Need opinion on TEA heads

I just received my heads from TEA. The flow sheet provided with heads are
as follows:
Lift Int Exh
.100 67.2 53.8
.200 142.5 115.0
.300 201.1 172.3
.400 245.7 210.5
.500 268.8 232.3
.600 270.2 239.9
.700 271.4 246.5

This was with 2.00 intake and 1.60 exhaust valves.

I had these heads independently flowed at two separate locations today. Both at .28 inches with a 4.155 bore, same as TEA.

SuperFlow600 SuperFlow300
Kim Barr Lloyd Elliot (Nighttrain66)
----------------------- ------------------------------------
Lift Int Exh Lift Int Exh
.100 65.4 53.1 .100 63.2 46.0
.200 140.9 109.3 .200 131.3 100.5
.300 202.0 143.8 .300 189.3 134.2
.400 245.6 174.2 .400 232.3 155.5
.500 258.4 187.1 .500 254.4 169.4
.600 261.2 195.8 .600 255.6 178.5
.700 260.9 200.4 .700 256.4 184.7

I am not impressed with the short fall on the intake peak. Lloyds numbers appear to be a little low.

Here is my question. Lloyd feels there is more to take out the intake side and exhaust side. He could probably better describe where. I believe it is near the pushrod wall and the guide. Would you have more work done the heads. TEA seems to want me to keep them as they are or send them back for a return.:rolleyes:

What would you do? These heads are for a nitrous stroker.

Michael

Honestly...I'd have Lloyd do some work on a set of stock heads. Very nice guy, and VERY reasonable on prices.

If TEA will give you your money back, return them. Those exhaust numbers are so inflated its ridiculous. They are not what was advertised, so get your money back.

Ryan

I know this doesnt help all that much but for a real comparison you NEED to flow atleast two sets of heads together on two different flow benches for a true comparison. This way you can tell if there is truely a difference.

I have seen posts in LT1 tech where their heads have been reflowed and have been dead on. With a CNC porting not much of a difference should be seen between heads.

If they will give you your money back and feel you can get better elsewhere go for it. But as a comparison I payed 2000.00+ for 258/217 from GTP...

I roared with laughter when I spied those TEA claimed exhaust side flow #'s.

No F'ing way!!!!

We have a lot of people locally that use TEA's heads and have good results. Its common knowledge here that Brian flows the exhaust ports with a stack, resulting in the inflated numbers. But, its not a fact that has really gotten out. As a result there are a few uninformed folks out there running single pattern cams with the TEA heads and wonder why they're a lot slower than they should be.

Originally posted by aggiez28
ouch....craig didnt use any vasoline!!!

brook

Yes thats a lesson myself, Ryan, and Cody have learned.:cry:

TEA seems to do good stuff. the reason the exhaust is diff is they were flowed differently.

intake is with in 10cfm, sounds ok.. considering changes between benches, maybe a diff port, etc

Just an update. Brian at TEA said he doubted there was anything like 10 cfm to be found in the heads. Brought them back to Lloyd Elliot (Nighttrain66) in Red Oak TX and within about 20 minutes he found a hair over 10 cfm on a intake port. I watched him do it with my own eyes. All I can say is if you want a stock set of LT1 heads ported, get a hold of Lloyd. :bow: You will not find a more upstanding person in this line of work. Dollar per horsepower you will not go wrong using Lloyd. Needless to say he will be going through the heads and getting them up to snuff.


AGAIN GO TO LLOYD FOR LT1 HEADWORK. PERIOD. DO NOT MAKE THE MISTAKE I MADE.

Michael

Is a 4.155" bore standard?

Lloyd :bow:

If they were both tested under the same conditions locally, I think the #'s should be closer. I'd be curious what another head would do on each local bench.

Dunno, but there's some inconsistency somewehre, whether it's the benches themselves or exact testing procedures.

It doesnt look like you got "bad" stuff or anything. The midlift #'s look okay. Everyone wants to claim their bench is low and try to make people think their stuff flows 280-300cfm.. cause hell, we can inconspicuously make benches say whatever we want. You start wondering though when these guys either have no dyno numbers, wont show you real dyno sheets, or aren't making 550hp+ on pumpgas like they should. Mayhaps it's just another one of these cases of the internet inflating numbers. I blame Al.:D

Well put,

550hp+ on pump gas with 275cfm heads is a strech on a streetable, stock bottom end 350 w/o F.A.S.T. That's well over 450rwhp, most likely that's not going to happen. 550HP+ could happen with enough cam and RPM.

Now 450-475 flywheel HP, yeah that's right in the range. Which is what you've shown with a 411rwhp pull and LT1 castings.

