Land&Sea Heads

[TB21]

need opinions on land&sea daul plug heads (good & bad) Thanks TB21

[Raceman]

My opinion......bad, very bad.

[us1]

These heads are very bad. They are billet alumimum with two 1/2 passages drilled through them for cooling. A melt down waiting to happen.

[Techno]

a few people in the past have mentioned that they saw no advantage to running dual plugs. It's kind of pricey too. I have 12 coils on my engine left over from a duel plug job that had been removed.

[Russ]

I would have to agree, stay clear of the L and S heads. Their design approach was used years ago when OMC was accepting prototype head designs from the developers around at the time for detail evaluation on the old OMC F1. Lets say they didn't "cut the mustard". However, there are some benefits to running well designed dual plug heads. Typically expect more torque in the lower rpm range, and that enhancement diminishing as it's run into the upper rpm range. (Don't read that as a deficit). Running dual plug heads will also allow running the timing retarded a degree or 2 which will smooth operation slightly without a performance loss. These heads burn faster, and do not require as much timing advancement to capture equal performance levels. But if timing is advanced too much, you've lost your sweet spot with these heads and you'll be in a deficit for best power/min octane required. Another feature is cyclic dispersion is more consistant, this is cycle to cycle cylinder pressure variances. This is based on how complete or incomplete the combustion process is from cycle to cycle. Consistancy is key here. Another, is that a good dual plug system is less sensitive to fuel octane variances, meaning it can deal with burning less than ideal or normally required octane without as high a probablity of detonation. This also means you can get away with running slightly leaner mixtures too. And last is that an engine which runs into an area where an over richness 4 cycling occurs can many times be made to run in this area by running this dual setup. Sorry for the run on here...

[Blade]

i have a BRAND NEW set,never been installed,still in box they were shipped in.bought em when i was REALLY STUPID about outboards,sales man at L&Stold me they were the best thing since PU$#$Y.When i found out different (about 2 weeks later)they said they didnt stock em any more so they wouldnt take em back.LAND&SEA NEVER AGAIN!!!!(DICKHEADS)SO if you by a set youll have the prettyest wallhangers on your block.been tryin to sell mine for a year cant even get an offer.the people at L&S will tell you there great DONT LISTEN there JUNK!!!!YOU LISTEN TO THE OTHER PEOPLE ON THIS BOARD like Jay Smith@JSRE AND NOAH@EAGLE ONE,AND OTHERS THEY WILL STEER YOU in the right direction. DAN in Missouri

[Jay Smith]

I have NEVER seen a set of these heads either single or dual plugged that would not run hotter than the "losfoam" Merc stock heads. Anything billet which is by structural make up more dence desipates heat less than one that is casted with the losfoam "looseness" with space inbetween the molecules.
And I have NEVER seen any performance advantage from any product L $ S ever produced!
My opionion !

Jay @ JSRE

[Raceman]

I agree with every thing you said Jay, especially the last sentence about L & S stuff. I never thought about the metal density issue, but just the way the cooling is in the billet heads seems greatly inferior. One mo thing. I had a set of dual plug heads from the Canadian guy. (can't remember his name) At least they seemed to have decent cooling passages and were cast instead of billet. Couldn't read any difference with the radar. I don't think they help at all, except the wallet is lighter. I've learned the hard way over the years that leaving the wallet in the car is just as much of a performance enhancer as lightening it with hot rod parts that don't work. One of the major (the major as a matter of fact) formula 1 teams was trying them several years ago and the guru said they didn't help. If they were outlawed I don't know it, but nobody ran em.

[Way2Fast]

It never ceases to amaze me how a company like Land & Sea can continue to stay in business. Back in the early 80's my marine dealership was a distributor for their products. We sold everything in their catalog for a discount from the prices they charged. We had a hard time trying to get their products sold, even at discount. From my personal experience 99% of the stuff they make is pure junk. They publish a fancy catalog and write glorified articals about stuff that just doesn't work. I gess people believe what they read, I know I did back when I was a L&S distributor. We wiped out a fair share of motors trying their junk!!

[Markus]

I have never heard anything good about L&S heads either, but heat dissipation does not work the way that Jay describes.

The tighter the molecules are coupled in a material, the faster heat will propagate. This is why diamond is the best heat conductor known to man.

In metals, heat spreads not only by molecular forces, but also in the electron gas, which means that a material with higher electrical conductivity will spread heat better. Materials like copper, silver and gold are far better att conducting heat than aluminum.

When a cast material goes from liquid to solid state, you will not get a homogeneous single crystal. Instead, you get a number of small crystals, and the heat has to be dissipated across surfaces. A billet material is much more homogeneous and heat conductance is better.

However, all this is likely insignificant compared to the limitation caused by the surface between metal and water in the cooling passages. This surface between two elements in different states is a great barrier to heat, which is why maximizing this surface and the utilization of it (through correct flow) dwarfs the other concerns.

The reason why the Land & Sea heads run hot is the design of the cooling water passages, not the billet material.

