[TR] Aluminum head?

[Wbeech@flash.net]

Oh wow, my ‘66 TR4 Motor has an aluminium head, am I doomed?  Discovered a water leak after I bought it, bad weld job on the one of channels in the block that fouled the head seal.  Filed it, fixed it, remember only 70ftlbs on the studs.  ISTR the liners were not as proud of the block as some say they should be.  
Bill
Sent from my IBM 8088

On Sep 2, 2019, at 8:50 PM, Michael Porter <mdporter at dfn.com> wrote:

> On 9/2/2019 7:10 PM, Paul Dorsey wrote:
> Gotcha!  I may be dumb but   I I am dumb, but,I’m no dummy, I don’t have an aluminum head on my motor. Do theymake aluminum heads for our motor or do they? Anyway they’re out of my price range.
>   As I was loosening the bolts that hold the head on,  I got to thinking, I wonder if there is a sequence for loosening these head nuts .   Metal bends, You know. Perhaps that is more critical for something like aluminum heads.


There have been attempts at making aluminum heads for the wet-sleeve engines, but they've been largely unsuccessful, for one major reason--they have been designed as analogues of the cast-iron head done in aluminum--dimensionally and in configuration, they're duplicates of the original.  For that reason, they don't have the mechanical strength of the cast-iron heads, and can't force down the liners as well as the originals, and therefore tend to leak.  There are a couple of people on the lists who have installed them on their engines.

The problem is beam strength.  Cast aluminum simply isn't as strong as cast iron, so if the dimensions are identical, then the cast aluminum head will tend to bend around the liners rather than punching them down into the figure-eight gaskets.  That produces leaks at the head gasket.  An aluminum head for the engine is a good idea, but not as currently done.  Future examples really should consider radical redesigns to accommodate wet-sleeve construction, in the way of increasing beam strength.  I've done some preliminary work on just that--thicker, taller heads in which the outer perimeter is raised and thickened, using a flatter cast valve cover socketed into the upper surface so it occupies the same space.  And, of course, adding crossflow port configuration, which should have been done right from the start.  It also wouldn't hurt to machine the block lower cylinder lands smooth and machine the cylinders for o-rings, which solves the figure-8 gasket compression sealing problem.  The cylinders only need to stand proud enough (a thousandth or so) to ensure that the cylinder head locks them to the block so they don't travel up and down with piston motion.

Something like that would work prettyOn 9/2/2019 7:10 PM, Paul Dorsey wrote:
> Gotcha!  I may be dumb but   I I am dumb, but,I’m no dummy, I don’t have an aluminum head on my motor. Do theymake aluminum heads for our motor or do they? Anyway they’re out of my price range.
>   As I was loosening the bolts that hold the head on,  I got to thinking, I wonder if there is a sequence for loosening these head nuts .   Metal bends, You know. Perhaps that is more critical for something like aluminum heads.


There have been attempts at making aluminum heads for the wet-sleeve engines, but they've been largely unsuccessful, for one major reason--they have been designed as analogues of the cast-iron head done in aluminum--dimensionally and in configuration, they're duplicates of the original.  For that reason, they don't have the mechanical strength of the cast-iron heads, and can't force down the liners as well as the originals, and therefore tend to leak.  There are a couple of people on the lists who have installed them on their engines.

The problem is beam strength.  Cast aluminum simply isn't as strong as cast iron, so if the dimensions are identical, then the cast aluminum head will tend to bend around the liners rather than punching them down into the figure-eight gaskets.  That produces leaks at the head gasket.  An aluminum head for the engine is a good idea, but not as currently done.  Future examples really should consider radical redesigns to accommodate wet-sleeve construction, in the way of increasing beam strength.  I've done some preliminary work on just that--thicker, taller heads in which the outer perimeter is raised and thickened, using a flatter cast valve cover socketed into the upper surface so it occupies the same space.  And, of course, adding crossflow port configuration, which should have been done right from the start.  It also wouldn't hurt to machine the block lower cylinder lands smooth and machine the cylinders for o-rings, which solves the figure-8 gasket compression sealing problem.  The cylinders only need to stand proud enough (a thousandth or so) to ensure that the cylinder head locks them to the block so they don't travel up and down with piston motion.

Something like that would work pretty well, methinks.


Cheers.

-- 


Michael Porter
Roswell, NM


Never let anyone drive you crazy when you know it's within walking distance....


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