing air box isan exan ple of an air box big enough to get the Job done. ‘This particular box 1s de sighted for remote mounting of the aur filer HOW BIG? The next question is, how big an atr fi fer 15 needed for any given situation? cormulas exist which tell you the minimum size necessary to give a 99 efficient air filter elemet Sure, you can make the Biter bigger than the following formulas describe, and itwill be to your advantage, But any percent 65that may be-mad to the laws of with respect y give the effective: IL hai ude ondito alter er, for n very dust mest tae HH ang will be Gouble tt he ter, don bother straight to. a K & N anythin that this when deal sr bh thal Now for the nent A= CIDXRPM ¥ formula u r air filer ne fol mula APH Ais the area you have just calculated rom one of the above equations, AFH is the Aur Filler Height you intend to use, This height 1s measured between tv rubber sealing rings of the air filter ele. ‘meni, not the overall height. Generally speaking, the effective height of an air filter is Ya height Hs inch less than the overall CARBURETTORS & MANIFOLDS ‘The standard two-litre engine can greatly benefit from in burettor air fow, Given all the carbura tion it can use, a standard two-litre en gine would produce abont 12-14 bh more. Smaller engines can also benefit from extra carburation, especially 66 45, By using an air fiter 174” tllay, thro air flow restrition points prio to the crburottor mouth are eloved, these bing the snorkel restriction, as much ofthe ar now bypasses. Thea iter Sizes increased, 30 helping ow andthe bs moved Ya" further away fom the carb mouth, 45, Before installing anal like this, | advise checking out the flow figures in Fig. ¢2. This should demonstrate the fat that tis stietly 2 csmatis-onl item, those with a rest ingle ng the best arb. Ii your vehicle hasa single barrel spent 1s to. have carb your best plan, if cost 1s a pr 1 the job tn factor, isto replace it with the standard large sums of money Ford two-barrel unit, This, complete having huge air flow with manifold and linkage, can usually not fly produce that much be bought ata breaker's yard. more power than an adequate car As the engi more ra wuretor. In in some cases it may cally modified, the carburettor’ effect produce less. If youare aller all the bhp nthe power curve becomesmorecrit- possible obviously you must use the 1. Aleach stage of the game, the key be carburation you can afford, Most4.1, Apart from being highly functional, this & Nfiter case and element made a smart looking instalation ‘onthe author's Weber carburated Pint, hotwodders must modify their eng with some sort of budget i mind, 1 wil start with the cheapest elfective modi cations first and progress io the expen sive ones later. UTILIZING STANDARD PARTS ‘The standard intake manifold utilizing the Hol feber carburettor, 15 jood. Flow bench and dyno tests show itis capable of performance superior tc ‘almost all the other two-harrel man te also capable of son the market. I power than some of four-barrel carbimantfold combina: tions. In standard form, the mtake i shout @3 percent efficient, ‘This figure is arrived at by measuring flow with and vathout the manifold. Flow distributi 1ow well one runner flows in relatian to another, — is also good, ‘Typically all runners are within 1/2 percent of each other, With a few minutes! work, Uns manifold can be improved further by radiusing the areas indicated in the ac companying photo, The main factor imiting am flow m th bburettor itself. Since the standard mat fold works so well, we would expect that any increases in air flow made at the carbu show upasa bh jain. Testing proves this out; even stall incteases mn airflow made al the purettor readily show up on dynamometer Working on the premise that modift cations costing little, yet producing 48, ABB Finding a saistactory iter setupfor own carburetor nstallaton ean be dict a¢ ie rom indifferent to useless. This K&N low high alow without measurable Festriction but also allows the carb ram pipes to be Used 410.8 nearing th radius on ach prt unnera the junction wth he plenum, the flow ofthis already efficient manifold canbe nereased.Alargeradus on ‘the top edge produces the greatest gains inflow. 