Ported Manifolds? Worth $?

LightEMup

Registered User
well my 89 SC is bone stock, brand new drive train. just a newer model supercharger off another sc i had. removed air silencer. Was wondering when i get an exhaust job soon, is it worth the money to put on ported manifolds? or should i put it into the intake area? and also what should i tell the shop to do for exhaust? i was thinkin 2.5 inch off the manifolds w/ no cats, 2-2.5 in resenator 1 3" pipe out then split back out into 2.5 through 2 turbo mufflers....does this sound ok? i want something a little louder than stock but not by much.
 
Having your exhuast done is very important in the preservation of your headgaskets. Ported manifolds are the way to go if you dont plan on doing any major mods. I think the stock collectors are 2.25". The rest of what you are planning sounds good.
 
i just got good cats and good resonator like you mentioned i use stock mufflers they say arent bad , it sounds good , the exhaust side of the heads are what hurts most next more than manifolds. look in this forum for head cutaway pics it will show you what im saying. i just did a little to the exhaust side of my heads a few years ago and it helped so much it makes me wanna take them back off and do some more
 
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Stock manifold size is in the order of around 2 inch...On a stock motor the exhaust is teh numbe rone thing to do...

If you can redo the cats and resonator youd be set..Even if you keep factory cat back
 
hmmm ok, so the exhaust system i have in mind sounds ok? i think i'm gonna do it without porting the exhaust manifolds, and take the other ones i have lying around and get em ported then slap those on. How much power could i get if i took the heads off my blown engine in the shop and cleaned em up in my spair time? is it worth it or should i get the performance heads that are available for the SC?
 
Having the heads cleaned probably wont net you ant extra hp, maybe put you back up to the stock hp. If you take them to a machine shop, have them do a vavle job, pressure check them, and have them surfaced. To go with performance heads you need to open up your whole intake and exhuast w/ headers to get the full amount of power out of it. You'd be better off starting off with the simple mods first and then working your way up.
 
sonicman1634 said:
Having the heads cleaned probably wont net you ant extra hp, maybe put you back up to the stock hp. If you take them to a machine shop, have them do a vavle job, pressure check them, and have them surfaced. To go with performance heads you need to open up your whole intake and exhuast w/ headers to get the full amount of power out of it. You'd be better off starting off with the simple mods first and then working your way up.
bring me back up to stock hp? wtf? i am stock..... how could that bring me back up to where i'm at now?? the heads on my car now are all re surfaced and have a 3 angle valve cut from when i rebuilt my engine. i dunno how the hell u go "up" to stock?
 
Yes, "cleaning" up the heads without doing any porting or going to larger valvles wont really net you any noticable hp. I'm not what a 3 angle valve job will do but I bet it didnt get that much more. Until you really do any real mods you probably will stay @ the stock hp level. After awhile, the engine will loose a little performance as the engine gets crud built up inside the heads and intake. Thus, you will loose a bit of power. So, cleaning it up can only bring you back up to stock. Putting on performance heads without any supporting mods wont get much. The problem is that you need to efficiently move air to and from the engine. Then, performance heads and cam would be in order. With the amount of money you would spend on heads, you could use that same amount for smaller mods that would probably net you more hp.
 
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