All great advice, thanks everyone.
If the heads are cracked are there any alternatives besides the pricey edelbrock aluminums? Can J heads from an LA be reworked to fit, or is that a headache?
The cracks in the heads appear in between the valves and actually do not effect the engine and n a negative way. As much as people jump under and down on this and other sites about running cracked heads, the Magnum heads crack prone areas being in between the valves is a spot where there is no coolant and performance doesn’t suffer a measurable amount.
But as the internet says, who outs cracked heads on a fresh new build. To this end, I am one of those idiots s that have done so and without any issues. Say what you will, there was nothing noticeable engine performance issue.
The Edelbrock heads offer the best bolt on bang for the buck behind the Trick Flow heads which cost more but are superior.
Then there are the Chink knock off castings and rebuilt units which are a gamble if not done by a good shop.
If your looking to make a hot rod engine, IMO, in the following order from best power performance head to last is listed below.
Trick flow
Edelbrock
Aussie cast “EQ heads”
Quality home refurbishment of the OEM head
Chink knockoff
Since the Magnum block has no provisions to oil the LA head, there are two was to do it and as said above, NOT cheap, IMO, stick with the Magnum head which is a better performing head as cast.
However, the two ways to oil an LA head on a Magnum block is to purchase a specific set of roller rockers that allow pushrod oiling and then (probably) purchase new pushrods that are hollow so they can oil the rockers and such. Comp Cams is one manufacturer that has these rockers. I forget who else has them.
The other way is to drill the LA head from two directions and relieve one vertical hole to oil the shaft. The other drilled hole at the rear of the head is tapped to an oil line coming from the oil pressure sending units hole which is of course, “T’ed” off since the other head needs to be feed oil. This is easy on aluminum heads and pretty hard on iron heads to drill out.
This modification is actually show here on FABO just recently and a ways in the past.
For WIW, IMO, ether stick with the OWM head and live with the performance it can deliver or step up to an aluminum head since it would be worth the entry price easily. There actually not that expensive but a waste of the engine is near stock in its build.
On a budget? OEM iron heads.
Hot rodding? Aluminum heads.