67FG.43 ‘All measurements at 25° Ho 1 2 2 4 5 orm. zz 237 ae 282 285, 1. Standard carburettor mounted on adaptor on flow banch, Base of standard fier in place Fier and iter cased removed, 2. Asfor test 1 butbuttrfy shafts narrowed and butters knife-edged 3. All las marks removed from booster (auxiliary) venturi and edges ofairhorn rounded of 4, Primary barrel venturi bored to 30.0 mm and secondary to 31.0 mm NOTE: boring out ventrs breaks through casting, tcan be easily repaired with any epoxy resin adhesive 5. Choke buttrty removed 4-11 Removing the choke toy was ted at ‘arlous stages of ear modifying, The flow bonch Showed that was generally worth 3 cfm at whatever stageit as red 4.12, rads onthe car intake, smoothed out ‘ition but produced very Hite in the way ef extra Silom. The dyno, however, els dierent tale A ‘Generous radlus prior to the carb mouth almost Saye gave about? bp inereace, 4.13, Here Dov Vieard checks the “signal strength” to various jet after carb modifications have be ‘made. This is done by making tppings into the ‘arious dreuits ofthe carb and measuring the essute drop that occurs when agiven amount of it [Spassed though the car,most desirable, let's consider modifica tions fo the standard carburettor. Fig 4 3 lists modhications that inctease air flow fram 227 cfm to 265 cim. As usual this ismeasuredat 25 inches water. You may want to compare f these air flow fi ures with most U.S, (2 BEL) carburet lors, which are typically measured three inches of mercury, To do this, multiply the figures in chart Fig. 4-3 by L27, Interestingly, measured at the conventional three inches hg. pressure drop normally used for two barrel car t urettors, air 0 More important than atr i he cari solely throug flow gained th sysiem of thon system ana resentative valve lift 1 21.6 perce you pea rons Lin aller’ clement otal air flo red ua the t Takin increases from 288 waited tor i nduction the maduc landard two-hire en br Joss at a select wl air filler module arlier, that K&N {414,43600r500 cfm two bare Holley carb onthe standard manifold makes agood ateratveto thestandard {arb An adopted pate ax shown heres required. In the past have obtained mine rom Racer Walsh or Spearo, = 416.11 youintend using a two bare! Halley on aPinto with emission equipment, you wilnsdto ater the ca linkages title in many casos. For instance it often necessary to et part ofthe orginal inkage st he point Indicated so that t clears everything when the trot is opened, percent. IFyou burettor along the lines previously de- mibed, the total air flow loss will be wn further to 142 percent. On the ‘dyno, these low gains represent a solid jold Increase on a standard enaine modify the car: ALTERNATIVE CARBS ce the factory manifold is 50 good, he limiting factor becomes the maximum abilities of the standard car burettor, And past this there comes a ime when the catb cannot be easily modhited to yield any mote air flov this point adaptinga higherair flow c: burettor to the standard manifold, sthe Araightiorward solution ‘Two carburetors which have proved highly successful are the 350 and the 500-cfm Ho lors. Many Pinic 'y two-barrel carburet alistsinthe USA, stock an adaptor plate lo conver stud mounting on the standard ma to the bolt-hole pattern on the 350 800 Holley. Calibrating 350 c Holley for a tyro-bine encine is very sim: ple if you bear in mind one thing most Of these carburetiors are built ior en: ines of at least double the displace nl, As such, the power valve restric onifice normally way too large for a (worltite engine. For most street ap: ns ona Pi plicati nto enqune or any two litre Ford OHC engine this orifice needs to be around 0017-0020 inch (043.081 mm) diameter. If it 1s too large, when the power valve comes info operation, the mixture will be very rich and power will take a nase-div And, if you lean-out the main jet to com: pensate, you run into arivability prob Jems at part throttle, Apart from this, use on the calibrating the Holley for Pinto engine seems a operation, Not only does it achieve good bhp gains, it also provides with regard to emissions, a very clean run ning engine, On my own engines [ have found I have been able to meet emis sion standards easier with a 380 Holley than the standard Holley/Weber car burettor, 'o give you some idea of how much power the 380 Holley is worth over the standarel Holley/Weber car- bburettor, see Fig. 4-4 fa 350-cfm carburettor is good, how much better can a 800-cim carburettar be? Well, among other things, this de pends on the engine's state of tune, If you have a carn which pulls fairly tah 69rpm, a modified he: ing-exhaust system can utilize the 590. Again, m my expen ence there appears to be litile or no dis .dvantage in using the 600 on mildly tuned engines. It's just that if an engine doesnt need ut, it