Fullauto Cylinder Head

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You would think that with my 850, if you lowered the gearing, it would accelerate faster - not so. My feeling is that the heavy crank always tends to spin up at the same rate. That is why, I get it spinning and use a close box to keep it up there, with minimal loss of revs on each up-change. If you let it bog down coming out of a corner, you would wait forever for it to accelerate.
 
I went 400 miles on my 73 850 after initial going through brakes suspension controls gearbox. Was blowing oil left side, has rh4 head. Valves weren't loose so I lapped valves, skimmed head and cylinder, Hylomar and no gaskets. Went 100 miles and no oil blowing. Was wondering if I was a future owner of a fullauto head and how long it would be before I rode it again. My other 850 has unmarked head, ports crudely cast, it needs freshening so between the two one will end up with a mostest for the leastest port job from Jim. Hopefully ill get a fullauto head on my own terms, get both 850's going and test with me and my buddies super accurate butt dynos.
 
acotrel said:
You have a lot of faith in dyno charts.
Click to expand...

We've had this discussion before ?

Using the same dyno to test various configurations of the same bike is an
EXCELLENT way of determining what actually works, and what doesn't
- without the seat of the pants factor.
A stopwatch or lap times can be equally effective - but requires a seriously intuitive mind.

Johnm detailed his dyno pathway to his dommie race bike going from ordinary to competitively fast.
We determined your race bike has never been near a dyno.
Perhaps there is a link there to no winners trophies in the cabinet ?

For average road riding - most of us here - where 100% performance is a threat to life and limb -and other road users - then a dyno is a perfect substitute to determine what works and what doesn't - and the perfect state of tune.
 
I'll tell you what. You pay for it and I'll do whatever dyno testing you want. Because I don't have the money. I'm battling to stay alive financially in a number of areas and, and, in the end, I don't give a flying fuck what the results are.

Hands up all those unhappy with their purchase of a Fullauto Technologies head and think it doesn't deliver all that I said it was? The ports were a distillation of over thirty years of Jim Comstock's knowledge of Norton motor building. If you don't want one or want to spend ten years tyre kicking before you buy one, fine.

I've just today returned from a ten day trip to Melbourne to ensure the survivability of the heads production and I think I have a number of options. It just comes down to money now.

Bugger this, I'm going for a ride. On my Norton.
 
If they can match the competition out of the box, they obviously make enough power and torque. Have you ever seen the two old guys up in the stalls on the muppets, I think one of them is called Rohan......
 
I needed a new head, did some reading here and bought one, so now have an original spare head that will undergo some work. Does it make a difference, yes it has, as it has highlighted that I have some shortcomings in my power train. The engine, of which the remainder is stock, and even on stock carbs (40 years old) and with stock jets and settings the engine spins up far faster than it did so now I need to shift gear quicker. Not sure about the top end as I have a 19T sprocket fitted, but this will be changed next year when the bike is refurbished fully to give me longer between gear changes. I never really saw the point in a 5 sp box, but now would seriously consider it along with a Maney crank, standard rods and pistons as I don't ride my MK3 interstate on the track I want an improved road bike, less vibration and better response. Just look at who stocks and sells them, they can't all be wrong.

If anyone wants to try my ride, then feel free, I'm not that precious over my MK3. If you see me about or know where to get hold of me just ask.
 
If you were going to buy a cylinder head for your beautiful bike, a nice new one is always better than a tatty second-hand one. It depends on what you intend to use the bike for. If it is a road racer, it is never going to be concours. When Ken was here the other day, he showed me a photo of his commando. It is a bike I could not live with. I'd be too scared of getting it dirty.
As far as performance is concerned - from experience AND RESULTS, I know my bike is fast enough ! I've had enough to do with 'experts' in motorcycle businesses to know that most of them should have been strangled at birth - dyno tuning with those idiots doing the measurements ? - BULLSHIT ! In any case horsepower is not the be-all and end-all.
Did you see the other day where the young Australian guy won the MotoGP race in the rain ? Sticky tyres don't teach you how to do that.
 
It is not worth even attempting to build a fast bike unless you have the gearbox. It doesn't matter what project you plan, it starts and finishes there. I tried racing with the standard commando box - it was bloody hopeless. Everything happened too slowly and it was impossible to be SMOOTH. Many guys try racing converted road bikes - they are always a compromise with inbuilt safety factors which slow them down. If you tried to use a Commando with a four speed CR box on public roads in traffic, it would drive you insane. The biggest difference is in acceleration up through the gears. Wind the heavy crank up and race-change to keep it there.
 
