Marty & All, Funny you mention yellow paint as the particular collection had a lot of stuff, engines, transmission all painted a yellow color, guy had lots of neat stuff (Injection units, log manifolds, etc...) I did some comparing of the heads I have vs. a stock set and the ports are almost as tall as the head bolt bosses vs. standard ones seem to be 1/4", I just got these heads as I saw they were ported never noticed the ports size until you mentioned it, not to mention they looked like they just came out of the machine shop coverings as very little rust on them. Is there a way to determine if they are a early D design or is that the tell tale the relations to the head bolt bosses. So how many sets of heads were made like the ones you have and the ones I have? Maybe a dumb question will these heads bolt to a normal set of manifolds or will I need to run headers to get them to work let alone take advantage of their design? Why do they refer to these heads as "D's" or was that the particular program they were designed under, also what year were most of these developed? Thanks for the info, neat finding out the history of these pieces, Regards,
Good morning Jim and all. I will tell you what I have heard over the years from various sources, and I, like you, appreciate the history. A few of the engine engineers wanted to get more horsepower from a nailhead, and design hardware that would be put into production. They went after the exhaust port to increase flow. The new parts designed were cylinder heads and exhaust manifolds. The design parameters they set for themselves were to design hardware that would work with alternator, a/c, power steering brackets for minimum costs. From what I heard, upper management said "no" since a new engine was in the "works" (400 and 430 CID) and the costs could not be justified. So what is gained? Dennis Manner from Buick Engine design states 15 horsepower with all the other parts being equal; camshaft timing, compression, etc.. A few people that own these heads had them flowed and they state the exhaust flow is less than "stock" because of the lower port floor. So how do you get 15 horsepower increase with less flow????? I have no idea.......maybe someone can explain. Your head looks like an early "D" design since it does not have the extra water jacket above the exhaust ports running the length of the head. You asked about using headers or "stock" exhaust manifolds. With headers you could probably modify the header flange, the exhaust manifolds may work but would probably require a lot of grinding. Why "D" head? It has nothing to do with the port shape. The casting number on the heads that were to go into production is B1367912D. Since yours does not have a casting number, I believe your cylinder heads was one of the first designs. Marty
Marty and Everyone, Thanks for the info and history, wish someone could shed more light on these items, plan on one day using these on one of my project cars though may need to research making some headers to fit a A-body one other idea on where the "D" came from might be the casting number last digit? Wow, I thought this was the good find, but had no idea, I knew the intakes were a rare item, but never thought the heads were, here a few more pictures of the heads the intakes looked to be port matched and the valves seem to be on the larger side, need to sit down with a set of calipers and take some measurements There are no casting numbers on these heads other than a 6 on the underside of the intake runners. Thanks for all the info and hope someone else can chime in and give some more history to these. Still curious how many of these might be out there and has anyone run them to confirm the 15hp? Regards,
That is some really cool parts you guys have there. I see they did the doc job on some of the intakes way back then.:grin:
I can't let you guys have all the fun! Here is my X intake. I bought it straight from the Buick engineer who was commissioned to destroy it and ended up saving it for 25+years in his tool box to then smuggle it out of Flint when he retired. My opinion, I think this a near final version as everything is identical to an iron DQ intake except the single mounting hole for the AC bracket. It is going to go on my 64 black/black dual quad Riv. Coming soon...
Hi, This must be the other version, is it the same height as a stocker or have you not compared? What is the distance between the carbs? Did he say what year this was produced? That will be neat to show off at your local cruise night, have the experts scratching their heads. Cool to see more out there Regards,
The carb spacing and height are exactly the same as stock 64 iron DQ intake, which I also have. The engineer did not mention the production year, but it has to be in 63 as this definitely a late prototype. He did mention that he had to dump tons of engineering samples aroun the early 80's and scrapped it all. This was a lucky piece...
Yeah all of these pieces are lucky someone had greed, foresight or dumb luck to hold onto these all these years Betting most of us would have loved to go thru those scrap bins and see all the treasures Thanks again for sharing some info and pictures Regards,
Just a thought,,,, The "D" designation on the experimental nailhead parts might, just might , have something to do with a engineer that worked in the high performance section by the name of Zora Arkus D U N T O V....o No: :Brow: he designed cams for chevrolet, pontiac and Buick for sure.... possibly other stuff too......
Hi Doc, Yes that sounds like as good as reason as any I have heard, never realized he had much to do with Buick, as all you read is Vette about him, would be neat to find out who was involved with some of these parts Dumb questions maybe, but is there any good books wrote about any of the engineering and development that went on at Buick, as you get pieces from different post and all the folk lore that has been past down over the years just wondering if anyone ever complied it Thanks again for the insight,
And it's now on eBay. http://www.ebay.com/itm/Buick-Nailh...Parts_Accessories&hash=item35e462f8ea&vxp=mtr