doesnt gain much bhp. If you expect your engine to hyp andl you expect rey it up to 7000 rpm or more, then the 00 clm/He off, See Fig. 4-5, which shows the 380 Holley for a 500. This particular en gine had a Ford Stage Il cam init anda modified head. It had been developed to the slage where the extra cim could be ulllized, Note that there is virt no difference in the power curv these two carourettors untll about 8500, out from here on up, the power curves diverge. Importantly, if you have previ ously Tun a 50 Holley and you decide ase a 500 Holley, 1 will he n mnodify the adaptor plat larger butierflies on the 800 Holley the adaptor plate 9gerorgon or erawnane us go rw wou cane 120| i HORSEPOWER HORSEPOWER 100 nou “Stanoane” "OSS Cou “ 300 are 4 CORRECTED FLYWHEEL HORSEPOWER. «9 ENGINE RPM ‘hoo sto 855 — eas — 00 4.171 you are going to use 2-bara Holley on an automatic Finto there wl be some linkage fabrications to Unat the do but the efrtts wall worth ft. The throte cable bracket (arrow A) has been cutout of she original bracket Compare what you see here with your own throttle cable bracket and masify it accordingly Arrow B indicates the enble connection to the throttelever and sow C the transmission “kick down attachment point hes COMPARISON OF 350 AND 500 CFM HOLLEY CARBS. Las.Fr. roraue\, £0 a # SY EE HORSEPOWERALTERNATIVE WEBERS Although [ have not tried it myself, 1 have heard reports that the factory en- gineers have achieved very good re- sults with a 38 DGAS Weber on two- hitre engines. Drivabihty 1s said to have been improved and power increased bby about five bhp. This carburettor will bolt directly to the standard intake manifold, so apart from installing an air leaner (K & N)and thr traightforward conversion. For my owm par, I have tried a 40 D.F.L8 Weber ona 2000 engine, This carb flo 330 cfin and was originally ten use on engines having one barrel per cylinder. [believe this carburettor was normally used on Ferraris. It bolts a rectly anto the Pinto manifold, As far as maximum power is concerned, 1 works very well, bul it does suiler fom one drastic problem: it has no power valve and therefore must be calibrated very nich, The result isa tremendous amount of exhaust pollution, very high fuel con sumption and bad drivabilty until close to full throttie is reached. Al full throttle, however, t produces a commendable power curve. For my own part, Ladvise you to steer clear of this carburettor, not because there 1s anyllung particularly wrong with 1! but because itis unsuita ble for our purposes. It was never de- signed to go onto a setup whereby more than one cylinder per barrel is 4-188 4-191 will be necessary o makeup yout own transmission “kick- dow” rod when installing two barrel 350/508 Holley on your Pio. These two shots show the form it should take used SINGLE SIDEDRAFT MANIFOLDS There may be more, but | only man aged to track down and try three single de-drait manifolds. Each has a diffe rent mode of operation. If you refer to Fig 46 you he baste port lay. oul of each type. ‘The Austrahan- made Warnerford maniold.s anequal-length type, As can be seen from the photo the passages crass over each other and in doing so, there isa considerable change m cross-sectional shape and area, As a result, this manifold has poor air fow. Some of the ports have flow ef ficiencies as low as 83 percent, The ay rage flow efficiency of thus manifold is 86 percent, considerably less than the standard manifold. It is possible to achieve more power with this type of manifold and a single-side draft Weber than with the standard manifold and the carburettor. Here is the reason why: on manifold/carburettor 7 {£20.1 wied a Weber 400.15 Weber bath in standard form and modified ona 2st Pinto. t produced: Ina but hore were many drawbacks es the tex expan. protwetgeet the standardsetup, the carburettor is the: lnmiting factor, not the manifold. With the War- nerford manifold/side-draft carburetor combination, the carburettor will flow considerably more air than the man: ifold, and the ‘otal efficiency of the car burettor/manifold combination may be up on the standard carburettor and standard manifold combination, How. ever, if you compare 800 clm of carbura~ tion on both the Warnerford manifold and the standard manifold, the standard manifold will give more ait flow and more power, Next, the Piper log manifold. In es sence, the theary behind its design 1s sound but the manifolds itself is poorly executed. Of the three manifolds this had the lowest average flow