AFR 210 Eliminator LTX Heads *Important* / questions
 

Just got off the phone with Tony Mamo from AFR. Over the last few days/week he has had the patience to speak with me about all my concerns and questions about the heads and/or my engine combination. He's a standup guy that would speak to me and he definitely gets my vote :thumbs:

Now the concern/question I have might also be important for all you LTx motor guys who are considering the eliminator heads for our motors. As some of you know my 388 Lt4 blew up and I'm pretty convinced to go with the AFR heads BUT.. the heads and intake ports do NOT line up at all. I voiced my concern but from what I understood it was necessary for the awesome flow #s. He said I could epoxy the manifold etc to work around it. Im going to be honest and and I'm not bashing the product at all, But I can't understand why an LT1/4 head would not even line up with the LTx manifolds. it's not like we have other manifold options out there :ack:

My question is what to do? Is epoxying and filling manifolds a good thing for reliability/durability in a street car ? Is it easy to perhaps weld the manifold up to get the ports to align etc ? The only other option here is to go with a custom sheetmetal intake. I like the sounds of it and always planned on going that route but the expense imo would be necessary to get the best out of the heads and having the ports line up perfectly and the right shape.

I'm kind of lost here. I don't want to get LT4 heads and wait to have them hand ported when I can pick an LT4 head that is almost the same or better out of the box. :bigears

Welding/epoxying intake manifols ports is common at that level and done in competent hands is nothin to be concerned about. Sometimes there is only so much materaial to work with and ya gotta create it.
THats hot roddin'. :yesnod:

Sounds scary, if a piece of epoxy falls off and makes it way into the combustion chambers that probably would not be ideal.

:iagree:

I am also not fond of machining/welding/eppoxying my GM LT4 manifold for these heads. after I do that theyre probably only good for these heads and nothing else out there.

Its not going to come off if done properly

If youre going to push the envelope on that motor you have to go balls deep or watch everyone else go fast :yesnod:

I agree. Its not new or out of the ordinary. If you're afraid of ruining your LT4 intake, buy an Edelbock version. :thumbs:

Well from what I know there isn't much material on the LT4 manifold to weld and re-create ports. How much more material is there on the edelbrock manifold ? if anything here's an opportunity for edelbrock to create a eliminator manifold that will work with AFR heads :D

I definitely agree. That's really why I'm asking how hard it really is to get over this hurdle. if welding and machining etc can be done I'm all for it. I'm really excited to get the heads with the Del west Ti valves :D

From the checking I did on my 210 elims, the ports weren't off by much except for the top. The sides and bottom matched up pretty much spot-on to the GM LT4 'off road' intake gaskets (which is what my LT4 intake is already ported for). The top of the 210 ports was a little shorter, though. I posted some pics in my other thread and can take more exact measurements if that will help with your decision.

I haven't decided what I'm going to do yet, but I'm definitely not going to epoxy the manifold (pain in the butt and I'm also worried about the epoxy falling off). I'm either going to leave it as-is, or have the roofs of the intake ports on the heads opened up a little.

One of the things I want to do first is really look closely at the intake to see how the port angles match up with the AFRs. I also want to run it by my builder -- I might try calling someone like Lloyd Elliott to get another opinion. My biggest holdup is that my intake is still on the car with my current motor and I won't be pulling it until it starts getting cold out :)

A sheetmetal intake would rock, but that's getting crazy-expensive (as opposed to the mildly insane-expensive that I'm at now) :D

Let me know if you want more pics / measurements and I'd be happy to provide.

Mark any info would be appreicated. IF any welding or machining can be done to match them up I would be happy. I'm like you where I don't want to get any epoxy anywhere.

What I'm really starting to like is the idea of a custom sheet metal intake make just for these heads :cool:

WHat worries me like you said is the angle of the ports in relation to the head. If the angles aren't right on that would affect the fuel flow and direction. Who know what kind of issues could arise form things not lining up straight.

I'd think that having a bit welded on, and then tapered up to blend into the roof would do it, if that's the miss-match. Not that big a deal compaired to buying a Hogan or other fabbed intake. Them things aint cheap. There's also the single-plane route if anybody makes one for the LT4.

:chevy

I would have the manifold worked over and not think twice about it. Trevor at EM had a miniram completely chopped up and welded back together so that it would work with the AFR raised runner heads. It was a bit of an involved process but when it was done it came out great. As long as the person/people doing it know what they are doing you'll have nothing to worry about.

The epoxy "fix" is no big deal. Just find a head porter who has experience. Welcome to hot rodding

There's lots of creative people on here but I've never seen a write up of anyone modifying or building their own intake. If anyone gets to doing it please post pictures. I'm starting a welding class in the next couple of weeks. Hopefully one day I will learn enough to post something like this.

:cheers:

From everything I can come up with it looks like the Eliminator is just a 23 degree head with reverse flow cooling. WIth the LT4 heads I had making decent power and running great I dont think I'm going to start hacking and welding and spending my money just to get my manifold to work with those heads.

ANyone selling LT4 heads stock or ported plz pm me :thumbs:

I took some more pics and measurements of the angles and ports on my elims. PM me your e-mail and I'll send them off to you if you're still interested.

Basically what I found is that the top of the elim port is 0.085" lower than the lt4 off-road gasket (about 3/32"). Not a big deal particularly when you take in to account that the angle of the port actually means the gap is even less. The angle of port entry is slightly lower on the AFR relative to a spare stock LT4 head. I measured the angles on both and the AFR was lower by about 4 degrees. What I wasn't able to do is measure the exit angle of the LT4 intake as it's still on the car so I'm not sure how that compares.

All in all, I'm feeling better since the gap and angle are very minimal. I'll still bounce it off my builder.

That being said, I'll be selling a set of bare (keeping the valves and springs for another project) unported stock LT4's as soon as I get them off the car later in October. :)

OK, just got off the phone with my builder. He said that the 3/32nd" difference is enough that he'd recommend blending ports the head or epoxying the intake. If it were a case of the head port being bigger than the intake then it wouldn't be an issue, but in this case the intake port is taller than the head port so it can create turbulance. His recommendation was to open up the head port very slightly just to make it match and blend it back about an inch. Any more would risk screwing up the flow.

Obviously if your intake isn't already ported to the lt4 off-road gaskets, it's not an issue because the stock intake manifold ports are much shorter.