Trick Flow small block heads
Well, I was quite surprised. The TF castings are certainly second to none. They are beautiful castings. The machine work was also top notch. No sharp edges. Everything finished like it should be. What was nice was the quality of the parts that came with the heads. The PAC springs are very nice pieces. The valves have a TF part number on them. I don't know who makes them, but they are very nice and the finish on the valves is the way I like them...a sharp cut on the top on the intake and a nice radius on the top of the exhaust valve. You don't see that kind of finish work very often.
I have to say that is the BEST CNC work I've seen on a production head. I really don't get excited about the finish on many places, but the short turn finish is a big deal. On the TF heads, the short turns are so nice I'd be hard pressed to come up with a reason to paper roll them. Usually, there are two, maybe three flat spots on the short turn. There were NONE on either the intake or the exhaust.
In the intake bowls, they use what appears to be a modified version of how TF used to "layer" flow around the bowl. If I was going to use a 45* seat I wouldn't touch the bowls. I'd leave them as is. This bowl is nothing like some of the earlier TF bowls that has way too much negative bias in them. Also, unlike Edelbrock, TF left materiel around the back side of the guide and also left materiel in front of the guide to help direct airflow around the valve. I hate the Edelbrock does it. They just have the guide flapping out there in the breeze. The air around the guide needs to be controlled and the Edelbrock fails there.
The two valves we had out had guides that were butter smooth. I would personally check them all, but if they check like those you can run them as is. That also, is unusual.
Personally, I think the biggest improvement is the exhaust port. They use a 1.57 valve. That's plenty big. A 1.60 would be a waste. They raised the floor to eliminate that crap design Chrysler used. And Edelbrock didn't fix it either. They are a small, well shaped port with a very very VERY nice short turn. To me, of all the things TF did that is worth the effort. The exhaust port on the SBM is just to freaking big. On top of that, it's a piss poor design. TF corrected that, in a big way. TF also used the guide boss to bias flow out of the port from the center of the chamber. Most heads don't come like that, and it's a PITA to grind that into them. Kudos to TF for paying attention to details.
Of course, the chambers were nicely finished, and even though I have a fetch for paper rolling things, I can't think of a reason to paper roll the chamber either. They are that nice.
All in all, I couldn't find a single thing to ***** about. Not even something to poo-poo about. They are the closest thing to a head you can run out of the box I've ever seen.
Obviously, I'd verify all the guides were like the ones we looked at. If the are, go for it. The parts are quality pieces so they aren't the issue. You can essentially run them OOTB and not look back.
TF did a good thing with these heads. They covered probably 95% of the SBM market. There is no reason why you can't tube the pushrod tunnels and use and offset rocker and pick up some flow. But how many guys want to buy rockers like that? So TF has the market pretty well thought out.
If I was going to use them, I'd spend some time on the flow bench and I'd play with 50* seats. I think that would be the next step up for them. You may have to reduce some of the intake port bias to make that work, but that just requires time and testing.
I can't wait for the TF intake to be released. If it's as good as these heads, it'll be worth every penny they want to charge.
Special thanks to lead69 for letting me stop by and finger fondle his virgin heads. I certainly molested them real good to see what they are all about.
And, like I said, we had a great bench racing session as well. All in all a great visit.
And a damn nice set of heads. TF did the SBM guys a solid.