efficiency, only 84.5 percent, The biggest hangup 18 caused by the two centre cylinder runners being acutely angled away from the direction of air flow, This means the atr has to make a very sharp tum to enter these port rinters. Result very poor fow efficiency as you can see from the numbers on Fig. 46. Again, this manifold failed to produce as much power as a typical 39 Holley on the standard manifold Last, we come to the Linx 180° oven pulse manifold. This 3s one of the few manifolds that [ve tested apparently having some serous thought done on i Tisalso the only one Ive tested having flow efficiencies which were as good or better than the standard marifold Since tt was the only manilold of the qroup thal really did work, it bears looking at in more detail. Fust of all why the 180 ° setup? Would it not have been easier to have the right batrel of the carburettor feeding the two right hand cylinders and the left barrel feed ingrthe two lef cylinders? Surely the air flow could have been made better under these circumstances. The: ans wer to that 1s “Yes, it could." Unfortu nately, however, this means each throat gets two pulses and then a long idle period where air flow is minimal. As a result, a mixture mal-distnibution prob: lem anes, There isa tendency of each cylinder fed by each barrel to have an incorrect mixture in both cylinders. But the Lynx manifold was desioned for normal street use Tt was designed to give good milearye and good thrattle re sponse even at low revs while also tak ing emission requirements into ac: count, By having pulses spaced 180 apart on each carburettor barrel, mix lure disnbution problems are minimal 72 FIG4.6 WARNAFORD EVEN RUNNER LENGTH MANIFOLD 4 8: 38.0% PIPER LOG MANIFOLD 1 2 90.69% 78.9% ee esos 79. LYNX 180° EVEN PULSE MANIFOLD 2 1 93.7% 95.1 3 4 91% SS 4.21, The low bench showed the Warnerord single ‘Side draft manifold was FAR LESS efficent than the ‘Standard Ford intake manifold The dyno showed orresponding results ‘4.22, With carburetiors of equa ow patentil, the Pipe “Log” Manifold produced less ait low hp than the standerd Ford intake, 4423, My own choiee of single sie draft manifolds ‘would Be this Lynx unit. twas the only ane! tested ‘hich produced better iow eficienies thn the Standard manila.matic transmission car, a Dellor carb on tis manifold is well wortha try As far as maximum power is con ered, fi nally supetior at top Tevs to that of a 50 cfm Holley yure on a power curve marg FOUR-BARREL CARBURETTORS Airflow comparisons made between two-and four barrel carburetlors relate eclly to manifold flow efficiency mi wr barrel manifolds divide car into two barrels for tw ylinders, Flow bench testing 1s nor mally cared out by opening the intake none cylinder then drawing air manifole an th burettor. Evaluating a four-barrel car burettor in sucha manner hasthe effect of halving the effective capac carb, thus a 390cim four barrel cark 4.24 Horejsthe singleDolirt kit sit comes rom Lynx. This setup proved tobe ust about the best induction ‘setup for torquein the low and mid speed range, thus making teal foranautomatictransmission ortowing I iciencies for four-barrel Vohicle. Top end hp was sim to that produced by 2 350 cfm Holley. For optimum results the only change ranifolds typically range hetweex 90 ‘wouldmateto his setup wou ou sarge RN iter and Sm or Thereabou] on 1 nee ed burettor’s better fuelat Acall runnersor divided plenurms. Most, ifnot » Lynx’s Jol Brudesin im Australia all, fow-barrel marufolds aval infemed this ‘Ther findings have sampanies as Spearco, Racer been that the Dell q 0 Walsh, Weiand, re intended for better id tiuottle response (arn h a Holley $90 clin four-barrel fant on ana Kc transis arbourettor. ‘This carb has two small but also gives a few more bhp at primary barrels qvving good atomiza ck revs. Talking of RPM ranges and ton at patt-tiwolti operation, The utomnatic transmission cars lead neon larger secondary barrels are vacuum fo this: suber ricular, However, operated and come into operation only youshould know that this manifol as the engine demand warrants. In an 2 high rpm unt. Depending on the cam matic Transmission Pinto Lowned, [ Ihe head-work that's been done, used a Spearco exhaust manifold anda ly wn experience has been thal the Spearco intake manifold mountuig a Jower curve flattens at about 6000 rpm, feur-barrel mF and one o jeople have reported this, and my own modified heads, This combine: nemnvelves claim this manifold is on raised the rear wheel horsep not meant