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ProComp BBF flow numbers large valve too...

116K views 77 replies 38 participants last post by  EdBrown 
#1 ·
Received my first order of the BBF and 351 C castings from Pro Comp today.

All in all not too bad considering the price.

The as delivered valve job is a 2 angle exhaust and 3 angle intake with 2.08"/1.65" valve sizes. The intake seat ID is too small for the head size and this hurts flow. The seat inserts are plenty big enough for 2.19"/1.76" valves.

As Randy stated the intake ports are Dove copies and the exhaust are a modified TFS copy that is purposely left small. The exhaust port location and height are as the TFS streets are.

There is a bunch of metal in these castings that does not need to be there. The wall thickness is such that making the ports larger is not a problem. I feel that this was intended to avoid patent infringement issues

These castings beat the as cast D3's on both the intake and exhaust when flowed with stock valves on the as delivered valve job.

When the bowls are blended and the intake seat ID addressed the castings beat the budget small valve D3's. Once lift exceeds .600" the intake ports get ugly just like the SCJ's do. They do however have strong flow numbers until .600" lift. This is really appropriate for a street head.

I do not see these castings producing the high lift numbers that the TFS streets do although they give them a good run till .400" even with the small valves. The flow numbers I have are with minimal work and the as delivered seats. I believe that the numbers will be better with my seat cutters and more extensive short turn radii work.

It looks like they will be a good replacement for the budget small valve iron castings even in a entry level budget version priced just above $1K.

Flow rates 1.65" exhaust:

As delivered / Bowl blended / Budget D3
56 / 62 / 58
99 / 105 / 108
138 / 139 / 137
159 / 162 / 155
172 / 178 / 170
182 / 189 / 180
183 / 196 /
184 / 200 /

Flow rates 2.08" intake"
75 / 74 / 78
147 / 150 / 150
211/ /211 / 211
257 / 264 / 258
270 / 290 / 287
290 / 299 / 306

I see some modest improvements coming with a better valve seat and more short turn radii work on the intake side and there seems to be about another 20 cfm exhaust available with a more agressive short turn shape again with the small valves.

To be honest I do not see the intakes surpassing the large valve iron stuff by much but the exhaust should be some 225 cfm or better. There is enough meat to make the exhaust port large enough to mimick the TFS exhaust port.

R&D is coming for a large valve fully ported version. I will update as more information becomes available.

For availability and cost information see post in the auction section.

Link to Pics: http://www.reincarnation-automotive.com/ProCompBBFCastingsIndex.html




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#2 ·
Thanks for the R&D effort and the info, Scott.

It seems that there is a new cylinder head on the market for the 385 Series. I question whether it takes the place of the D3, though, since when all is said and done (dollar-wise) the D3 is still bang-for-buck to the Procomp...just as the Procomp may be considered bang-for-buck compared to a higher end cylinder head. In other words, you still get what you pay for. The suggested position between budget D3's and Street/Strips puts this head into overall perspective, thanks.

So what are we up to now...25, 26 or 27 different aftermarket head options for the 429/460? Nice. :mrgreen:

Paul
 
#3 ·
Pro comp

Scott ,
Looks like the intake valve may be shrouded by the chamber wall some what . Have you tried laying the wall back some to see if that helped flow?



Thanks for the info
Blake
 
#6 ·
Nice info Scott. Hearing that the ports have a lot of "meat" in them sounds like a good thing, you'll be able to do whatever you want/they need to make them work effectively. It also means that a CNC programed port to duplicate your work is just a matter of time... Good luck with the development work.
 
#7 ·
CNCing a Ford 385 head intake side is somewhat like a big-block Chevy in that it REQUIRES two different intake port profiles.
#1 and #3 are different than #2 and #4; although they don't look that way to the naked eye.
 
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#8 ·
DaveMcLain said:
Nice info Scott. Hearing that the ports have a lot of "meat" in them sounds like a good thing, you'll be able to do whatever you want/they need to make them work effectively. It also means that a CNC programed port to duplicate your work is just a matter of time... Good luck with the development work.

