Another set of W2 heads that leaked

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pittsburghracer

pittsburghracer

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Such a great head, if you got a good set. I like many others didn't and got a real sour taste in our mouths. I personally gave up on the forever and sold of two sets of rockers and W2 Victor I ported. I went as far as to buy another set with Norris rockers as I knew I could make a few bucks on them, and did.

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I had a brand new one crack adjacent to the end outer head bolt when being torqued down for the very first time.

Shortly afterward they added the stiffening ribs to the castings.

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Going through this trouble right now. One head cracked, the other didn’t. My brother is going to try to tig weld it with the new-ish “EZ Rod” tig rod. Then I might try to get some epoxy inside the water jacket where the crack is. I did buy a replacement from a member here because I don’t have high hopes of fixing the old one, but it’s going to require a good amount of machining to match my existing one. Will report outcome on my build thread
My 422 smallblock build
 
rumblefish360 said:
Is only quibble on the chambers.
What have you found otherwise?
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I forget the exact year but it was probably sometime in the early 1990’s Chrysler was selling W2 heads for a hundred bucks each. It could have been 1988 or 89 now that I think about it.

Anyway, you could buy as many as you wanted at that price. I was going to buy some and my dad talked me out of it. His theory (he was right) is that Chrysler was going to come out with a better head and the W5 is what we got.

That first run of heads were a better design as far as the casting and how they put it together than the heads they released later on.

As PRH said above, the first run of the “new” W2 castings didn’t even have those support ribs along the bottom row of head bolts.

I know some of those heads didn’t have the dowel pin holes drilled deep enough, or I was told that they drilled the dowel holes and then did the surface on the head and on some of the castings that had to take more off to get them in shape and the holes were now not deep enough.

Not sure if I believe that one or not.

I‘m also not a fan of some of the newer chambers. The OC heads take a beating but it‘s way better than most people think because the OC chamber takes a beating in magazines and forums.

The W5 chamber is straight GARBAGE. You can fix it but it takes some work.
 
I like the open chamber for its flow pattern when it enters the chamber/cylinder. It’s nicer, more broad.
When Brett did my 5’s, the chamber was worked on a little bit. He was telling me it really didn’t need much to become good. Th changes were subtle. On a side by side you can see the difference.
 
The external appearance of the early W2’s, in the area around the spark plugs, looked a lot more like a stock head.
I don’t know if these are crack prone or not.
The one that cracked on me was like the blue one.

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PRH said:
The external appearance of the early W2’s, in the area around the spark plugs, looked a lot more like a stock head.
I don’t know if these are crack prone or not.
The one that cracked on me was like the blue one.

View attachment 1716109833
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I forget who told me but that casting above was based on OE core boxes. They didn’t break like that.

When they re-released the W2 head they used all new core boxes and they had issues, one of which (IIRC) was the dowel pin holes didn’t get drilled deep enough. It held the head up enough to break the corner off.
 
W2‘s crack, W5’s leak, glad they got it right with the W8! Last known pict of my leaky W5 head before it went to scrap.

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It would have been a good candidate to start cutting up.
 
pittsburghracer said:
I remember that. I think you tried to sell them to me. Lol
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that was set “B”…..
set “A” caused us enough grief where we liquidated it all.
we had some old W2 heads. Cracks between the seats so we never invested any $$ into them. Think a dirt track buddy has them now Iirc.
 
LMAO! Good one.

Personally I cut up a lot of stuff to see what’s what inside. It’s just a curiosity thing. Sometimes it’s an excellent show and tell item, sometimes it can be a learning thing to show others.
Perhaps a paper weight or a side shelf item.

Seriously, what slice of cylinder head would look cool on your desk or man cave, garage wall art, etc…. I wouldn’t mind a slice of a W5 head to display. With their rep…… I may have my own head up on the wall one day!

:rofl:
 
We had a cut up W5 we got from a freind….. even had the “DLI” stamp on the end. Should have kept that :)
 
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