for high rpm application: rom 51 to 69. However, a 350 tw ith respect to aulomaic transmis- rel on the standard manifold also pro- on torque demands, this is one ofthe duced 63 horsepower at the rear best manifolds for such use. Dyno is. This result seems 10 be fairly ing hasshown that in the 1300-2300 rpm commen when comparing two- and range, this manifold gives more torque four-barrel installations, and the four m « han twin side- draft manifolds, Again, — barrel advantage is, in mast cases mat 4425. This spt port Otfenhauser manifoldworked thus ray be due fo beller alomuation, ginal. Where four barrels cio score over wellonthellow beach nd onthestip The priniple accuse two cylinders draw from each the big sinalo two barrel, ‘of separate ports WITHINEACH PORT fortheprimary C25 yi _ tnefocondaryboreswonswel probabiyieecnaet barrel rather than one. However, due to ity and smoothness, This seems te ofexcesiveportsizeinthehoad.Theprmarybarrels (je [20 layout, each carburettor barrel most evident on engines Introduce the fresh charge into the ast moving ar at the TOP ofthe intake port inthe head Mae ot Nese rte Jovyerrtom pensar wi ss each cylinder operates under more but one cylinder. Because manifold for use on a mildly. mi Jess identical pulse condition untier volume is small, minimal reduc- especially with auto tran: Although tus manifold fell tion of the incuction pulses cw hort duration, Ingh-lifl street cami ‘Weber ca plenum chamber action takes place and ported heads can produce sharp hat tt might work b If you are contemplating an alterna induction pulses. In turn these produce carburettor due tot! ive carburetor/manifold for an au- alr flow velocities in a 380 Holley two:426. This Spearco manifold does in effect, divide a single four barelinto two tworbartel cabs of hal the Selec as: Sena reas 3 —< | I~ £ 1-350 2-BBL \ 5. : 3 : wanirou 3 3 390 4-B6L HOLLEY speanco i | Miniroto aves! space 2 tnben cane g ‘990 4-BBL HOLLEY SPEARCO. 3a MantroLD WITH NG SPACER ee ee ee ee sate for drivabutty problems stemming fected by as lle as 4° too much ad form large throtle bores. But cam tim vance on the carmsball This situate iogisigucty,tidurstion wivstalllie foo: senda ite fa four-barn long, drivability may suller. With some hot street cams and two-barrel installa 4 used, 427... a8 seen here allows all four evinders to ‘daw from al four bares ofthe carb. See Fig. 47 for Ug ffects on the power output when used with and without spacer 4.28, This 390 cm Holey four barrel was des Specicallyforasmall displacement engine. ‘ofthe ventuis compared with hs COMPETITION FOUR-BARREL CARBURATION Virtually all the four-barrel manifolds available for the Pinto are intended mannly for street use. At the ume of w1428,.... bigger brother, the 600 cfm Holly, canbe 431. This excelent twin side drat Delors setups avalabe as at rom Lynx ‘Soon here. Areallybigh winding, wal developed sent aA et hey See ej res wet LEC : oh : nn fhe vo irettor. Although the manifolds previ feel if his w a) ‘0 ee got:able to adapt sidedraft Webers or Dellortos to most installations. When Webersand Dellortosare mentioned in the same breath, the almost inevitable guestion comes up as to which isbetter, The Dellorto carburetors appear t have finer atomization of the fuel and since we are in a situation where fuel ropaut can easily occur due to the large port, the Dellortos would appear to be better, My preference is for De- llortes, and many of the cnnckest, nor mally aspirated engines are so equip ped. Dellorto carburetors are now readily available in USA, The com pany you need to get in touch with i ‘Claudes Buggies in Farmersville Calt fornia. In Australia, try Lynx. In Eng land, Contact lopments 1s the company to deal with You can find Weber distnbutors in every major city but if you should have trouble, try con: acting B.A.P. or Red Line in USA, In Australia, Warnerford would be a good one to contact, and in England, try Weber UK. Carburettors of Sunbury on-Thames HOW BIG? When you are shopping for sidedraft carburettors, just how big should you go? Should you use 40s, 42s, or 48s or even bigger. A simple rule helps here. Although not 100 percent accurate it will give youa guide, If youexpect your engine realistically to produce over 155 bhp, figure on 43s. If you anticipate less 14.32. Four 40 mm Mikuni carbs grace this Ford powered offroad car. They proved capable of good Powe output and are insensitlveto tebumping and Jarvng experienced of-roed conditions, figure on 42s or 40s. Forty-mil- throats