I understand that the Len Hoffman are the gold standard for Heads. What could be considered the silver standard? I don't want to rebuild the stock heads because even Len thinks they are too old and tired to fix. CB and AA performance make new castings but do they address the main problem with the valve seats that plagued the original heads?, Remember that this is supposed to be the poor mans Porsche if I was a real Porche owner I would be driving a GT3. I can buy the Lens heads but the back of my mind kicks and screams that I bought the entire car for 2k and these 2 hunks of aluminum are almost double what I paid for the entire car. I want to rebuild the engine to a 2270. I want improved HP but not MAX possible. I want a reliable engine with improved HP to displacement that lasts 100k miles. what do the average folks do when making a 2270?

(edited for more realistic expectations)

Porsche’s aren’t Honda’s - I have both. Call up FAT and see what they offer. They might not be the gold standard but it doesn’t hurt to look at alternatives.

It’s said that all Porsche’s cost the same in the end. It just depends when you pay.

Speed cost's $$$, how fast do you want to go?

I recall back in the '80's a good friend had a Harley Sportster, he added new "thunder heads" I still recall the improvement. I will be looking for a silver standard at some point soon.

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Unrealistic expection IMHO. Modern 2021 Civic HP ranges from 158 HP to 174 HP. We won't even talk about the type R coming in at 306 HP. Now if you're talking about matching a 1974 Honda Civic at 74 HP that can surely be done .

You're dealing with 70's vintage air cooled technology. More HP = more heat and there is an uppper bound to how much heat you can dissipate with aircooled engines.

As far I'm aware there are very few data points that indicate that you can take a VW T4 engine out to 2270cc and get 200,000 miles from it. Yeah, there is the Raby data for his 2056cc build, but, statistically speaking that is only 1 data point. I don't say that to tear down Jake. I'm a huge fan of what Jake does. His data point is hugely interesting but it is singular from a statistics standpoint. If he had 100 more of those 160,000 mile data points fully documented then it would really become compelling.

http://aircooledtechnology.com/high-mileage-teardown/

Edit: I do concede that there are lots of near stock, well cared for VW engines out there that have made it to high mileage. Just questioning how many 2270 or larger engines make it to that mileage.

Our T4 engines were never designed to power a sporting car, more like a bus pulling up hills.

From my small insight one weak link is the cylinder/ cylinder head connection. If this connection is really dialed in and the engine temps are kept in check, maybe some power with long life could be had.

If you bought your car for only $2k, consider yourself ahead money-wise spend the money you saved on the car on heads that will last. Especially if you're going beyond the stock displacement.

Unfortunately, AA missed an easy opportunity to upgrade the casting to use a 12mm long reach spark plug instead of the stock 14mm short one.

Len’s heads don’t drop valve seats and if you get the thermal coatings can last. A 2056 with a better than stock cam gives you more modern hp.

Reliable 170-180hp is totally do-able, just bring money.

You'll never get 200K out of it without regular maintenance, which includes freshening the heads about every 60k miles. But really you should be doing stock heads at about the same interval.

I agree that we cannot match a modern VVT engines output power but as Jake proved, HP improvements are possible mainly thru head and cam improvements.

You bring up another point,I was under the impression that the dropped valve was the most common reason for engine failure. You say that these engines by design need to be rebuilt periodically no matter which heads are installed, if so then the cost/benefit of LN head loses some of its appeal. I was hoping that once I replaced the D-jet with a modern ECU (Haltech) I could rebuild the engine using modern components chevy bearings, H con rods, LN heads I would have a car that only required standard maintenance like a modern car. oil/spark plug changes with occasional valve adjustments. What heads are most folks installing on their rebuilds.

Check with Rich at 914 Werke.

He can help you with the proper build and any additional needs based on your intended use and where you live.

The whole engine doesn't need to be rebuilt, it can easily go 150-200K, just the heads need to be touched up. 5K miles a year will give you 12 years before you should need to do this. The heads don't just drop seats, most cases it's overheating due to grease caked dirt clogging the fins...or a rag in the fan, mouse nests, etc. So the head mantainance is a good excuse to check and clean the cooling system.
I don't see how an ECU, bearings, rods, etc. would increase longevity, just like quality heads won't replace good mantainance habits.

What is unrealistic is expecting a 50 year old car with an 90 year old engine design to perform like a modern car. Really if that's what you want then respectively maybe you would be better off with a modern car.

With a modern ECU you have more supervision as to what is happening with the motor and can program fail safes like detune accordingly to prevent damage due to overheat or even power down the engine if you suddenly lose oil pressure. The more precise fuel metering helps lower oil dilution due to over rich settings. I've hear that chevy bearings are superior in material quality to the VW offerings, stronger and lighter rods and pistons to limit stress exerted on the cranks. I think all of these have some merit in improving long term engine life.

I don't mind normal maintenance but when the maintenance requires dropping the engine and you don't have a garage and a lift to work on, you have a strong desire to make improvements where possible to limit the Maintenance events that requires engine removal.

I.d suggest a bigger wallet and a garage to work on a car like this.

A cheap Porsche will be the most expensive car you will ever own.

With mid-engine cars, dropping the engine for maintenance is a given.

No garage, no lift required. I've dropped engines in a dirt field with a K-mart hydraulic jack, jackstands, and a sheet of plywood. Not really a big deal. After you've dropped the engine a couple times, it really is easy.

IMHO way too many people try to resist dropping the engine and the job ends up taking twice as long and usually entails collateral damage inflicted by not working on the engine out of the car.

Understandably you don't want to do it for fun.

