Well guys, finally got my IK200's in the mail via fedex
(stick to USPS or Brown, I had to wait until today to receive them because on Friday, they "could not locat recipient" .)

So anyhow, here they are, look pretty nice to me.




However, there are a few things I picked apart. First off, the casting on all the parts that the airflow will touch is pretty rough. Like 60 grit sandpaper rough. I know that is fine for the intake runners because the air/fuel needs to be suspended. But there is about 1" of smooth surface that seemed to be done on the mill.




So this edge is fairly smooth with a mirror sheen. It's also uneven as you can kind of see on the side of the runner in the second picture. Should I roughen it up a bit with a sanding drum to match the rest of the casting? Or will the fuel/air completely bypass this part when the fuel gets squirted in?


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Another thing that is bothering me is, as stated before, the casting is very very rough. Combustion chamber and exhaust are even just as rough:






Would you recommend definately cleaning up these areas? I can't take the valves out, so I will have to make due with what I have, but if I polish out the CC, is it okay if I knick the bottom of a valve in the process? I know that the surface has to be even to elliviate hot spots, so I'd be as careful as I could in that respect.



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One last thing, and then I'm done. There is one low spot on one of the intake runners, just a casting flaw. Will this be much of a problem, or should I try and even that area out as best as I can?






What would you guys do if you were ready to put these heads on?

 

wow, i havent seen a CC that rough before. even a stock casting is decently smooth.


I would say definately clean up the CC's or you may end up with some detonation.

The intake runners *should* be a little rough to keep everything mixed up on its way to the camber. You dont want it a mirror finish but also you dont want it so rough that its going to kill flow either.

 

Alright, so clean up chambers. Is it okay if I hit the edges of the valves? It's kind of inevitable you know? I would think that if I took them out, I could royally eff up the seat if I slip.

 

Anyone? What would YOU do to these heads?

 

Either remove the valves, and clean them up properly, or leave them alone and just install them.

A sanding disk may make them look and function a little better, but you won't feel the difference. A few percent gain in flow at best.

 

polishing the chambers helps resist detonation big time.
put duct tape on the valves and be super careful. A dremel with a sanding drum gives the best control due to it's light weight. You can use a die grinder with it's cheaper sanding drums for the easy areas. I think it's not rocket science to remove the valves, a simple "heads off car" valve spring compressor is like $10...
That just means if you slip you ruin the valve seat, and not the valve....
6 of one, half dozen of the other right?

 

I found out from a friend that he has a valve spring compressor I can use, so I'm going to pull out the valves and do some bowl work. Doing the combustion chambers makes me nervous though because if I hit that seat, the head is toast and I'll have to send it back out for machining.

 

yea, I nicked 2 seats when I did mine. A nick the size of a pimple. I think they just lapped my valves to that. Cutting a seat costs $10 per I think, so it would have been a cheap fix anyway.

I used a dremel with carbide bit, about 3/32" in diameter, ball nose, to get in close to the seat. Hence why I only hit 2 seats (which was with the die grinder, before I wised up.)

Duct tape solves all. Put it on your die grinder nut to keep it from gouging the seat while you do bowl work. If you put it on your seat it might save that.

Remember, work near the plug helps a lot, 'specially polishing there.

 

You run about a 50-50 chance of nicking the valve seat each time you work in the bowl.... on each bowl... It can be done, but chances are high that you will need to grind the damaged seats. Is it worth the risk? Very little gain to be had on a nice set of heads like those. They already flow well enough. The combustion chambers are fine the way they are now for a low compression street engine.

I think that you should just use them as they are.

Good luck!

 

Looks pretty much like my trickflows did. I used a round sanding drum and a dremel and cleaned the chambers to a mirror finish. the aluminum is WAY softer than a valve, so even if you hit the valve with the sanding drum it won't even nick it. Don't remove the valves....

You want to polish to a near mirror finish, but don't go so far as to take out more than a cc or so total per chamber.