are good up to about 150 bhp and 42s to about 185. Over that you will need the bigger carburettors. Should you be overly ambitious and de- cide to go for 45s when not needed you will actually lose bhp, Interestinaly, a42 DCOE Weber with 82 mm chokes will flow more air than a 4§ DCOE with 34 chokes And if 35 mm chokes are used the 45 starts to out-flow the 42. The point Tam trying to make is, don't be over ambitious, When building a street en ge, if anything, err on the small side for better drivability. If you intend to build an all-out race engine, 45 mm car Fa 49 FLYWHEEL HORSEPOWER 1909 2000 3000 4.33. Fite requirements for Mikuni carbs are easily Satised by these high low K & N clip-on filters, “4000 burettors are too small. Youlll need at least 48 mm carbs, and here Dellortos prove to be the favourite ‘MIKUNIES Another carburettor well worth consid: ering for use on an independent runner system (LR) is the Japanese Mikuni carburettor This has excellent flow uuaits and for out-and-out racing yields good power JETTING If you think you can buy a pre-jetted carburettor for your application, you 50006000 ENGINE Ral, ———— 70001434, This fel injection systom is offered by Holbay Engineering, ts intnded for use with petrol gas os tothe alcohol systems offered by Essinget Engineering, cer Walsh and ethers. 4.35. Many high performance fuel injaction systems tmpioy side pate totes but the Holbay setup toes utterfies, This would appear tobe adequate {or most instalstions 4636: When dusty conditions preva arg ar fier ‘must be used. Shown heres the large element on Bwaine Essingers normally aspirated sand tTare not being realistic. Inall the years I have been builciing high-performance engines, | have only had one set of car- burettors jetted optimaliy at the outset. ‘Typically, aset of carburettors jetted by 4 carburettor manufacturer or supplicr will be between 5 and 10 bhp down from what they are ideally capable of Gn these engines we are typically ex- pecting a ten, sometimes a 15 bhp in- crease through precise jetting, The gol- den rule is, having purchased your car burettors, always use a chassis, dynamometer for correct carburettor calibration, CARBURETTOR LINKAGES ‘This 13 an area where many home mechanics fall prey to problems Ifyou 78 buy acanburetior kit, be sure it contains linkages compatible with your particu: lar velucle. Some carburettor linkage kts cannot be used with automatic transmissions inasmuchas they have no provision for a kickdown linkage. Ifyou intend using a four-barrel setup on a Pinto and you want to retain the ‘kickdowm linkage I suggest you use the Spearco setup. If you intend using a two-barrel Holley on an automatic and maintain the kackdown, take a look at the nearby photo and see what | cob: bled up through modifying the original brackets ‘The only other item necessary was a piece of light gauge tube from which to fabricate the kickdown rod. As far as making a linkage for your carburettor mstallation, [offer a couple of suagestions. Racer Walsh has some linkages available for sidedraft Web- ers be they single or twin, and for the two- and four-barrel Holleys. For un- conventional conversions, Lynx pro- ducesa carburettor adaptor kit contain ing all manner of gadgets, rods, ball joints and fittings. Ihave used this kat on couple of occasions not only for Ford SOHC but other vehicles as well, and.it has proved to be very useful. In Eng: land most of the carburettor kit man- ufacturers provide some linkage parts ‘Magard outlets and Chnis Montague Carbarettor Co are a good source of supply for excellent twin side draft in kages, if your carb kit is not linkage equipped. However, no! alldo, so do ut vestigate before you buy a carburettor kit which may seem fo have a super knockdown price.CHAPTER FIVE Exhaust Manifold & Exhaust System Inspite of much research, exhaust sys tems are still a combination of science and tnal and error. There is no doubt a great deal is still to be leamed and on top of that, there are a few things to be uniearnect. Getting the best power curve possible from a normally asp Tated engine is a question of juggling with pressures, On a silenced, street dnven engine, the lowest-back pres sure possible aver the entire rprn range used is our largét. On an open-exhaus race engine we atlemped to use shock wave and an mertially produced pres: sure drop to draw the exhaust from the combustion chamber, ‘This effect 1s especially beneficial on engines wich have large overlap cams. Here is how it works: ila pressure