Ric Wood - Race Engine Manifolds

Manifolds

Inlet and exhaust manifolds are another essential and tunable option for racing engines. We have two options in this area : Optimise the standard manifolds or replace with specialised bespoke item.

The area of manifold tuning is key to the success of the engine. A standard inlet manifold could severely restrict the power potential of a gas flowed cylinder head.

Our first area of investigation is to look at the standard inlet manifold or the manifold in current use. The flow through this manifold can be quickly established on our flow bench. More importantly we are able to analyse the flow with the manifold attached to the cylinder head and discover and then address any issues we find.

Over many years we have identified and resolved many issues with inlet manifolds on many engines. For example: our Ford Essex V6 manifold has evolved in to a unique custom item which addresses many of the long standing issues with standard manifold.

Where the standard manifold can be modified , we apply our best gas flow engineering techniques to ensure the optimum flow to all cylinders. The final prototype head is replicated on our scanning CAD/CAM system for future CNC production.

We also utilise the best 3rd party INLET manifolds where we believe these will achieve our expectations.

With exhaust manifolds we base all specification and design decisions based on flow characteristics of the head.

We fabricate the manifolds ourselves in many cases to ensure the exhaust has all the flow and resonance features we require. Almost every engine we test on our dyno requires a new exhaust manifold. We also use specialists who can manufacture to our specifications.

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