An interesting observation is that the better the heads conduct heat, the more energy is lost during combustion. Therefore, technologies that reduce the transfer of heat from the combustion chamber to the head, have received certain attention. However, the challenge is to find a material that conducts heat laterally, to get an even surface temperature, without conducting heat away from the combustion chamber. Soot is likely to be as poor as it can get in this respect, since it is a perfect black body, but a poor conductor, thus absorbing heat and keeping it.


"In every engineer, there is a teacher unfulfilled"


The guy in Canada, is that Tim Garec? He used to have a web page with EFI systems, but never replied to my emails...

[Balzy]

my spare gearcase last week. It wasn't that the guy that took the order was rude or anything but he sure as hell was not friendly at all. He left me with the feeling that they were doing me a favor for having what I wanted. I hung up the phone and kind of wished I would have bought someone elses. Just something about the way he treated me and the way he talked. He no appreciation for my bussiness at all. It seemed like a real pain in the ass for him to take my order. Probably messed up his solitaire game on his puter or something. Also, 8+ dollars to ship a piece that weighs about 6 ounces is a little steep. (which I didn't find out about until it arrived) I thought about posting something when I hung up the phone and didn't. Now that this thread started I had to speak up. I have been in customer service most of my life and it really pi#$es me off when I get treated like I owe the vender something because I wanted to spend my money with them. I treat my customers with respect and like "real people" and expect the same back when it's my cash flying around.

BTW, During the beginning of the call I asked him to send me a new catalog. He said they were in the process of redoing it and it would be here in 6 months or so. You would think they would send you the old one in the mean time, hoping you would order something and put you on a list to get the new one when it came out. I don't care if ever comes now. It will be used as fire starter anyway.

This company needs to get on the stick and at least put someone on the phone that knows how to treat their bread and butter. THAT'S US !!!!!!!!

Now I feel better !!!!!!!!!!!

[Edited by Balzy on 06-01-2001 at 01:06 PM]

[Firestarter]

The Canadian heads, were built by Alex Heldin. I am not aware of any websight.
Ted Greguc (not tim ??????) used them a lot. They worked well on the 2.4 motors. The heads really woke up the midrange.
I have not seen to many on 2.5's, but he runs them on some of his 2.7 offshore motors. I do know they have far greater cooling capacity than mercs heads.
I too agree that what L&S make is not worth the box is gets shipped in. And I mean EVERYTHING is JUNK.

RT

[sosmerc]

Since we are on the subject of Land and Sea....I bought one of their water brake dynos several years ago. Spent over 5 grand...have countless hours of frustration trying to get the electronics to work....sent it back on several occassions. The mechanical part of the systems is fine...it will load high horsepower engines without problems...but capturing meaningful data was hit or miss. Yea, a few times everything worked as designed and I got some pretty neat graphs on my computer to compare engines, etc. But it is such a pain in the ass to hook up and use that I end up using my hydraulic dyno most of the time. The real kicker was their lack of an 800 number for technical assistance...I spent a small fortune on long distance calls trying to get things to work. One of these days I may get it out of the box again and see if I can make it work...but usually the hair starts to stand up on the back of my neck when the data collection device fails to read correctly or capture any data. Like I say, the few times that it did work correctly I was pretty thrilled. Got a neat comparison of a stock 3.0 litre 225 vs. a 260 2.5 EFI. I was able to lay the torque and horsepower graphs over the top of each other...pretty interesting. Curious to know if anyone else out there is having any luck with their Land and Sea dyno.

[Jay Smith]

Marcus ,

I suppose we will have to agree to disagree! The losfoam head will cool and desipate heat ALOT Quicker than a billet head! Been there and done it!

Jay @ JSRE

[Raceman]

I'm with you Jay. I'm sure at least the cooling passage design is far inferior on the L&S and as a result, cooling is crap. As far as the Hedlin dual plugs, I ran em on a 2.4 bridgeport with stock carbs and later with a 6 2barrel set up. I also ran em on the only V6 powerhead I ever blew, a 260. I'm not blaming the heads for the failure. There were other variables, somebody else's gas mix of which the mix and age became questionable later. I've still got the set off the 2.5 that blew. Damage in 1 cyl on each side, but repairable. I just don't think they helped either engine, but they do look neat with the cowl off. I've got em on my snake oil list, right beside tuners. Wunna these days I'm gonna do a snake oil sale and get rid of all this stuff. Might can even dig out those old 2 stage plastic reeds that were supposed to ad several hundred RPM's......what a joke.

[FCnLa]

I have L&S motor mounts, nose cone, reeds, blowout ring, torque tab, and velocity stacks. Of course I have an old cross flow and some of these items arem't avaliable anywhere else. When I ordered stuff I talked to Dick. He seemed OK to me. I have never had a dyno or heads from them, so maybe that stuff is junk. But the "junk" I bought for my old piece of "junk" seem of good quality and I am happy with them. Just my opinion.

[sosmerc]

One of my customers has a Land and Sea Torque-shift prop and he really loves it. Has a 20ft. barefoot Sanger with a 200 EFI Merc...has great launch and still decent speed. I've used their solid mounts and they were fine.

