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Path: utzoo!watmath!watdcsu!haapanen
From: haapanen@watdcsu.UUCP (Tom Haapanen [DCS])
Newsgroups: net.auto
Subject: Re: Leaded gas and old engines vs. new engines
Message-ID: <303@watdcsu.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 11-Jul-84 14:16:42 EDT
Article-I.D.: watdcsu.303
Posted: Wed Jul 11 14:16:42 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 12-Jul-84 02:37:44 EDT
Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 25

Says Keith Baker:

> The newer engines use harder valve seat material to prevent
> wear which used to be prevented by the lead in the fuel.  One
> way to fix the problem is to get heads from a newer engine of
> the same type which will have the hard seats.  A side benefit
> of this is often a reduction in compression ratio which will
> lessen detonation in the old high compression engines..  You
> could wait until the engine needs a valve job and either have
> hard seats installed in the old heads or go to the junk yard,
> pick up a newer set of heads and have them rebuilt instead.

A reduction in comnpression ratio (from the head swap) will:
   (1) Lower the performance of the car and/or
   (2) Increase the fuel consumption
due to the decrease in the volumetric efficiency of the engine.

Also, how are you supposed to find new heads for cars that were never
available in unleaded gas-only models?  There is no way I could find
such heads for my '72 Bug around here at least (even though they may
have been available in California).

Tom "flat-six fanatic" Haapanen

{allegra,decvax}!watmath!watdcsu!haapanen   U. of Waterloo   (519)744-2468