Quote:
Originally Posted by Doug Hoven
I recently had the head off of the 6 cylinder on the flow bench. Boy were we surprised how good the head flowed even at the .388 lift I am allowed. Flowed better on the intake than a stock small block head, and the exhaust flowed 80% of what the intake did. The reason it flowed as good as it did was the fact that the intake ports(there are only 3 btw) are WAY too big. While I do believe flow is very important, when the rest of the engine (in this case the 200 cfm carb and small cam) can't support the flow you can get out of the head, you're going to run into an issue with air not moving fast enough. There's a reason the most common aftermarket chevy 6 cylinder head mod is to weld in a "lump" to the bottom of the intake port to take up some volume. As odd as a chevy 6 cylinder may be, I can only imagine the same principal applies to a wide range of combos.
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Good morning Doug and to all,
Back when all we had was stock castings from which ever car Mfg. that we chose to play with, was when the "advent" of commercial Flow Bench's came to be. The use of these machines has lead us to where we are today with all the aftermarket support, and the advertised Flow Numbers helped sell products. Now in todays world of Big Horsepower and Big Engines the cylinder heads that have been developed all started off life on someone's Flow Bench. Okay that being said - we as Stocker Racers should still be able to gather useful information from these Flow Bench's, especially given the Lifts that we have to deal with.
They may not be the Final answer, but I consider there use an asset in the further development of engine performance. It's a tool just like a dyno
so how you use the tools that are available to us will determine the amount of improvement you'll find in your engine development programs. The facts are right in front of you, follow them as you see fit.
Just my Two cents from a very small spot in a very large world.
Respectfully,
Henry Kunz 1534 H/SA