below atmo: can be created in the exhanst port dur ing the ovetlap petiod, the contents of the combustion chamber will tend 10 flow fram the chamber into the exhaust port By the same token, the contonts of the intake will tend to flow from the port into the combustion chamber, When this happens, we score in Lwo ways Under normal cucumstances the piston cannot push exhaust from the combus- hon chamber. As a result, this residual charge of exhaust dilutes the incoming, charge. If the chamber is scavenged with the incoming air/uel mixture, not only asthe exhaust charge been elim nated, but the combustion chamber 1s filled witha fresh charge, Thusbegins to take on more significance when some demonstrative numbers are thrown in, Let us assume the engine isa 2000cc unit witha 14:1 compression ratio witha chamber volume 3écc. If each cylinder pulls in another G8cc of fresh charce, the power is going to improve in about the same manner as increasing engine capacity by IS2ec (4 x 38). I exhaust tuning is really dialled in and the cylin der scavenging 1pm coincides wath in: take shock wave tuning, yet more in: creases in power are possible and one more factor of significance starls 10 show up. If the scavenging action is great enough, a fresh charge will not only be pulled into the chamber but also through into the exhaust port If iL gets this far, i's wasted. Under these cHrcumstances it may be necessary 10 lower the CR so thal the increased charge voluine has room to stay in the chamber. Under these conditions change retention always gets prefer ence over the geomettic CR.. Although the geometric CR may come down, the effective CR ts staymg largely’ un changed because of increased cylin: der filling, ‘With an exhaust system for the street, shock wave and inertial extraction be: come signlicantly mote difficult, due 10 the presence of the muffler, ‘The biggest enemy power has ina silenced, wystem 1s back-pressure. Some ex. perumenters have claimed that in cer fain instances, a litle back-pressure in @ stroot system fas helped power. My contention here is that the experiments: were nol closely controlled enough and the small back-pressure was in fact compensating for some malad) in mbxture or tuning. In my expenence, when everything that I can think of been optimized, the lowest back-pres sure gives the best power output An approach that seems to be taking Increasing importance, isthe designing of an engine's entire air throughi-flow system having the minimum back flow possible, This is a relatively new con cept for most high performance engine builders. The basic concepl is very simple. Deciding on exhaust pipe dimen tions is never an easy task, and it 1s further complicated by the fact that there are essentially two different con: figurations to consider. Systems can be four into one (4/1), or four into two into one (42/1), The 4/2/1 system seems popular, but I have not seen as much power with this type as with the 4/1 type. Another aspect of al least equal importance fora street-driven machine is that a 4/1 system seems better at iron tng out undersirable characteristics of relatively Jong-timing road cams. To give an example, a rally engine equip ped with a 300 ° cam would pull nght down to 1000 rpm with a long 4/1 sys tem, but with a 4/1 system st would positively refuse 10 lake full. throttle even as high as 2800-3000 1pm Moreover, i! imposes a power lass of 4 to 15 bhp between 5000 and 7000 rpm ‘The only point against four-into-one is that they generally do not produce the mich-range torque that a-4/ 2/1 system can, ‘This 1s the prneipal reason that many tubular factory mar. sfolds are of this configuration and the fact the 4-1 system sometimes cannot be installed due 10 space limitations, ‘Another point is that a manufacturer 1s hardly likely to install an exhaust s tem yeilding high-rev power if the en cine is redlined al, say, 5000 rpm, ‘The biggest draviback to long pend, high-overlap cams, the flow reversals which occur at low 1pm These flow reversals diminish a 1pm nises, because increased gas speeds have more momentum and less time to reverse. If ports and valves are de signed to flow weil in the correct direc- tion but badly in the reverse direction undesirable low-speed charactenstics of these cams are substantially 16 duced. Positive and negative shock ‘waves travelling within the exhaust sys tem present a similar situation. Also curcent system desgnsas shown in this book, which backllow badly, also tend to allow easier passage (0 2 useful 79