Gauging Interest - Tunnelport Heads

[Greaterthenjake]

I lurk here alot... tons of amazing info I fit into that under 40 crowd trying to piece together a FE. Tunnel port cammer parts etc even a solid FE the entrance fee is steep. Steeper still for the exotic stuff. Its a solid platform that no one else I know in my age bracket want to deal with. Sad but things like lack of hardened seats in stock heads and so few machinists will touch them keeps the ls swap crowd running strong. That said it's nice to see people trying to make this stuff available to those of us who came too late to score it when ford unloaded.

[mike7570]

Bench racing here - If I still had my 452ci tunnel port, I sell the heads, intake and valve train for almost enough money to cover the cost of Jay's new head package. What would I gain?
I'm thinking the heads out of the box pick me up 50-75 hp and I have a myriad of new intakes available. Throw in a new cam and a tunnel ram and I'm knocking on 750hp?  (basically similar short blocks other than the cubes)
Now I could get the TP heads and intake ports worked on and a bigger cam and I'm what 675hp or so and only have 2 or 3 intakes available to use.
For the racer the available power level of Jay's new heads is much more appealing and I suspect after he gets the cam sorted and maybe some port clean up they're up to 900hp.

[cammerfe]

Just as a 'by the way' comment on the subject of TP engines, I got a set of TP heads out the side door at EEE during the time when the TP engine was going through the run up to its use in the LeMans GT40s. I got a pair of heads, a dual-plane dual quad manifold, and a pair of the 652 center-squirters.

Brother Lon bought a new short block 427 and we put the engine together to run in his '67 Mustang. Finally damaged that engine at Milan one warm day, and exchanged it for a medium-riser that ran in the car for a number of years.

Came time to go through the car one more time and I sat down with Jim Dove and we looked at what might make sense. Jim made up a set of tunnel-port heads with very close to factory details on the intake side. (I'd talked to Mose Nowland regarding possible changes to both the placement and shape of the PR tubes. He assured me that the guys testing variants to the tube area had come to the conclusion that there was nothing worthwhile to be found by being exotic.)

The exhaust was a different situation. Jim's 'Type Two' design raised the exhaust runners, changed the spacing, and re-shaped the runners. If you look at the billet head photos above, you'll notice that they are sort of an oval with one lower corner pulled in. That's the shape Jim Dove came up with. The changes to the exhaust runners was so significant that the exterior of the heads differed substantially from any factory design. Mounting the heads to a block and putting the block in the engine compartment made it possible to see clearly that the spring towers had to be eliminated. Rolling a sheet of typewriter paper and inserting it into the exhaust runner made it obvious that the exit was aimed up very pronouncedly.

We removed the spring towers completely and dropped the attachment points for the upper A-arms much as was done in the GT350 conversion. The filler panel where the towers were cut away were filled and reinforced so as to be able to mount QA-1 coilovers out in the wheelwell. An upper bracket was attached to the filler panel. Upper and lower arms were tubular.

All that work made possible custom headers that were uncompromised. There was more than six inches of header out of the flange before any tube changed direction at all. On the driver's side, we re-did the steering so as to get rid of the rag-joint and use Borgeson all-steel universals in such a way as to leave the header uncompromised as well.

Then Lon sold the car to someone in New Zealand.

KS

[feadam]

any timeline of when you would have heads?

[cammerfe]

If that question was aimed at me, Jay told me that my position in the ordering line put me at sometime after June. His experiences with rocker arms came after that pronouncement so my expectation, at this point, being realistic, is sometime next fall.

KS

[jbamber]

any timeline of when you would have heads?

We won't have a firm timeline until we have a design, and a commitment from the foundry.  However, we do want to move as quickly as possible.

Our development process is as follows:

• I create a CAD model which includes all of the constraints, and has our best shot at the port/chambers.  The layout often driven by the valvetrain and it's constraints.
• I create a prototype of a single cylinder for flow development.  Below is the most recent example - this is an updated Boss head for the 385 series.  On this one, I removed most of the material on the outside of the port so Dave could easily locate and install a down nozzle for wet flow testing.  This head will be primarily used on methanol burning engines.
  
  
  You may notice it doesn't even have valvetrain mounting provisions - it is for flow development only.  We expect to be at this step in a few weeks.
• Dave does his magic with flow development, and final sparkplug location in the chamber - which is based on wet flow testing.
• I digitize the optimize ports, chamber and sparkplug location then put them in the CAD model, then finish the design of the remaining items.
• I program and machine a billet version of the heads for early testing.  At that point, we will have to decide whether to include water passages (for gas) or test with methanol.
• The cast version will become available as soon as possible after testing and any revisions.

[e philpott]

Dang , that Boss section would look good on the mantel above the fire place in the living room

[GerryP]

Dang , that Boss section would look good on the mantel above the fire place in the living room

Ha, ha.  I was thinking the same thing.  Instead of those bland glass globes, corporate recognition trophies should be that carving.  At least it would be a startling conversation piece.  At least the guys would appreciate it.  I don't know what you'd do for women...maybe a sponge or something like that.

[My427stang]

I love lots of options for the FE, and looking for a 400+ CFM option that has a decent volume and fits under the hood of my Mustang, but why a TP? 

Are they making an intake too?  A high port, medium volume, fast TP would be awesome if there was an easy way to the carb.

[Katz427]

I'm not saying anything, to throw water on anybody's ideas. I just wanted to comment, on stuff from the late 60's thru mid 70's. At that time I was on a crew part time that ran a modified, with 427 with hi riser heads. When the tunnel ports became available, the car owner, wanted to try them. The lap times, never matched the hi-riser. The driver said the hi-riser had a broader power curve. Now I'm talking  3/8, 1/2, and 3/4 mile tracks. The car was later sold, and replaced by a new car with a 500 inch BBC. At Thompson speedway, the old car with 427 hi-riser was brought along to make the deal with it's new owner. The BBC had problems during practice, and the owner decided to pull the car. The new owner suggested that " why not run the old car with the Ford". Which they did, the driver won the consi, and starting at the back, worked his way to a 4th place finish, behind 3 BBC that we're all near 500 inches. Just for some history, some might enjoy.

[frnkeore]

What you are talking about, involves port velocity. With a new head, you can configure the port to have the right velocity, for the application, with much increased flow.

My question to jbamber is, what valve head sizes will be run in the canted vs a inline head.

[e philpott]

Tunnel Port sure went toe to toe against the Hemi's in Nascar in the 60's

[Katz427]

I hate messing with this post, since it is about interest in the tp. Yes the tunnel port was pretty effective against the hemi. The hi-riser was banned at the end of 1964, by Nascar. The only options were the rare SK medium riser until the tp became available. However the high riser was the power plant for most, like Gerry Chamberlain, Jim Shampine, Maynard Troyer , Red Farmer and others on the short tracks. Dick Trickle did use the tp, when it became available in his short track car , as that was about the only head, other than the medium riser that was legal.

[feadam]

I watched chamberlain win many races in the 76. He would be the only ford in most races and won many.

[Joey120373]

Weather or not you go ahead with it....please post more pics of your development units, that thing is just plain cool!

I hope you get enough interest to proceed with it though. The TP is probably my Favorite looking engine. Of course the HR and SOHC are right up there, followed by the boss 385, but the TP is top of the heap in my book. Even if its not the "best".