Thanxxx Dave.

The work I have done so far is very rudimentary. I am doing this in stages to see what is available starting with minimal work on the ports and then graduating to a full on porting regiment.

The TFS intake port is such a well engineered design that I can not see the pro comp intake flowing on par with it no matter what i do. The pro comp short turn is too low by almost .100" which places it more in line with the D0VE ports. The short turn has an exaggerated bathtub shape that is actually quite narrow compared to the D0VE. This will need to be addressed. The exhaust is a different matter though. It is shaped in a manner conducive to good flow although it is smallish as cast.

As Randy pointed out the intake ports on the BBF heads are different 1/3 & 2/4. I have alluded to this in past posts but not elaborated on it as I consider the porting differences to be proprietary. It is mostly a matter of port entry location relative to the pushrod holes.

I will be cutting the valve seats with a good cutter and then set about getting some flow numbers that better reflect the potential of the castings. Seems pointless to fully port while utilising the generic as delivered valvejob.

The port I have developed on this casting is #4 which is typically the worst flowing port anyway. Port width at the pushrod pinch is about 1.67" on 2 & 4 but is quite a bit wider on 1 & 3. This difference will be more of an issue as the port is optimised with better shaping and large valves.




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#9 ·
Flow rates with good seats and 2.19"/1.75" valves

Although the procomp intake port looks like a narrow dove intake port the short turn radius to roof height at the crest is some .100" greater than the iron castings. After removing the unneeded aluminum I got the following flow rates. The intake is still fussy above .600" lift but I feel that this can be addressed with some additional development work.

Procomp / Large valve dove std entry / Dove w / Victor entry


60/79-----------------75/84 / 85
108/162--------------119/157 / 161
150/226--------------154/224 / 231
190/270--------------186/271 / 272
212/305--------------203/299 / 310
225/325--------------208/325 / 324
230/345--------------209/334 / 341


Long story short there seems to be some potential with the castings.



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#10 ·
Glad to hear you're finding something in the Pro Comp head. It's interesting to hear that the port shape really is unique and not identical to something else AND that there might be enough material in the right places to allow a good flowing port to be produced. Where did the design come from? What is the chamber/valve placement like, is it the same as a DOVE or a D3VE?
 
#11 ·
DaveMcLain said:
Glad to hear you're finding something in the Pro Comp head. It's interesting to hear that the port shape really is unique and not identical to something else AND that there might be enough material in the right places to allow a good flowing port to be produced. Where did the design come from? What is the chamber/valve placement like, is it the same as a DOVE or a D3VE?
Dave,

The chamber is D3 in depth but has a heart shape to it. Valve placement appears to be std bbf. The deck is .600" thick so milling to reduce chamber volume is not going to be an issue.

The intake port is somewhat unique. I will need to do some more comparisons to the tfs castings to see if the short turn height relative to the valve seat is the same. I will do some further comparisons later today.

The exhaust bowl is smaller but this seems only to effect high lift flow rates which will not be used on this casting so I see no point in opening it up at this time.




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#13 ·
jpierce55 said:
So it sounds like we have a good product after all. Sounds better then Edelbrocks from what I gather, is that so?
I like the exhaust port better because the bowl is not too large relative to the valve diameter.

The jury is still out on the intake. When I mitigate the short turn the flow is as good as a ported edelbrock is but I will need to putz with it to figure out which is the best solution to the growley flow at high lifts. Widening the short turn works on the cj type heads as well as the tfs streets but does not work well on the iron doves so I will have to approach this cautiously. Remember too that when the short turn is made wider to accomodate better high lift flow it has a tendency to kill off low and mid lift flow.

Regardless of how they perform on the bench the true test will be on a dyno. I might just use a pair on my dual quad 460 truck engine I am building. I still need to mock up a pair on a block with a cam and valves installed to see how rocker geometry pans out.


