Is this salvageable?

[PinkieT]

Bought a set of heads years go. Guy bought a car and they were in the trunk, and he didn't want them. Got them cheap. Just now took a close look. Both are either brand new or fresh rebuilds, protected by oil so no corrosion. Problem is one of them has dings on the surface. I Is it fixable? If not, no problem, I can use the cam anyway then sell off the valves, springs, other parts. The second head looks fine, fortunately.

 

[white95]

Yep. Those gouges can be repaired through minor welding and then the heads can be decked.

 

[96blak54]

I do see some bruising on the gasket surface area that dont look to deep and will require decking to clean up with not much material removed.

The deep gouges are within the combustion chamber and would most likely be fine long as the heads were of normal use.

Id run them in a daily driver.

 

[PinkieT]

Thanks! That "bruising" is the grease they were preserved with, so looks like I might be good to go. There is a good machine shop nearby so maybe I'll have them checked out. Still deciding if I'm gonna sell them and just to a cam/intake PI swap or do the whole enchilada. From what I read the cam and intake swap (something I am comfortable doing myself) doesn't leave much power on the table vs. doing a full PI head swap. I have a buddy who has a pair of nice PI cams for $80. Decisions, decisions!

 

[96blak54]

Keep in mind not all pi cam are the same. I dont know if your read the npi pi cam thread i wrote out but its about discovering camshaft profile differences. I find the actual mustang pi camshafts and the 5.4l camshafts are the best performing ones.

Unless youve had good practice with the tensioner wedge so the chains dont move, 1st time doing the cam swap means pulling the front cover and removing the timing chains. Being that far along, may as well swap the heads. And if you do, do yourself a favor and grab a set of exhaust manifolds and bolts along with the swap. This way you wont be fighting rusty crap exhaust bolts potentially breaking them adding to the headaches.

Keep in mind the major power increase comes from the compression bump of the pi heads smaller chambers. Both style heads are comparable in potential despite what the masses say. The fastest naturally aspirated 2v used npi ports.

 

[PinkieT]

Yep, I followed the thread on pi/npi cams. Still confused... I can get good used Mustang PI cams off a guy who builds turbo cars and knows what he has for under $100 a pair. However, I have shorty headers to install too, so maybe the head swap would be best all the way around. All this gotta wait until the docs figure out my health issues. Right now 30 minutes of standing on concrete kills my legs, and I have a heart monitor taped to my chest that they'll read off next week. Getting old is not for the timid...

 

[delling3]

First, sorry to hear of your health issues. Take care of yourself and get well.

I am in the midst of a cam/intake swap. I agree with others that once you pull the timing chains that you are not far from pulling the heads. I opted not to do the heads based simply on my budget. I figured $200 for a set of donor heads, another $200 - $400 for having a machine shop go thru them, plus $150 for head gaskets and head bolts. So, $550 - $750 for the parts to do the swap. I just didn't have the dough for that.

If I were to do the head swap, I would have the donor heads gone over by a machine shop. I saw from your prior post that you already have heads which might not need much attention, so the costs are reduced there. Unless I am mistaken, there really isn't an advantage to doing the head swap and headers at the same time.

 

[PinkieT]

First, sorry to hear of your health issues. Take care of yourself and get well.

I am in the midst of a cam/intake swap. I agree with others that once you pull the timing chains that you are not far from pulling the heads. I opted not to do the heads based simply on my budget. I figured $200 for a set of donor heads, another $200 - $400 for having a machine shop go thru them, plus $150 for head gaskets and head bolts. So, $550 - $750 for the parts to do the swap. I just didn't have the dough for that.

If I were to do the head swap, I would have the donor heads gone over by a machine shop. I saw from your prior post that you already have heads which might not need much attention, so the costs are reduced there. Unless I am mistaken, there really isn't an advantage to doing the head swap and headers at the same time.

Thanks. If the docs say nothing major, gonna buy me a lift and go to town on the head swap. If they have bad news, I'll have a bunch of parts for sale...

The donor heads turned out to be Summit Racing closeouts, so are either brand new castings or good rebuilds. Probably ended up on the discount rack because of the dings. Still, like you said, it is worth having them checked out before installing. Never pulled apart one of these puppies before... I am guessing an advantage of doing heads and exhaust at the same time is removing the heads from the top with the stock manifolds attached, putting the BBK shorties on the new heads, then wiggling the combo in. That, or installing the BBKs loosely on the H pipe then dropping the heads on. Kinda wish I had a 5.0 sometimes!

 

[PinkieT]

A local Mustang club guy posted he wanted to borrow a transmission jack. I offered mine and we, of course, talked about our cars when he came to pick it up. He has done PI head swaps and offered to help me if/when I get to it. Gotta love the Mustang community!

 

[white95]

A local Mustang club guy posted he wanted to borrow a transmission jack. I offered mine and we, of course, talked about our cars when he came to pick it up. He has done PI head swaps and offered to help me if/when I get to it. Gotta love the Mustang community!

That’s amazing!