I will be pulling my 160K mile 2.0L motor in the next few weeks and once I check out my parts I will begin my engine build.

In California or elsewhere, where have folks gotten heads rebuilt?
Did they do a good job.
Did you get the services you wanted?
What services did you get done?

New seats, valves, guides, surfacing, trueing, new exhaust studs, porting, polishing, high performance valve springs, etc...

Approximate costs for total rebuild?

Any and all information appreciated.

Thanks in advance

You could just get new heads and ebay your cores from Jake, send your heads to Len, or Adrian at Headflow Masters, but you will have to specify with Adrian exactly what you want whereas everything will be just right from Len or Jake. There are many others, but these are the ones I'm familiar with. Rimco has done STOCK heads for me for the type 4 and even for the 356.

Have you listened to the Oct 26 show yet?
http://richchristensen.com/radio/ivdimension.php

He should... And tomorrow's show as well...

Dan,

TechCraft out in Pleasanton does 90% of the heads for race engines built by Bay Area shops. If stock rebuild is all you are looking for (no serious port work) I would use Jay at "Jays precision machine" He is the one I sent Randall and Bill too that Sat. He did all the machine work (in house) for Garretsons and did all of Harry Capello's 356 engines (Maestro dude) Ted at German Precision wont touch T4 heads.

All the others mentioned above are top notch people also.. but dealing with someone local has always been easier for me than shipping stuff away. Jay will work on the heads while you stand there..LOL TechCraft is more of a "flow+port" them type of place.

Check with Elgin on the cam replacement. He worked hand in hand with the T4 development in the Super Vee series.



B

Dan, Have you decided on what you are going to build?

The Jake designed /Len Hoffman built head combinations sure look good.

But equally as important is to be sure that whatever head combination you decide on has a matching cam.

Ideally make sure someone has run them together on the dyno or you're simply in a crap shoot.

When I had my heads rebuilt by Jay in Santa Clara I had them flowed in the shop next door to Jay. After they were flowed I sent the information to Jake and he told me which cam to use to take maximun advantage of the head work.

I haven't put that motor back together yet (it's next) so that I can finish the story, but the rational behind Jake's cam selection, as opposed to what everyone else was saying about heads, valves and cams, really made sense to me.

Randal, I sure hope you get that motor together for next year. How do you keep that thing from rusting!

The 2.0 liter motor is all wrapped up and protected from rust.

The 2.4 liter motor should be going to LA for dyno work sometime this month.

Thanks all and you too Brad....
I knew that Ted wouldnt do T4 heads anymore...too much trouble.

I will contact Jay and see what he charges for a complete rebuild.

I am still leaning towards the LE180s except there isn't much out there for info on them yet since they are so new.

LE180 is 914 2.0 only better. The CNC allows for superb repeatability so you get matching combustion chambers, matching ports, etc. That kind of stuff really increases tune-ability and even running. I just measured the combustion chambers on a set of spare heads awhile ago and they were 1.5 cc difference from the smallest chamber to the biggest.

I've never worked with Jay, but I tried to do the 'keep it local' thing and it bit me in the ass big time by wasting almost 6 months of my time waiting. It ended up costing me $20 per PAIR of heads to ship them to Adrian and I had them back in two weeks. I definitely wouldn't be afraid of shipping them out.

Pictures from Adrian @ Headflow Masters for my $5k motors:

Dan,

Keep us posted, prices and all.

Nobody suggested Rimco - bad experiences ??

http://www.rimcovw.com/

Thanks : )

--

Audirac V W's Headflow Masters
2466 S Santa Fe Ave Ste F
Vista, CA 92084
7607271827

yup, i have to say that i was happy with the work jay did for me, but it came after about 12 blown deadlines... you literally have to go down there and watch him do your work, or else it won't get done (at least in a timely manner). interesting fellow though, and a REALLY cool shop with old tools/engines laying everywhere.

ditto...I had to stay there on a Saturday for about 4 hours to make sure I went home with my heads...... ...I got a "free" lunch out of it.....

Jay is good, but what they said:

You've been away for awhile. Now all the old tools/engines/cars are stacked to the ceiling.

Ask Bill. He couldn't believe it when he saw it the Boxster weekend.

But Jay as usual machined a really complicated piece for us while we waited.

Dan, definitely listen to the last two radio shows with Len and tomorrow's show. Just hearing him talk about how much more metal there is in the AMC castings (compared to stock heads) makes me only want new heads.

I've been working with Len on a set of heads and he is super easy to deal with.

Anthony,


Not trying to start a shit war.. but.. Do you know why you need more material?

Mark,

who did you "try" and use local?



B

Are you saying it's not needed or beneficial?

I can't remember the specifics but Len was talking about how much heavier the AMC castings are compared to stock 2L heads. He was saying that they improved some weak points (I think around the exhaust studs and ports). I'd have to listen again to get the specifics. I'd also guess that more metal also helps with cooling.

After dealing with a couple sets of 2L heads that weren't rebuildable I'm kind of thinking that starting with a new casting, even if you do completely rebuild it is beneficial.

At Road Atlanta, in 2004 (I think) on Chris Foley's car, the original casting Len used at the time literally burned right through. Sure racing is a test under extreme conditions, but it exhibits weakness pretty fast. Somewhere I have a picture of Len holding up the guilty cylinder head. He pointed out to me that there are a few spots where the casting is pretty thin, and Chris's head had holed right at a weak spot. Maybe we don't all need this additional structure, but there is no doubt that metal fatigues through repeated heat cycles, the question becomes "how pure was the casting material, and how carefully poured?".

Look at 90% of the factory 2.0/914 heads..

see those cracks in the chambers stemming from the spark plugs and radiating toward the heart of the chamber???

Thats why more material in the chambers is beneficial....

Its also a huge benefit when porting the intakes and exhausts.. We can't do the CNC work on used castings because the castings LACK the material we need to remove material and retain strength..

Tossing 30 year old castings is a step in the right direction.