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#14 ·
Scott,

Not only is the intake port floor low, but have you observed that the top of the intake port (as viewed from the valve train area) is no taller than the D0VE pass car port??? By comparison, the iron CJ ports are about the same height as the valve cover rail, while the D0VE and Procomp intake ports are about 1/4-inch below. In fact, there seems to be more removable material along the sides of the intake ports than the tops of the intake ports.

Procomp's price sheet shows CNC porting options prior to delivery, but we have just heard that they are still working the bugs out of this and that the primary problem is breaking through the top of that low port roof.

If you ask me, I feel somebody needs to tweak the mold in this area...

Paul
 
#15 ·
I have made some comparison measurements...

Paul Kane said:
Scott,

Not only is the intake port floor low, but have you observed that the top of the intake port (as viewed from the valve train area) is no taller than the D0VE pass car port??? By comparison, the iron CJ ports are about the same height as the valve cover rail, while the D0VE and Procomp intake ports are about 1/4-inch below. In fact, there seems to be more removable material along the sides of the intake ports than the tops of the intake ports.

Procomp's price sheet shows CNC porting options prior to delivery, but we have just heard that they are still working the bugs out of this and that the primary problem is breaking through the top of that low port roof.

If you ask me, I feel somebody needs to tweak the mold in this area...

Paul

Your correct in that the roof of the port especially near the entry is as the dove ports are. The port is however taller near the spring cup and hence the area around the guideboss directly above the short turn crest.

The port responds exactly as the dove does when the bathtub shape of the short turn is flattened. It makes the port more unstable past about .060" material removed from the corners. I layed back the short turn even more and the port became more unstable earlier in the lift curve just as the doves do. You can only get away with so much before the port just gets ugly.

The distance from short turn to roof is 1.972 in the procomp, 1.865" in a dove and 1.787 in the tfs street.

Short turn to deck distance is 1.145" in the procomp, 1/110 in the dove and 1/247 in the TFS streets.

Seat to short turn crest height is 1.062" in the procomp, 1.00" in the doves and 1.120" in the TFS streets.


At this point I do not see the lift figures above 600" improving much. Given that the intake port appears to be a loose copy of the dove architecture none of this is really surprising.

Flow rates with an rpm intake attached are almost identical to large valve dove on both the low and high runners just 4 or 5 cfm better through out the curve.

This is certainly no TFS replacement as those castings have much better manifold attached flow rates with an rpm attached.

The procomps do have a better exhaust port which should help power some but I do not see them making a bunch more power than the iron stuff does.




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#16 ·
Nicely ported exhaust flow numbers with small valve...

The small valve flow rates are almost identical to the 1.75" valve stuff. This i feel is because of the small overall dimensions of the port.

As a recap the flow rates for the as cast vs bowl blended stock seat and radius seat fully ported small valve are as follows for the exhaust.

.100" / 56 / 62 / 57
.200" / 99 / 105 / 113
.300" / 138 / 139 / 145
.400" / 159 / 162 / 178
.500" / 172 / 178 / 210
.600" / 181 / 189 / 224
.700" / 183 / 196 / 230

There appears to be potential for better large valve flow with a larger pocket and larger overall port cross section and volume.



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#18 ·
I have been contemplating the intake side...

jpierce55 said:
Keep us updated sounding better then expected from those heads. So is the above .600 lift shaping up on intake or just on the exhaust?

...and have some ideas to try. I would like to see the port stable till about 680" lift because invariably folks are going to use these heads past what I feel is their design limits.

All and all not to shabby for the money and antiquated intake port design. It really kind of baffles me as to why the intake port was not updated a bit. It would not have been a big deal to raise the short turn .080".



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#20 ·
Quite possibly...

jpierce55 said:
Another question and I am not even dreaming this but:

Does it seem like these would be good heads for a mild blown/charged engine?. Seems you have good exhaust flow. Might be the best budget charger head?

The exhaust can be made bigger and my gut tells me the additional flow will follow. I find it best for me to walk away from R&D when I hit a wall with a project. I almost always find a solution when I revisit the sticking point.

From the lift points .100" thru .500" the ported procomps are actually as good if not a tic better than the TFS streets ported but again after about .565" on the intake side the port gets ugly. The TFS streets have good low and mid lift numbers but as I shoot for flow above .600" lift the lower lift numbers fall off some.

