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Wow great video. Same powertrain as my gto, minus 1000 pounds! That thing is a beast. I had a 240z back in the day, awesome car.
thanks man, yea these z's are such a blast. my buddies rag on it because it has no power steering or a/c but hell, who needs it? i think it adds to the character of badassery. Most fun in the world to cruise around in, smoke a few vettes in the quarter, then cruise to the mountains and whip through the twisties.
Originally Posted by A.R. Shale Targa
Cool vids. Love the speed shifting and reeling in $70,000 dollar Vettes.
LOL, I think I surprised a few vette owners for sure!
I'm in for flow test results ! They look pretty good my guess is the exhaust will flow 210s .... the question is just how good is the intake side !
man, 210 in the exhaust would be great! as for the intake, i hope its good as well. i polished out the runner and roof but left the floor, short turn, and bowl area pretty rough to avoid puddling. I really only cut down the rocker bolt bulge, the valve guide boss area, and the swirl ramp, so I hope I correctly increased velocity and didn't enlarge the port too much. I have a massive cam in there (.620/.610 and 236/242) so I don't think the heads need to flow huge volume seeing as the valves are going to china and back, they just need to flow fast. I'm just praying I didn't cut too close to the coolant tunnels on the other side of that area where the swirl ramp used to be. At 200 degrees, I really hope there's more than an 1/8 to a 1/4 of an inch of that alloy in there to hold 18lbs of hydraulic pressure...
If anyone knows of any old timers who know a thing or two that would like to show a young whipper snapper like myself a few things, including how to use a flow bench, in his old machine shop he's got set up in his garage, please let me know....or really just anyone that has one that isn't too busy that I could pay to flow um for me. I found a shop up in Ohio near my uncle's place, but would like to just find a local spot instead of deal with shipping and all that nonsense... AI is stayin busy and doesn't have time to flow um, as they are concentrating on the work they currently have (good to hear they're staying busy)(hire me, AI!).
@wannafbody okay good to know, plus if you're runnin stock cam vs by giant cam, i think large runners might be good for my cam selection, especially when I'm aiming to make more high rpm hp instead of low end grunt. dont need that much torque in a 2700lb datsun...
last update: did some modifications to two of the exhaust ports that weren't flowing quite uniformly according to my home made cheapskate flow bench. post mod flow test showed uniformity. and I won't be doing anything to the combustion chambers except polish them. I think I'll check runner cc and if those are within a percent or two of uniformity, they're gettin send to get flow tested, and i'll post again in a few weeks with results!
Cool. Hey maybe post another vid after these heads go on?
Not to go off-topic, but I wonder how the aluminum block LS1/T56 combo compares in weight to the original iron-block I6/5 speed? Probably doubled the power.
I didn't realize this was all in/for a z car until you posted the video, my first car was a 76 280z and i'd love to have another one day, preferably with an LS swap.
got some more done on the heads, finally. Been busy lately. Found a common design for home made flow benches and all my ports are faiiirly close to one another in terms of flow. Two exhaust valves needed a bit more opening up and polishing to match the others, but the intakes are almost identical in flow according to my cheap flow setup. I'm still definitely gonna spend a few hundred and send um off to have them professionally flowed just to make sure, before i slap them on and get ol dolly the datsun retuned.
Let me know what yall think.
I's love to show them to someone in person who has experience with porting heads. I just simply dont know how close the tolerances oughta be for uniformity....
Nice setup you came up with.... you have a very expensive hobby for a college student!
I'm up the road in Rowan County. My oldest is in his last year down there at UNCC (he did two years mech eng and jumped over to mathematics- physics was kicking his butt).... AI built my heads and my engine, as I type this, is currently sitting on a dyno at RF Engines.
(I also studied mechanical engineering a lifetime ago in college - my unofficial senior project was shoehorning a smallblock into my S-10).
Cool. Hey maybe post another vid after these heads go on?