A BTW a healthy 383 LT1 with more head will make 550+hp easy. Hell the Engine Masters prooved that you need 290-315cfm heads to get a pump gas street (below 6500rpm) in the 570-610HP range.

On the topic though, I have a set of CNC LT4's here with stock valves that TEA did. I am going to flow them either tommorrow or Friday. I'll post what I find.

EDIT: I'm going to do all the flow work on Monday when the intake is done.

Bret
Bret

I have a set of the TEA heads for an LS1 and they seem to be great heads. They should be on and running by the weekend. So I'll know more this weekend. But as far as the exhaust flow being "inflated" that's not realy true. The proper way to flow an exhaust is with a tube. If you don't it will cause turbulence and the numbers will not reflect what happens when the heads are installed. You wouldn't claim that intake numbers were inflated just becuase they used a radiused inlet would you. So why say that if they use a pipe on the exhaust? It's the same thing. Flow benches are like dynos you can't really compare one to another there are too many factors that are involved in to do an A-B comparison.

Just an update on my TEA heads. Remember this is what TEA flowed the heads at:

Lift Int Exh
.100 67.2 53.8
.200 142.5 115.0
.300 201.1 172.3
.400 245.7 210.5
.500 268.8 232.3
.600 270.2 239.9
.700 271.4 246.5

This is what Lloyds bench flowed the same heads:

Lift Int Exh Lift Int Exh
.100 63.2 46.0
.200 131.3 100.5
.300 189.3 134.2
.400 232.3 155.5
.500 254.4 169.4
.600 255.6 178.5
.700 256.4 184.7

After reworking the portwork here are the flow number on Lloyds bench:

Lift Int Exh Lift Int Exh
.100 64.1 47.0
.200 135.7 101.1
.300 193.2 136.1
.400 239.4 159.0
.500 266.0 176.5
.600 272.5 188.2
.700 273.5 195.6

I would love to see what they would flow on TEA's bench. Needless to say I am pleased with the results.

I know 3-4 guys running around here that are all putting 400+ rwhp with TEA stage 1.5,2 with mild cams and headers. To be specific the one running a 224/224 cam is abour 420rwhp and the other running a 226/230 is about 440rwhp. So I would say the heads are decent, I just bought some as well, so we'll see what they do for me.

I got my flow sheet:

at .550
299I and 256E

How do you get in touch with Lloyd to buy his heads??

Jason

jkbadz28

I sent you his email and phone number to your email address.

Michael

I am sure that the TEA LS1 heads that you are talking about are a NICE head just like the LT1 heads. The LT1 heads that TEA produces are VERY nice. Much nicer than other heads that cost hundreds more. They are a CNC head and I do not think that you could get a better CNC head unles ya want to weld on half of the sets. Since it is a CNC's head there are some places that need to be left thick for core shift and other casting differences. They have a GREAT flowing valve job and flow good #'s at all lifts.

1 reason Black95Form wanted more work done is because he was expcting flow #'s closer to what was advertised (270/239) and he was expecting these #'s to be comparable to #'s from a Superflow bench.

It seems pretty well known that GTP heads flow about 250-255 on a Superflow bench and he was expecting 270 from the same bench. When the TEA head flowed 255 as well he was a lil depressed. The low/mid lift #'s on the intake port are MUCH better than the GTP head though. If the head was advertised as a 255 cfm head with KILLER low/mid lift flow #'s than he would have been happy with these #'s. He was expecting the 270 cfm AND the low/ mid lift #'s that they have.

Another reason is because the extra CFM was just sitting there and easily obtained. It was obtained while not touching the shortside or valve job. Mainly by removing about 3 cc's worth from the long wall, narrowing guide and pushrod wall. Easily picked up cfm, not much runner volume added, did not cost much, no loss of ANY low or mid lift flow. How could he resist. He could have ran the heads like they were but he wanted what was advertised.

Will they make more power now than before ?? who knows.
Will the car be any faster?? who knows.
He is happy now and that is all that matters.
FWIW I can't see the extra CFM and 3 cc's of runner volume HURTING his 383.

FWIW the TEA heads and their flow #'s (at all lift points) would be hard to beat for the money ($1500 or less I think).
Almost anyones head could be touched up and nit-picked for extra cfm. It is a CNC head so that makes it a lil easier and if ya ask Brian at TEA he could posibly do this for a few extra $$$.

I just wanted to let people know that he is not being picky or racing a flow bench. He now realizes that flowbenches vary and like I mentioned, the extra CFM was inexpensive, easily obtained and did not hurt flow anywhere.

I also wanted to let people know that I am not bashing TEA.
TEA heads are NICER than almost everything else out there and have KILLER low/mid lift #'s and I am sure they would have made good power untouched.

