The AUSubaru.com.au Forums

Howdy friends,
Can any of you advise if the heads shown in the pictures in the link are viable or not please, thanks in advance !;)

http://z15.invisionfree.com/Mv_Brat_Bru ... 1688&st=0&

Hard to say, but from my limited experience with engines, I'd think they would need repairing as a compresion test would probably show some leakage ... + if they wern't fixed, I'd say they would eventualy fail.

However I'm not sure if it would be worth going through the effort of repairing them with an unknown $ assoicated, and the effectiveness of repair.

It would be much easier to just find a replacement.

Hope that helps, Bantum.

An NA EA82 will run fine with these cracks. There's little to no compression loss and I've personally ran a set of heads with these same cracks - it's an EA thing I believe.

I don't know if this is any different to the turbo EA82, I would say it doesn't matter but there could be someone here that knows different. I've also heard that repairing them only makes it worse in the long run and possibly US after the repair job lets go.

Personally I'd be disappointed about it, then slap them back on if they're square, if not have them shaved and go from there

Cheers

Bennie

The reason for the cracks is, it is the weakest point in the chamber for the interference fit of the valve seat inserts. The compression loss may be low, but the risk of a valve seat coming out is high.

I wouldn't be using them as is.
The heads need to be hardness tested to see if they are repairable.

With turbo heads they can get much hotter and the crack will grow quickly.
I have used a few cracked heads on turbos, but once the crack gets past the valve seat they need repair.
If you get them repaired, be carefull, several head specialists that I use and did a very good job, now, will not repair cracked ea82 efi/turbo heads. As they are to hard to guarantee they will not crack again.
I have had heads done by them that have never cracked and work well.
Basically if they are cracked, they are not right, and starting to fail, how long they will last depends on how you treat them.

had mine welded, also ran with similar cracks, and always find those cracks on EA82 or T heads and were not giving any symptoms before finding

Those heads since overheated due to dodgy gauge sender, warped, machined and back in service with genuine HG's , so far done 64,000km!

The welds servived the overheating !!.

An option that was tried on me - std mpfi NA EA82 heads converted to EA82T by drill and tap a M10 1.50 pitch hole in correct spot for oil feed to turbo, and anothe hole to takle the oil return, with a M6 1.25 threaded hole for securing the return pipe. My latest buy was mpfi Na, lost water on the way home - became a VW air cooled for last few kms, heads were cracked same. Did not try to diagnose, just cleaned the gunk off my driveway, stripped for bits and sent it packing

littlewhiteute wrote:The compression loss may be low, but the risk of a valve seat coming out is high.

I've never heard of this happening. Have you got a thread or an article about it that I can do some reading up on it?

Cheers

Bennie

Yes it is a very very common EA thing.
Get it fixed to be on the safe side!
There are several ways to fix, all done by an experienced engine shop.

Cheers Cam

If the cracks are only between the valve seats, its a cosmetic crack and not an issue. But if the crack extends down into the port, like one photo shows, eventually it will make its way down to the water jacket and leak coolant. It won't cause a noticeable compression loss.

Sent from my new touchy phone thingy

a couple of centre punch divots beside the seat in say three equal spots around can help the seat stay in place in the risk of valve seat coming loose. I stripped an engine down twice and head off another two times to really get a noise sorted in an inline four !