Just curious, Were, or are there any Hemi type heads (conversions) that fit a small block Chevy.. I would think that someone, somewhere has done this.. I have never seen anything like it so I thought "What better place to ask the question" than here! Post some pics if you can! I would love to see them. Lain
I think Arias/Fontana just does the big block. But mostly in Nitro burning atomic bomb form. The little small block can produce more HP than you can use with conventional combustion chambers. Why worry about the shape?? Take a look at the Junior Fuel motors. They go faster than many of the top fuel machines of the 60's.
I seen a couple of outfits out there on the web that do the Big block, and even wedge head smaller mopar engines over to a hemi head.. I just really wonder, was there an issue with doing such a thing with a sbc? I mean with all the people over SOOOO many years, you would thing someone somewhere did just what I am asking about... I am a flathead Ford nut now, but still have a place in my heart for small block Chevy's as that is where I cut my teeth first as a teenager... Part of why I ask is because like Ardun's are to flattys, you would thing someone did a hemi for a sbc? On your part there about "why change the shape"... mainly just because you already know there are people out there that say "why not" ya know Lain
It may have something to do with the pushrod angle. Zora and his brother Yura actually designed the head to solve the flathead overheating problem in the big trucks. I have an old Popular Mechanics article from the 50's. When they were ironing out the bugs they were pretty excited about the performance market, and that's where the heads mostly went. Wikipedia has a pretty good biography, that pretty much jives with the PM article.
Chet Herbert is/was making a conversion head set-up. And there was a really cool conversion made by Leo Lyons that was on the cover of Rod N Custom March '66, but as far as I know it never made it to production.
Yep, In the March 66 Rod & Custom there is a story about the Lyons Hemi-Chevy Small Block conversion. There's a pic of it on Isky's dyno. 301ci,6-71 blower,hilborn two port+638 hp. Our scanner is messin' up. I'll try to post the pics though. Smokey
Just for fun, its kind of a bummer that nothing seems to have been produced for the masses... But then again, you get back into costs, and "will they sell". I just think that would have been a fun, cool toy for a sbc. That would be cool to see your scan of one of these... Lain
Yes, there was a Hemi head produced for the SBC. Leo Lyons designed and manufactured them in the '60s. Lyons was located on Kendall Drive in San Bernardino, California. A few years ago I heard that the tooling is owned by Walt Austin and there were plans to produce the heads again. Here's a link to one that appears to be in Speedy Bill's collection. http://www.museumofamericanspeed.com/Collections/Engines/AllAlphaE006.shtml Mike
Hey it turns out that the idiot runnin' the scanner was the problem. A hard bound book doesn't work to good in our scanner. 50 Years of Rod & Custom is a great book to have. Here goes... i hope it worked... Smokey
Murf, thanks for this thread. AV8 thanks for the info. I'm a cylinder head guy in a race engine shop. I'd like to see somebody make these heads. Smokey
Both of these are waay cool... It just seemed like out of ALL the small block Chevy's out there, someone, somewhere had to have done a Hemi head for the mighty mouse motor! Making Hemi heads for sbc's...Hmmmmm (evil wicked laugh..) Lain
Slightly off subject but, at one time a company was offering an aluminum small block replacement block. Among the options on this block was Ford Cleveland head configuration. It was for the sprint car guys and I believe it may have been called Jones Engineering.
Here's some cool info I found out last year: I go to the old GMI college in Michigan, and we had a car show during the alumni weekend. All the judges for the show were past graduates, and I had my '30 there for the show (it's got a big block in it). Anyway, one of the alumni walks up to my car and is looking at the motor. I walk over and talk to him and it turns out he was on the team that designed the 396, which at the time was known as the mysterious race motor for GM. Well, I had heard a couple years ago that GM had prototyped a motor with Hemi heads, but of course they never made production. In fact there's a guy here in town with a 1st gen Camaro with the heads on it (not factory of course). So I asked this guy about it, and he confirmed that GM did make this setup. In fact they made several prototypes under the direction of Zora Arkus Duntov. It was planned to be a special motor for the Corvettes. Unfortunately, he said that they decided there would not be interest in the motors, so they dropped the program.
