Best set of aftermarket street heads for a 94?

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my recommendation .... either talk to a cam dude like ed curtis or jay allen for a combo, or just be done with it and get a total trick flow package that includes the heads, cam and intake.

+1 with the packages. I just had a friend from work do a new 306 with the Trick Flow package, and it runs like a raped ape.

Kurt
 
Back when I was big into these cars, the heads you wanted were the trick flow twisted wedge heads. These days it seems to have switched to a brand I haven't heard of until recently: AFR. Are the AFR street heads the ones I want to get? If so, is there any particular reason why? I assume they just flow better than the trick flows. Trick flow used to claim 73 more HP than stock, if you added an appropriate intake, cam, and throttle body. They were saying that an exta 73 HP to that setup was JUST from their twisted wedge street heads. That was supposed to be minus all the power that the other stuff was going to give you.

So, can AFR make the same claim? Are they really better than the trick flow twiested wedge street heads?

Nothing has changed. The Twisted Wedge head is still the best bolt on HP on a stock bottom end 302 and gives you more room for growth than a lot of the other heads out there.
 
or just be done with it and get a total trick flow package that includes the heads, cam and intake.

This will likely be the route I take as well. Their top end kit is built with top notch and more importantly well match components. Combine them with decent intake and exhaust components and you've got yourself an honest to goodness 350hp contender. More if you add a little displacement to your engine first.


....and they look bad ass with the crinkle black intake manifold and valve covers. :nice:
 
This will likely be the route I take as well. Their top end kit is built with top notch and more importantly well match components. Combine them with decent intake and exhaust components and you've got yourself an honest to goodness 350hp contender. More if you add a little displacement to your engine first.


....and they look bad ass with the crinkle black intake manifold and valve covers. :nice:

Would it be worth port matching everything first? And when you say 350HP, you mean 350 RWHP right?
 
Would it be worth port matching everything first? And when you say 350HP, you mean 350 RWHP right?

I would just bolt them on and go. Don’t' bother with port matching them. They're component match already and the Trick Flow stuff is pretty high quality, so you don't get a lot of the casting shift you would with other brands.

The kits are rated at 350hp and 360hp at the flywheel, depending on which intake you go with....and that's at the flywheel. You're going to need to either get very aggressive in your parts selection or add some displacement to the engine to see 350 horsepower at the wheels in naturally aspirated form.

Don’t get too hung up on numbers. Remember….you’re still adding a good 125hp/60bs ft of torque to the output of the stock 5.0L engine. With traction, that’s enough horsepower to situate you very comfortably into the 11’s.
 
The trickflow kit is nice no doubt, but just a little pricey. I just went over all the items individually and it's the same price as the kit! They aren't saving you anything by buying it in kit form which is kinda disappointing. That and the kits are starting to get into the 3k $ range where supercharger kits are!

For my money, unless something is broken in my top end, a supercharger would be the pick of choice in that money range any day! Not to mention used blowers are SUPER cheap these days.

Edit: I stand corrected.. if you price each item in the kit individually (Track Heat kit) you come up with 2735.00 whereas the kit costs 2649.00. So you save 80 bucks by buying the it in kit form. Not a huge bargain to me..
 
I would just bolt them on and go. Don’t' bother with port matching them. They're component match already and the Trick Flow stuff is pretty high quality, so you don't get a lot of the casting shift you would with other brands.

I disagree with this statement. Amateurs bolt on heads out of the box. Having the right person go through the head isn't that expensive and is worth every penny. Any head out of the box, even the trick flow, should get at least get a valve job. Once they have been dissasembled to do the valve job, touching up the port work is inexpensive. My engine builder port matched both my heads for $65.

Kurt
 
I'm sorry Kurt, but I won't go spending 1200 to 2k on a set of heads only to have to spend more money on them! I'll bet AFR heads don't need any of that crap done, you just bolt them on and go with it. If TFS heads need that kind of attention they are not as good as people make them out to be, in my humble opinion of course.

Like you said earlier, most of your cheaper heads have crap for hardware. So if TFS heads need attention too, why not spend 900 bucks on a generic Edelbrock E street head, Spend a couple hundred on springs and valve job and have the "Same Head" as those $1500 AFRs?

This is exactly why I run lost of boost on stock motors. A BUNCH less guess work involved, stock streetability and from what I'm seeing on Summit less money invested!
 
I disagree with this statement. Amateurs bolt on heads out of the box. Having the right person go through the head isn't that expensive and is worth every penny. Any head out of the box, even the trick flow, should get at least get a valve job. Once they have been dissasembled to do the valve job, touching up the port work is inexpensive. My engine builder port matched both my heads for $65.

Kurt

:nice::nice:
 
Just look at the time in Kurt's sig. It proves that extra head work is worth it. :D

In all seriousness though, if you are putting the heads on a built or aftermarket shortblock then it is beneficial to do all that additional head work. If you plan on putting them on a stock shortblock then just port matching the lower intake is usually the best route to go.

As far as which brand is best....they are all good brands and have quality pieces. All of the major brands have had manufacturing defects of one type or another in the past (bad valve guides, spring cups, etc) but have all pretty much remedied those problems. I think Trick Flows are pretty neat because of the patented twisted wedge type combustion chamber giving the ability to run a larger cam without having notched pistons. I currently run an Edelbrock head (not any of the new E street ones, but an older model) though because I got them used from a buddy for a good price. They had good springs and valve hardware out of the box and Edelbrock does the castings and CNC work in house.

Whichever brand you choose, as long as you stay with one of the major brands (AFR, TFS, Edelbrock, Brodix) you can't go wrong.
 
I'm not talking about all kinds of extra hardware. Just a valve job and make sure they are straight. That's like $200 if you go for the most expensive 5 angle competition valve job. I would assume that even the best that afr offers is a basic 3 angle out of the box. If you have to buy all new hardware like on an e street, then that would be a ton more money. Don't get all tied up in catch phrases like CNC machined. A lot of the head and engine factories push the term. What it really means is they set up the machine once, and then pay an unskilled worker $10/hr to feed it blocks and heads. A good engine builder can do a quality port or notch job with hand tools.

Kurt
 
Don't get all tied up in catch phrases like CNC machined. A lot of the head and engine factories push the term. What it really means is they set up the machine once, and then pay an unscaled worker $10/hr to feed it blocks and heads.

Kurt

That's the beauty of a quality $50,000+ CNC machine. Get the program accurate and anyone with a little more inteligence than a monkey can run it :D
 
Monkey or no, the results speak for themselves... just saying.

One other thing, I would expect a built 347 to bust off 11.5's without nitrous.

That was the engine I built back when I was an amateur. That's why I'm giving advice, because I've already made all these mistakes. Hopefully this 347 will run 11.5s without nitrous.

Kurt
 
And we appreciate the advice Kurt.. it's always nice to have people warn us about mistakes like that. All the more reason I want boost because frankly I don't like messing around with heads, cams, intakes, etc... there's enough different combos to make my head spin!
 
And we appreciate the advice Kurt.. it's always nice to have people warn us about mistakes like that. All the more reason I want boost because frankly I don't like messing around with heads, cams, intakes, etc... there's enough different combos to make my head spin!

Boost comes with it's own quirks to make your head spin also.

I've been through it all, started with nitrous on a stock bolt on motor, then in '04 bought an S trim. At 14psi and over 420rwhp/435rwtq that was super fun on the street. Then I got into the motor and added heads, cam, longtubes, girdle, windage tray, 7qt pan, meth injection, etc etc. Still fun but still a stock block so I keep the boost and tune limited.