Not to go off-topic, but I wonder how the aluminum block LS1/T56 combo compares in weight to the original iron-block I6/5 speed? Probably doubled the power.
of course more vids after! weight comparison is just about the exact same weight according to other guys who have done the swap. the LS is much lighter than the i6, but the t56 is much heavier than the old datsun 4 speeds, so it evens out. center of mass gets pushed back towards the rear. On average I read that guys see about a 40-60lbs offset on the rear wheels after ls swaps.. and not those iron block truck motors; actual aluminum LS engines...
Originally Posted by 00pooterSS
I didn't realize this was all in/for a z car until you posted the video, my first car was a 76 280z and i'd love to have another one day, preferably with an LS swap.
What rear end are you using? Stock?
im using the stock r200 that comes in alot of the 280z's and nissans. the r200 is supposed to hold 600ish according to the datsun guru's over on hybridz, but the u-jointed half shafts are ticking time bombs. I need to find some CV jointed half shafts from a 280zx tt to swap in, or buy the billet cv axles from wolf creek racing for a stout 900 dollars. I hear that a good condition r200 with cv axles is the bees knees for 280z's..unless you drop a few grand into an r230 conversion... or drop 4-5+ grand into custom rear suspension.
Originally Posted by NC_John
Nice setup you came up with.... you have a very expensive hobby for a college student!
I'm up the road in Rowan County. My oldest is in his last year down there at UNCC (he did two years mech eng and jumped over to mathematics- physics was kicking his butt).... AI built my heads and my engine, as I type this, is currently sitting on a dyno at RF Engines.
(I also studied mechanical engineering a lifetime ago in college - my unofficial senior project was shoehorning a smallblock into my S-10).
cool cool, small world. and yes expensive i was working full time for a few years while I built this thing, so it wasn't so bad for all the major stuff. now i'm just trying not to break anything while I finish up school and find me a good career position.
Originally Posted by madsv1000
Those look really good. Look very similarly ported to mine. You should get some decent flow numbers. These are the flow numbers from mine.
Man I hope I can get some numbers like that... after all the time and energy put into them.... REALLY hoping my home made flow bench was somewhat accurate..
Oh and i guess that wasnt the real final update, cause this is the last real update that i forgot to add that may save a lot of people a lot of frustration in the future. The guy that sold the head to me decided not to tell me there was a bolt sheared off in the exhaust bolt holes, but i noticed them anyways, even though i wasnt worried about it, because i could do this:
Its an old mechanics trick that was taught to me back in high school. It only works with aluminum heads, but if you shear off a bolt in a head, just stick a spare nut over the sheared bolt, weld them together, then spray some pb blaster or wd40 down in there, and it should come right out. Which it did. Only reason i welded a litte rod to the nut was so i could hover it over the sheared bolt easier. Dont have to even take that extra step...
Anywho, stay tuned for flow numbers, and install updates, eventually....
I think you are doing a great job. More power to you man! Also LOVED LOVED LOVED the video of you beating up on those Corvettes. I bet that gets their panties in a bunch back in the parking lot.
I'll be watching for updates on how your heads do.
im using the stock r200 that comes in alot of the 280z's and nissans. the r200 is supposed to hold 600ish according to the datsun guru's over on hybridz, but the u-jointed half shafts are ticking time bombs. I need to find some CV jointed half shafts from a 280zx tt to swap in, or buy the billet cv axles from wolf creek racing for a stout 900 dollars. I hear that a good condition r200 with cv axles is the bees knees for 280z's..unless you drop a few grand into an r230 conversion... or drop 4-5+ grand into custom rear suspension.
I was real hard on mine when I had it and snapped many u joints on stock power, but never had a rear end issue so I figured they were pretty tough.
As far as the billet pieces, if I recall correctly the guy with the gray LS swapped 280 was twisting the billet stubs when on slicks at the track, so I would be more inclined to go the zx swap if people are having good results with that.
08-29-2017, 10:43 PM
i was working full time for a few years while I built this thing, so it wasn't so bad for all the major stuff. now i'm just trying not to break anything while I finish up school and find me a good career position. 