I rebuilt my original 73' 1.7L to a 1911cc and later drove it for over 100,000 miles. Pretty darn good for an engine that was already an antique by the late 80's! I would have never expected it to make it to 200k. It was feeling tired toward the end and as Mark states could have used a freshening of the heads. Ultimately the car was rear ended and obliterated the engine before I could do that.

Also as a data point -- I have a set of Len's AA China cast 2.0L 3 stud heads with his seats, valves, machining. Very nice and wasn't that much more than what I turned up doing competitive shopping and considering what it costs to rework tired used heads.

-Chevy bearings or rods won't fit a 2.0 crank, you would have to weld the crank journals and re-machine to use them. For stroker cranks I prefer to use the 78mm size because you can use the larger VW type one rod journal. 80mm Chevy journal (actually a Buick journal not chevy) stoker cranks will have a shorter TBO than engines with the T1 rod cranks.

-Aircooled engines need a ballpark 12.7:1 AFR under load as the fuel charge actually provides some cooling, no way around this. Overheating head and oil temps plus pressure can easily be monitored with gauges and/idiot lights.

I'm not tying to steer you away from an aftermarket ECU, I have an aftermarket ECU on my 2600cc T4 and I'm gathering the gear to do my 3.0/6, I'm just trying to help you have realistic expectations of what a aftermarket ECU can and can't do.
BTW I have hundreds of stock and performance T1 and T4 builds, plus a bunch 911, 996, and 997 builds under my belt.

There is aftermarket T4 2.0 H beam rods but they still use the stock VW bearings. Unless racing there's little to be gained with the aftermarket rod and full engine balance would be on my list before aftermarket rods.

Yes I have found this out in the last decade I have owned this car. Being in Cali I wanted a pre 75 smog exempt project car to tinker with. A family member mention he had a project car for sale cheap and Porsches are cool right, why not, it was all downhill from there. but they are very fun cars to drive that is why it is not for sale despite many interested.
I'm Just looking to get the most bang for my buck like most folks.

Best value IMHO is a stock-ish 2.0 Djet (or MS2 or SDS EFI), a fresh 2.0 (2056cc) is a lot of bang for the buck without breaking the bank.

Performance will be 2-4X the money or even more.
Carbs can be cheaper and easier to tune on a big cam engine.
#1 for bolt on HP is a good set of headers.
This isn't an engine to half ass a build, it will bite you.

In my opinion where Americans get lost with Porsche (and 914's in particular) is that they were never meant to be the fastest cars on the road. Trying to make it that just destroys what they were meant to be.

What Porsche does excel at is delivering a particular driving experience that highlights communicative steering with direct feedback, nimble handling, and excellent braking. Fast in a straight line has never been a the main reason to own a Porsche.

Modern US roads laid out on a North/South & East/West grid and straight arrow interstates have resulted in American's favoring straight line performance at the expense of a holistic driving experience.

Bottom line is that there will always be faster cars in a straight line. But in the curves there are very few cars that deliver a rewarding drive experience like a Porsche can. The fact that a 70's era 914 car still delivers that dynamic driving experience that competes with some of the best modern cars can offer says a lot.

I'll continue to say it -- if you want rocket fast, go buy a EV. Tesla, Taycan, whatever. You can't match an EV for off the line acceleration and 0-60 performance.

If you want a rewarding handling experience, then be happy with a 914 for what it is - a novel vintage car that somehow manages to hold it's own 50 years later.

Mark,

Whose headers do you recommend? no heat required

Thanks

TANGERINE headers are the best (some lead time to build)Chris is Awesome to work with

Thanks. my original idea was to build a 2056 but seeing that going 2270 was not a whole lot more hardware wise. I had built a megasquirt about 6 years ago had trouble getting the car to start and put in on the back burner, eventually doubted my build quality put it on the "one day pile". A couple of weeks ago saw a fellow member making a youtube on deleting D-jet using the Haltech 550. I figured I would buy the same ECU and follow his install.Ian karr also has a youtube and he was selling some 96 mm P&C at a good price so I got those.
The next item to consider was the heads hence this thread, which went off on a tangent. so to get back on track. When considering heads on a engine rebuild the best option is A.get LN heads. if that is not in the budget should I

B. have a shop "rebuild" the originals
C. buy a set of basic heads from AA performance and have a shop rebuild those to address the valve seat issue and enhance performance a little.
D. buy a set of prebuilt"performance" heads from AA performance
E. buy a set from alternate well known Air cooled shops like Rimco/FAT although the price is not a whole lot less that the LN
F. the heck with fiscal responsibility skip the mortgage and buy a set of LN heads with Nikies and have Jake put it together. Ill be homeless but having lots of fun

Cost verses bang for the buck I'd likely do a cheaper set of MSDS headers just because on a small engine you're only gaining 8-15HP max. Only thing with an MSDS is you have to fab a muffler. With a bigger engine i might go with a tangerine, in fact I have one hanging on my wall waiting for a home.

Do not get heads with bigger tha 44x38mm valves, bigger valves than that are just dumb and even stock 42x36mm valves are big enough . My 2600cc uses the 44x38 size valve.

For EFI i still like SDS, as it's the simplest system to program, but I'm building a half dozen 2.0 Djet engines right now so there's nothing wrong with the stock FI.
I'm also building a spec 80x96mm 2.3 engine with 44 webers and that Tangerine header if anyone is interested.

Beware of back log of orders for Heads ....There was a waiting list for new Ham heads only so many per batch, and batches per year? This may be true for Ln /Type 4 store? As they are made by HAM too

To make my deadline for this Summers 2056, I went and had my 1.8 heads updated with new valves/seats, etc. I am happy with the work European motors did (Jorge)He is a great source for type 4 engines and always seems to be happy to help with my questions and gives good advice