The biggest reason the heads ended up on the performance market was that just after Zora & Yura got the heads ready for production Ford switched to the big Lincoln engine in their trucks, effectively killing their market for the Conversion. The brothers then turned to Sydney Allard in England , working a deal to supply them for his flathead powered Allard , that fell thru when Cad & Olds introduced the Kettering Overhead V8 in 49 & the Allard buyers opted for it. The heads languished in England till Andy Granitelli (sp) bought a bunch, splitting the order with C & T Automotive in California. C & T was just rebuilding their 40 Ford shop truck engine & had also just bought a dyno, they decided to try a set on the engine & dyno test it. Before they were done they had gotten Stu Hillborn to cobble an injector set up for it , got , I think Kong Jackson, to set up a mag with something like 50 degree initial advance & pumped Alky thru it ending up with 300 plus actual horses out of it . Word of this kind of power spread & the heads became "De-Rigor" for a go fast Flathed guy.
Man...thats just a drag!! Hah Ha!! "They were made"...so somewhere in a vault, in a top secret place, only known to two people (and both of who are dead..."this parts just a joke guys") and they didnt pass along "where".......sits a complete set of patterns for casting NEW Chevy small block Hemi heads.... Ready to take to foundry for a "production run" of say a few thousand sets... well, there I go daydreaming again! Haha!! Lain
At Yunick's auction in '88 there was a lot of kool strange stuff from the end of 409(W block) to the early bigblock(Mark) era.
I seen a picture once of Zora standing in the middle of about 6 engines and one was hemi headed and for the life of me can't find it again.
It would be interesting to know what the failure to go into production was. Maybe just price. I know the Chrysler LA motor hemi mod is not doing well, because you can't just put a hemi head on a motor and be done. You need a cam, you need an intake, you need valve covers, you need everything! Basically all you can use is the block and the crank, and maybe the rods. Everything else has to be in the kit. Insert dollars here...
in the summer of 92 i was in Estes Park Colorado with my family on vacation (i was 17 and just out of high school) and saw what i think was a Duece (if i remember right) that had a small block Chevy with HEMI heads. i thought it was the neatest thing cause i'd never seen that before or heard of anyone doing it.
Most of the exotic SBC head development efforts went into overhead cam conversions. But the simple fact is that the SBC is a near perfect design, and hemi heads did not offer much improvement. The OHC conversions, on the other hand, did bump the top RPM potential. But in the end, hemi or OHC conversion, the return, in performance, just did not justify the expense. In todays gold chain environment, where bragging rights mean more than common sense, there may be a small market for both.
I think what you have here, and what Bib overalls wrote just above says it all really in the reasoning for "not making" any production runs of the Hemi style heads... I mean I love the flathead engine, but I do love the small block chevy too... and yep... small block chevy's are a well built engine that does quite well with little to no modifications... But "Wouldnt it be cool if" they would have just busted out about a few thousand sets of hemi heads! I definately know that if I ever come across someone who has a set on an engine, I will definately hope that I have a camera ready... That would be something to see in person. Lain
Here's a couple of pics of the "babbitt & Lyons" blown Hemi head chev powered dragster. Eddie Babbitt built the chassis and Leo Lyons provided the 283 c.i. Chev engine with his Hemi heads. Don't have any info on the times that it turned. Mick
wonder how close these were to say the first style hemi ....i mean mickey thompson did the hemi head conversion for pontiacs and fords...and supposedly 392 head gaskets pretty much line up.....well atleast on the pontiac version.... brandon
Look close at the Lyons heads, they are very close to the design (externally) to Arduns, at least they look that way to me, the placement of the plugs, the bolt pattern, the shape of the cover and the shape of the head itself. Any detailed info about them?
posted this awhile back thread'chevy hemi heads interesting valve train' as seen at Barkersfield Valley Head Service
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