Mr.Sparks said:
If they can match the competition out of the box, they obviously make enough power and torque. Have you ever seen the two old guys up in the stalls on the muppets, I think one of them is called Rohan......
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I don't need a new head, I'm perfectly happy with the one that I've got !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
Does this mean that Jim Comstock did all the port work and it went into production without anyone actually testing the finished product on a dyno ?? ?? ?? ??

I must say I find this a little surprising.
Seat-of-the-pants testing is all well and good, but even Norton Villiers did some dyno testing,
even if the results never became public...

Chilly weather for "survivability testing".
A filthy hot day is what is needed for aussie conditions ?


Fullauto said:
I'll tell you what. You pay for it and I'll do whatever dyno testing you want. Because I don't have the money. I'm battling to stay alive financially in a number of areas and, and, in the end, I don't give a flying fuck what the results are.

Hands up all those unhappy with their purchase of a Fullauto Technologies head and think it doesn't deliver all that I said it was? The ports were a distillation of over thirty years of Jim Comstock's knowledge of Norton motor building. If you don't want one or want to spend ten years tyre kicking before you buy one, fine.

I've just today returned from a ten day trip to Melbourne to ensure the survivability of the heads production and I think I have a number of options. It just comes down to money now.

Bugger this, I'm going for a ride. On my Norton.
Click to expand...
 
I think it's rather fantastic that you can even get a new cylinder head for a machine that ended production 40 years ago. With all the crappy cracked RH 10 heads (thank God mine seems to be OK) there would be a bunch of dead motorcycles being parted out rather than still on the road, getting painted and shined up and receiving other mods and updates, all of which helps keep this hobby semi-affordable for more people. Is the FA head expensive? Undoubtedly. It's not being mass produced by a factory full of CNC machines and computer-savvy engineers, so it HAS to be pricey to exist. Does it improve performance? Almost assuredly, although like anything else, it requires other mods and updates to the engine for full potential to be realized. I'd imagine a Ron Wood or a Leo Goff could examine one and tell you how much work it would be to get a NOS head (if you could even find one) to perform on equal footing. Would dyno testing prove the FA's superiority? Mos likely, but to what end? A dick-waving contest? Please. Leave these to racers pushing the edge between powerful engine and hand grenade.
 
Rohan said:
Does this mean that Jim Comstock did all the port work and it went into production without anyone actually testing the finished product on a dyno ?? ?? ?? ??

I must say I find this a little surprising.
Seat-of-the-pants testing is all well and good, but even Norton Villiers did some dyno testing,
even if the results never became public...

Chilly weather for "survivability testing".
A filthy hot day is what is needed for aussie conditions ?


Fullauto said:
I'll tell you what. You pay for it and I'll do whatever dyno testing you want. Because I don't have the money. I'm battling to stay alive financially in a number of areas and, and, in the end, I don't give a flying fuck what the results are.

Hands up all those unhappy with their purchase of a Fullauto Technologies head and think it doesn't deliver all that I said it was? The ports were a distillation of over thirty years of Jim Comstock's knowledge of Norton motor building. If you don't want one or want to spend ten years tyre kicking before you buy one, fine.


I've just today returned from a ten day trip to Melbourne to ensure the survivability of the heads production and I think I have a number of options. It just comes down to money now.

Bugger this, I'm going for a ride. On my Norton.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...


Correct. No testing before production.

I'm going to organise a dyno day here in Perth and pay for everything. I'll let you know when and the results will be presented here.

Survivability pertaining to the business, not the heads. I personally have 20,000 miles on the first production head, having run it in sustained heat above 42 degrees Celsius on many occasions.

Tell us about YOUR experiences with YOUR Norton Commando head on YOUR bike. I've never seen you talk about your bike. Enlighten us.
 
Danno said:
I think it's rather fantastic that you can even get a new cylinder head for a machine that ended production 40 years ago. With all the crappy cracked RH 10 heads (thank God mine seems to be OK) there would be a bunch of dead motorcycles being parted out rather than still on the road, getting painted and shined up and receiving other mods and updates, all of which helps keep this hobby semi-affordable for more people. Is the FA head expensive? Undoubtedly. It's not being mass produced by a factory full of CNC machines and computer-savvy engineers, so it HAS to be pricey to exist. Does it improve performance? Almost assuredly, although like anything else, it requires other mods and updates to the engine for full potential to be realized. I'd imagine a Ron Wood or a Leo Goff could examine one and tell you how much work it would be to get a NOS head (if you could even find one) to perform on equal footing. Would dyno testing prove the FA's superiority? Mos likely, but to what end? A dick-waving contest? Please. Leave these to racers pushing the edge between powerful engine and hand grenade.
Click to expand...

