200cc Honda clones

[itchybird]

Yeah, but which head is better?

Answer: The one on the left, the GX160. It looks like an 18cc combustion chamber making it the best of the bunch. Mill it 0.065" and it'll be even better.

Next up is the clone head, and finally the Predator head, both of which have much larger combustion chambers and therefore lower compression.

I prefer the early GX160 ZH8 head. At 14cc, the early head will really wake up a dished piston motor. Many options avail, but I prefer OEM Honda castings.

Have you seen the new Hemi predator heads? The combustion chambers are huge, but the heads have 27/25mm valves stock, vs 25/24mm on all the Hondas and clones. So many choices!

 

[scotto-]

I would agree to all that and then port that Honda head while you're at it

The Predator 212cc Hemi head:

 

[Bruce Lee]

Yeah, but which head is better?

Answer: The one on the left, the GX160. It looks like an 18cc combustion chamber making it the best of the bunch. Mill it 0.065" and it'll be even better.

Next up is the clone head, and finally the Predator head, both of which have much larger combustion chambers and therefore lower compression.

I prefer the early GX160 ZH8 head. At 14cc, the early head will really wake up a dished piston motor. Many options avail, but I prefer OEM Honda castings.

Have you seen the new Hemi predator heads? The combustion chambers are huge, but the heads have 27/25mm valves stock, vs 25/24mm on all the Hondas and clones. So many choices!

With the 212 motor and a flat top piston do you know the comp ratio?

 

[Bruce Lee]

I ment 212 hemi engine and a flat top piston. Comp ratio?

 

[itchybird]

I'm not sure what the out of the box compression ratio is. It's easily calculated if you know the CC's of the head, thickness of the gasket and how far in the hole the piston is. I would guess that's 24cc chamber. You can mill down the Hemi head to raise the compression.

I have built a lot Honda's, clones and HF212's, but I have not built a Hemi motor yet, though I do have plans to build one out here shortly.

 

[scotto-]

I prefer the early GX160 ZH8 head. At 14cc, the early head will really wake up a dished piston motor. Many options avail, but I prefer OEM Honda castings.

That pic above is a GX160 ZH8 TKI 8 head that used to be on my 212cc Pred race engine.......the head on it now is also a ZH8 that has been ported, milled down .065" and using large SS valves with 37lb. springs and 1.3:1 billet steel rockers.

The piston is Wiseco flat top that is .012" out of the hole attached to a 3.707 ARC billet rod and a .032" copper head gasket. Chromo push rods and billet lifters. The cam? That's another story.......

 

[itchybird]

Hey Scotto,

What are you running for valves in your hot-rod motors? I have been running the aftermarket stainless valves and just had another exhaust valve break at the stem. As you can probably imagine, the results were not pretty.

 

[scotto-]

Hey Scotto,

What are you running for valves in your hot-rod motors? I have been running the aftermarket stainless valves and just had another exhaust valve break at the stem. As you can probably imagine, the results were not pretty.

Hey Rich, sorry to hear that. I'm just running the oversized aftermarket stainless valves in Honda heads same as you guys.....maybe your valve springs are a little too stiff?

 

[itchybird]

What do you run for springs, the typical 26lb? Depending on cam, we run anything from 26lb all the way up to 55lb dual's. I don't run the 55's on any of our street motors -that's race only stuff.

 

[scotto-]

37lb. springs on the mild 275 cam.......37lb. springs on the 308 cam. I really don't like the dual springs for several reasons.

 

[itchybird]

Yeah, that's the spring I run in my personal motors, but I tend to run bigger cams in our personal builds. I don't run duals on any street motors, just not needed. On the 275 cam motors I typically run the 26 lb springs.