NightTrain66

Nighttrain66,

Well put. I am not out to put anyone out of business. I originally posted this to see if the advanced gurus would go after more cfm in the head for my stroker build up. I have learned alot about the difference from a cnc to a hand port job, and flow bench results. My heads have been flowed on 4 different benches and I have 4 different results.

Michael

O.k. got to the flowbench. Since I sell TEA's stuff I wanted to double check them. I don't want to sell stuff that is not up to snuff around here, it's not just their name then it's mine.

For the LT4 heads that I have from TEA. They have stock valves in them and were angle milled to get a VERY small chamber. Now just to preface this, angle milling does not improve flow. It is the only way to keep out of the valve seats when you want a small chamber. It does change the valve angle, which might get it in the 21-22 deg range. The head ports are not changed to go along with this flow so it's not going to help really, the short side might have less shrouding but the plug side of the chamber is about the same. Either way, most heads I have seen that were milled flowed less and not more due to the importance of the chamber.

This is only intake because I don't have a pipe for these heads, so I'm not going to compare apples to oranges. Since the intake was really the ports in question (and the one that makes the power) that's what I wanted to verifiy.

Numbers quoted to me by TEA:

.200 143
.300 205
.400 247
.500 280
.550 288
.600 290

Numbers I found on a SF-600 Bench, with a clayed inlet:

.200 147
.300 207
.400 252
.500 279
.550 285
.600 298

Now I don't know about you but that's pretty dam close to what they said. Neither Chris (his bench)nor I did any flow bench tricks to pull this off. We put them on the bench and checked the flow. These heads did have the tool marks sanded off, but there was no marks that showed anything different from that.

Now I double checked a set of Brodix T1's from Weld Tech. They had the tool marks from the CNC on them and had no hand finishing. They had the same results that Weld said they would just like the TEA LT4's. One thing about CNC ports is that they are usually close like they say they are. Funny they were also 290cfm heads and 215cc's, except alot better flowing in the mid lift numbers. (267 @ .400) Also a 2.08" valve vs a 2.00" valve.

I've spoken with Lloyd about the ones he re-worked and his post above states all of what we talked about. I still want to double check a set of LT1's from TEA.

Obviously something odd happened with Black95Form's heads. Either way now they are going to be killer LT1 heads. On top of that still below GTP's price and it will outflow them too.

The LT4 heads are going onto 96z's 383, which I would guess will be in the 450rwhp range. More if I could get some better flow thru the intake, or using a single plane. The flow thru the intake was hurt from .400 and up at about the rate of 10%. The intake was ported for a certain size port working more on tuning, I wish I could cut it open and find some more flow in it but that's probably not going to happen. Either way it's even more evidence that a single plane conversion is needed for a LT1-4 engine. Since before the T1's flowed only 2% less with the Super Vic on.

So basically I'll keep using TEA's heads. I want to figure out why the LT1 porting is not consistent, but with a little help they are definately Bad A$$ stock ported heads.

That's my thoughts.

Bret

Hi,
Could someone explain this single plain intake conversion you guys mentioned, I am not sure how it would work.
I thought all single plain manifolds where carbed?
Thanks!
Chris...

Originally posted by CGrant
Hi,
Could someone explain this single plain intake conversion you guys mentioned, I am not sure how it would work.
I thought all single plain manifolds where carbed?
Thanks!
Chris...

Yeah, all single plane intakes are carbed. Unless you're talking about one of the Edelbrock/Accel type manifolds built for use with a 4bbl throttle body. Those were built specifically for that purpose (dry flow).
What Bret is speaking about is using a single plane carb intake, welding in the injector bungs and using a 4bbl throttle body or maybe even an "L" and the LS1-type tb. So basically we're talking about using a HVH Brodix, Vic. Jr, Team G, etc., to get a longer runner. Thought about going that route with my build but didn't.

The LT4 intake I'm using doesn't pose to be a restriction based on the flow we saw, intake and tb. Did require a bit of internal work on in the plenum, lots of radiusing and then the intake has to be patched back up. Nothing too crazy when you consider that guys have been cutting access holes in manifolds for a long time. Seems to work fine.

-Mindgame

Originally posted by Black95Form
Nighttrain66,

My heads have been flowed on 4 different benches and I have 4 different results.

Michael

That should be the quote of the day.:)

As Bret mentioned the LT4 heads he is talking about is going on my 383. I am very happy with my heads as they are and the flow numbers Bret got seemed to reinforce this even more. FWIW my GTP LT1 heads flowed 40cfm less than the TEA LT4s did. And for what they cost compared to the GTP's there is NO comparison.