The RH4 heads are the ones that crack. The RH10s are ok. Ask Jim how many unrepairable RH4s he"s got sitting around in his workshop.

Well, actually the heads ARE produced by a factory full of CNC machines and computer savvy engineers. Just not MASS produced. They are made thirty at a time.

When I showed the head to a bloke who's been in foundries a long, long time just a few days ago and told him what they retailed for, he said, "that's cheap."

This bloke does all the castings for Brook Henry's bevel drive Ducati motors and all the stuff needed to build Repco Brabham V8s. Amongst other things. He knows a little bit.

I went to another foundry that does the Irving Vincent castings. He also does the castings for TZ 750 crankcases. He said my heads were on a par with the crankcases as far as difficulty goes. I was told the crankcases retail for AU$10,000.
 
There has been plenty of flow bench testing on the heads, with Jim's velocity and flow numbers for the final production configuration published here, along with a large number of other stock and modified Commando heads for comparison. You don't need a dyno to recognize that the combination of better flow and high velocity will make more horsepower throughout the usable rev range. How much more depends on what else is done to the engine, from stock to full race prep, but it's obviously going to be more. Horsepower is directly related to how much fuel-air mixture you can pack into the combustion chamber, the more the better. Seems simple enough to me.

But hey, what do I know?

Ken
 
Just spent an hour composing a post, and then the board jumped me back to logging in. Not going to rewrite it. A good reminder to all to compose long-winded replies off-line, and then to paste after logging on.



ฺ
 
lcrken said:
But hey, what do I know?
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I respect your comments Ken, and all the comments here.
But it sounds like you don't know a hp output either !!

It is obviously marvellous that they are available at all, and not outrageously priced either.
But it is trifle odd that no-one has put one on a dyno ???
 
Fullauto said:
I was told the crankcases retail for AU$10,000.
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My goodness.
A relative bought a brand new engine for an ultralight he built ( a while back).
That would go a fair way towards the full cost of it.
Well, nearly half anyway....
Fullauto Cylinder Head

Much of it is CNCed though.

My (Commando) head on an 850 is an RH10, and for a road bike they seem to be entirely adequate.
Its never been near a dyno.
I have other bikes too, and riding isn't as big a part of my life these days.

More go would be nice, especially if its just a bolt on goodie, so its curious no-one has tried one on a dyno.

For Alan. A few years back, I went to a bike show where they were doing free dyno runs in the park.
They had a mobile dynojet dyno on a trailer.
The big performers were a hotrodded 955i and a ZZR1100 ( it was a while back).
The SPEED those things could zip through the gears told you they had some serious mumbo.
Its the TIME taken that is used to calculate the torque and hp curves.
I filmed them - in low res- but 50 deep back in the crowd of onlookers its mostly just noise.

I always do a mouse copy every now and then, keeps the longer posts safer....
 
Norton Commando cylinder head versus ultralight engine. Apples and oranges. Not a fair comparison.

The problem is if you DON'T have a good RH10 head. Try and find a secondhand one in good condition for sale. This is one of the reasons for doing heads in the first place. There ar4e plenty of 750 second hand heads for sale. But not 850s. I sell five 850 heads for every 750 head. That's not the proportion of bikes out there, just the proportion of heads needed. Remember, secondhand 850 heads are more common now because of the availability of my heads. Hell, I'll sell you two! Err....... no warranty, expressed or implied.

Why all this talk of performance? Will it change your life knowing the difference? The Fullauto Technologies heads were developed as a factory replacement, NOT a performance item. The extra performance is just a by product. And they are not exactly like a dyno tune with fuel injection remap, where tricks can be played to make it look or feel like you've made an improvement.

Ride a bike with one of my heads on and see for yourself. Then tell us what you think. What part of the world do you live in? I'll even scout one out for you to ride, possibly.
 
Fullauto said:
Norton Commando cylinder head versus ultralight engine. Apples and oranges. Not a fair comparison.
Click to expand...

I thought the $10k was for TZ750 crankcases ?
A whole motor v's a set of cases or 2.
(they'd be in magnesium ?).

Fullauto said:
Ride a bike with one of my heads on and see for yourself. Then tell us what you think. What part of the world do you live in? I'll even scout one out for you to ride, possibly.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the offer, but thats not really the issue.
It was convincing Alan that he needs one of your heads for his Seeley racebike.
Then we discover there are no actual dyno figures for it...

Again, this is just a comment.
And its marvellous that these are available for folks that need them, but thats not (currently) me.
Cheers.
 
Cast Alloy in Adelaide South Australia made valve covers etc. for Harley Evo models. Full Auto heads are brilliant 10,000 kms on my Commando Mk3 with one fitted no problems and excellent performance.
 
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