Edelbrock 60049 455 heads

Hello to all & new to the group.

Have a question on the above heads and the installation on stock rebuilt 1970 455. Engine in my car was rebuilt using T/A stock compression pistons, bored .030 over, decked block, T/A 110 cam using stock hydraulic lifters, balanced rotating assembly & high volume oil pump.
Have factory Stage-1 heads on it currently with Performer manifold. Freshening and straightening things up after many years of minimal use and mainly storage. Would like to add some performance and drop some weight with the above heads. Are these a "bolt on" addition to my current engine build or will there be additional machining and or parts required to install?
Car will also be getting new performance 2.5" exhaust with MT long tube headers, electronic ignition, and a 800 cfm qjet. What kind of performance increase can I expect from Eheads over stock Stage-1 with the set-up described?
Any comments/thoughts with the above questions would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance

 

In the industry, Edelbrock heads are considered excellent cores to work with. Never seen a set that had correct valve guide clearance, or a concentric valve seat in it. Many stories of engine failures due to valve stuck in guides, burned valves, less than anticipated performance ect, ect..

Plan on spending about $300 to bring them up to that claim on the box... Once you do that, they are pretty decent in power production.

And unless something has changed here recently, those heads are MIA.. with no expected release date.

When they first came out, they were about $900 each, assembled.. even adding the $300 to get them ready to go, they were a good value.. but at the current price of nearly $1500 each.. not so much... I can get you into a set of TA heads that flow considerably better than these will, for that money. And since the TA heads look more stock, especially if painted, they are probably a better option for your particular car, as far as appearance goes.

Yes, we have had issues with TA and parts availability.. but at least we know someone is worried about it, and working to get the parts back in stock, asap.. can't say that I know that is true with Edelbrock.

JW

 

Hello Jim and thank you for the reply,

I had actually called Tom at T/A last week on the availability of his heads and he was not optimistic that he could provide anything in the next few months but did place an order for set as a formality just to get in line so to speak. My car is at my builder and he plans on starting on it end of this month in hopes of having it completed late May early June, that being said do you have anything on the shelf that is available possibly in this time frame? I like the idea of the T/A product over the Ebrock for the reasons you stated, and yes they would get a coat of red as the engine will look bone stock. If availability is no go in this time frame I could always leave the factory Stage-1's on it for now and circle back and install the replacements at a later date. Let me know your thoughts please when time allows.

TR

 

We have been working on several OLDS engine projects along with the BUICK engines we build. One we recently worked on, a stock 455 short block with forged pistons. Heads are 70 Iron OLDS 455 heads that Duane did a great job on porting them as usual. The combo has a hyd roller cam and the NEWER Edelbrock OLDS Air Gap RPM intake. And putting it on the flow bench, it flows like gang busters out of the box !! And it has a Holley sniper on top of it. An easy to build, easy to get all the parts for, and cranking out 625 HP on pump gas . But besides the ease of getting the parts for OLDS and availability . It is not the engine itself we are focusing on. But the ease of building them, ease of getting parts, and promise of more perf parts. Realizing how well that new OLDS intake worked, we looked at the possibility of having one made with Edelrock for the BB BUICK . The plane crash landed before it even took off !!! Edelbrock response : " Not interested. Never going to happen. BUICK enthusiasts are not serious enough about their mark. The "numbers" aren't there. We get even more interest in product from Cadillac than we do for BUICK. There will likely never be any new products for BUICK from Edelbrock". Now I figured how is that possible ? There aren't any more OLDS folks out there than BUICK ? Yet they have $1000.00 stroker cranks, several different versions of aluminum heads, intakes, readily available cams, complete rotating assemblies, and so on and so forth. Don't get mad at me or shoot me. I am only the messenger. Only being matter of fact. The future does not look bright ahead for BUICK ? These OLDS combos comparatively speaking are starting to crank out more than BUICKS. We are completing another OLDS now. But we still have a number of BUICKS on the go. But I will say it is getting a lot easier to build these OLDS engines. We are very lucky we have TA and Mike T doing the best they can for BUICK stuff.

 

Port your iron stage one heads, bump your cam up to a TA288-92h. Run a set of .027 cometic mls gaskets, have everyday performance tune your carb and distributor, it will deliver what you want. Check your piston to valve clearance, it will be close

 

Getting the power and what we want from BB BUICK is NOT the problem. We have built plenty of 600 - 800 + All Iron block/ head combos. The point I am making is that it is getting difficult to get the PARTS . That's what makes them difficult to build. IE: NO Roller cams and for some people no aluminum heads. And very little new product development for BB BUICK. It's getting difficult to build them waiting for the parts. This all Iron 464 combo with ported "Iron Stage 1 heads" had no problems making 800 HP . It is full weight running an exhaust system and power brakes. A street/ strip car. Check the time slip at the end of the video.

9 Second 1970 Buick GS Stage1 Iron Head Update 9.75 @ 133.61 - YouTube

 

Exactly, why wait around for unavailable parts, use what’s available. My point is you don’t need aluminum heads to make good street able power, which is what the op is looking for

 

Can't even get the 3" down pipe form TA for my TA Shorty headers.