DIY head porting with a dremel?

[rabbit16v@attbi.com (Dave Ewing)]

I did my first one with a dremmel and it increased the flow somewhat but I
have learned since then that a die grinder is the only way to go!!  You will
spend LITERALLY DAYS on that thing with a dremmel!!  A die grinder will make
it so that you can do it in an afternoon!!  The bits for the die grinder can
cost around $100  because you'll need something to take the aluminum away
quickly then sanding and smoothing bits to sculpt and clean and polish.
This is the way I did my last head and it turned out NICE!!  What might be a
good idea, though, is to find a core head and experiment first!  Even when I
did MY first head, I had experience doing others so I didn't just jump right
in!

In my opinion, unless your reaching for every last little hp, you can
effectively to it yourself.  The reason why most people you hear have it
done professionally (technically, I am a professional) is that they want it
flow benched AND they want someone to blame if it doesn't work!!  Plus, most
who have any or all their work done by someone else either have no time and
gobs of money or no desire to get their hands dirty (or afraid to!!).  It is
not wise to always listen to someone else and not to follow your gut!!  If
it is something you really think you can do than go for it!!  I am a huge do
it myselfer and I like to live by two sayings (one I made up myself!!)

If man made it, I can fix it!! (notice, God made women, not man!!)
If it doesn't kill you, it can only make you stronger!

Dave
----- Original Message -----
From: "T. Reed" <treed2@u.washington.edu>
To: <scirocco-l@scirocco.org>
Sent: Friday, August 30, 2002 9:12 PM
Subject: DIY head porting with a dremel?


> Okay, well this is gonna sound stupid coming from an inexperienced
> youngin' like me.. but..
>
> With everybody running to pay a shop hundreds of dollars to get their head
> ported, is there any reason I can't just do this myself?
>
> I mean.. looking at before and after pictures of 16v intake and exhaust
> ports on people's web pages, it looks like somebody just took a dremel
> with a grinding bit and opened up the ports a little without making the
> outside surface any bigger. I consider the dremel tool to be the
> handyman's 3rd most important secret weapon (after vice grips and duct
> tape) and I feel quite confident with a dremel in hand. I don't see any
> reason why I couldn't just duplicate the re-shaping of the ports as shown
> in the photos myself. Or is there something more to this that I'm missing?
>
> Why do people send this work away to be done by professionals? Is it the
> risk of taking off too much material and ruining an expensive 16v head?
> Fear of screwing it up and actually reducing the engine's power? Or is it
> just a sense of "if you're going to do something, do it right"?
>
> Maybe I'm being stupid here and grinding material away like that only
> helps if you put bigger valves in too..
>
> Being a cheap bastard, and being that I'm going to be pulling my head
> real soon now anyway to put in a 2 liter block.. I just have to ask
> because if $20 worth of dremel bits will buy me some more ponies, I'm
> game.
>
> -Toby
>
>
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