I am getting alot of inquireys about the heads and I do not want folks to think that these are going to be a budget substitute for the TFS streets. I do not believe they will hang with the streets when the combo gets above 550 to 600 hp but this is just an assumption on my part based on my findings in so far. I do feel they will make a really strong street based terror or even better a great truck based high torque head. They are circles better than the D3's on the exhaust side and 5 to 6 cfm better at mid lift than the iron passenger car heads.

Of course we will know more once we have some dyno numbers for comparisons.



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#21 ·
Revised large valve flow figures... They are better....

Did some additional R&D on the procomps and have some interesting findings.

The exhaust port is in fact capable of more flow with some additional size added in the right places.

I managed to delay the uglyness that occurs on the intake side until .660" lift with additional short turn work. This does however start to diminish lower lift flow so I feel that this is the stop point.

Revised flow rates are as follows:

.100" / 52 / 84
.200" / 108 / 159
.300" / 159 / 220
.400" / 190 / 270
.500" / 220 / 303
.600" / 237 / 325
.700" / 242 / ..... 331 @ .660"
.800" / 245 /

The average intake flow rates are better than any of the dove iron heads I have available until .600" lift and the exhaust are just as good as the TFS streets till the same lift but with a smaller port cross section.

Seems to me that 650 to 700 HP is about the most I would reasonably expect from these castings N/A. While the intake flow hits a wall the exhaust is far better than any dove iron stuff and this will be an advantage although I can not venture a guestimate as to how much.

Seems fair to say that the std port stuff can be ordered as follows:

Small valve D3's no porting
Small valve D0VE's no porting
Small valve pro comp as cast seat no porting

Small valve D3 iron heads
Small valve D0VE iron heads
Small valve procomps fully ported

Large valve D3
Large valve D0VE
Large valve procomp
TFS steet castings as cast
TFS streets fully ported.

Hope this helps clarify the procoms place in the order of things passenger car port sized.




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#22 ·
Hey, Scotty....

Hey, Scotty, you lost me on the pecking order thing. I just worked a graveyard shift and drank 30 beers, so forgive me if it's obvious. 8)


PS: I just witnessed the valve job on my D3 heads that I ported per your specs. And my house just SOLD !!!!! Oh, and I have 8 more beers.

I'M DEBT FREE !!!!

Sorry if this is off topic. :p
 
#23 ·
Re: Hey, Scotty....

cletus66 said:
Hey, Scotty, you lost me on the pecking order thing. I just worked a graveyard shift and drank 30 beers, so forgive me if it's obvious. 8)


PS: I just witnessed the valve job on my D3 heads that I ported per your specs. And my house just SOLD !!!!! Oh, and I have 8 more beers.

I'M DEBT FREE !!!!

Sorry if this is off topic. :p
Heads are grouped in three seperate catagories from worst to best.
The TFS come only with large valves hence their inclusion only in the last grouping.



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#24 ·
Thanks for the R&D effort and info, Scott. 8)

What really pisses me off about this new casting is that damn intake port. Aside from the intake, the head has some real potential...but unfortunately, the intake port is what it is and so the head delivers far less than what it really could have been, had that intake port been engineered instead of loosely copied and resembling something of yesteryear's port design(s). (That clause about being "loosely copied instead of engineered" is a presumption of mine, but even if I am mistaken, it doesn't make the port any better.)



Also, Scott, look at the photo above...specifically the intake flange/port on the valve train side--insufficient material for an agressive CJ portmatch! Even a D3VE/D0VE has more material in that area to allow for a more gradual transition from the manifold side of the intake flange to the inner passenger car port.

I truly feel this ProComp casting could benefit tremendously from a mold revision in much of the areas of the intake port...it's just killing the potentilal of the head.

Paul
 
#25 ·
One nice thing about that intake flange Paul is that the head is made from aluminum and welding some additional material into that area would be pretty easy. I do wish they would have put at least a little more thought into the casting design.
 
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