[Markus]

Jay,

I do not doubt that the L&S heads run hotter and take longer to get cool than the Merc. lost foam heads. I had some Wayne Taylor billet heads myself a couple of years ago, and they were running hot as well.

However, I think that:

1) They run hot because of the lack of water jackets.

2) They take longer to cool down because a billet head is one big, heavy chunk of metal.

[all2003]

i bought a new gambler intimidator in 1991. i read about the l&s torque-shift prop in a mag.(don"t remember which one) tested on a gambler so i bought one. big mistake! prop worked as advertised but there was no duribility. the prop threw springs and cracked hubs regularly.(not just mine, but friends of mine that bought them also on my early recommendations). called l&s and was asked if i had jackplate on boat(yes) asked if run very far distances(yes) said was my fault because prop was not designed for that. would not replace hubs, i would have to buy a new one at $300+. the prop came with stacks of instructions and lit. no where did it say anything about jackplates or running distances!they are also very rude to talk to!!!! i have a expensive paperweight.

[Markus]

A friend of mine (the one with the Mach props) imported a bunch of L&S torque shift props to Sweden in the early nineties.

According to Swedish law, a business has to give a non-negotiable two year warranty on everything it sells to private customers.

The durability of the L&S props was very bad, and it ended up costing my friend a fortune, since he had to reimburse or replace the propellers, while L&S would not back him.

To be fair, though, I have heard that the torque shift propellers have become a lot more durable since then, as long as they are not run too high in the water and kept at fishing motor RPMs.

[sosmerc]

I personally never got a chance to run one of Land and Sea's props. However, I did run several of the Aerostar props (built in Spokane, WA). They worked extremely well, but were far too expensive to be reasonable. It's too bad because I think they could have sold many of these props if there had been some way to bring the cost down. They no longer make them, but decided to concentrate their efforts on aircraft propellers.
I wonder if anyone will ever build a practical shifting transmission for outboards? Engines designed and ported for top end power could benefit from increased gear reduction at low rpm. Maybe when we start seeing performance 4 stroke outboards we will see variable valve timing and that might help solve our "can't have it both ways" performance problems. I have mixed emotions about 4 strokes......but I doubt if we are really going to have that much choice in about 5 years.

[Russ]

Raceman, sorry you blew the 260 you put the dual plug heads on. That design head you have could only have been from a 2.4. The 2.4 heads would fit a 2.5, but a 2.5 would not fit on a 2.4. The 2.4 heads are too narrow for service on the 2.5. Those heads were made for racing on the old 2.4's. A number of them over time have trickled away from racing teams and into the Hi-Perf enthusiast world. Just as those heads sit there could have been a possiblity of the head leaking, but definately would have been a problem with the chamber size. That chamber size would have been too small to run as a straight swap over on to a 2.5. The head design is a good one, and still is today. They were OMC's selection hands down when they were used on the old OMC F1 motors. OMC wouldn't of handed over $50,000 to someone to do there headwork without hard evidence of their advantage. Diamond Marine is a current day supporter of this head. They've looked at them, evaluated them and have periodically ordered them. Most individuals don't understand what to expect to get from these heads. Anyhow..gotta get back to the salt mine..

[Instigator]

Just received their solid mounts for my JohnRude. $100. for the uppers, $179. for the lowers. Exact phone manners as Balzy described. by the way $6.72 freight to Cols,Oh.
I have personally tried almost everything they offered for my toys.
Was also a distributor for a short time.
I told one of their tech guys one time that they could'nt be spending much on R/D because they let all of their customers do it for them!!
Bought one fo their first electric jacks and it instantly wore out the half length slide bearings that it came with. They updtaed their design accordingly, and SOLD me the new bearings!
Bought one of the first Torque Sift props in this area.
I was a kid on Christmas day with this thing!!! After all, I read their performance reports in their shinny catalog.
What i got was a toy!! Would not "up shift" unless you ran eaxagerated positive trim. It would start at 9" of pitch and would'nt shift untill you trimmed up.
Try skiing in a 75' rooster tail!! While the boat porpoises constantly.
No problem we can update it for $300!!! Saved that untill the trade show and backed their CEO in a corner, and got a "good faith" update at N.C.
No improvement in performance! Had maybe a total of 2 hours on it when I sold the boat to a friend and later sold him that prop, as a toy.
He brought it back aftre he ran ti the first time. The hub had cracked at all three holes where the blades mount!!
You can guess their response on that one!
My buddy tried very hard to get me to take legal action on that one based on liability and safety.
Bought one of their "new" single hose nose cones for my new '89 GT 200 JohnRude. The thing was fine at cruising speeds, but above that it sucked the single hose dry and ran out of cooling water. Again, a brand new motor!
No problem, we have an update!!! Think it was $75.
Oh yeah, and it ruined how the boat ran!
Also on the Dyno issue, a big name OMC Tuner told me that he has been through 3 or 4 of their dynos before he gave up and spent the money on a Sure Flow (??).
I agree with Rcaeman too on the snake oil issue.
I have to admit being a sucker for a shiny catalog, especially if it has dyno sheets in it!!!
My feeling is L/S has decided that we are border line more trouble than we're worth on a business standpoint. If we want to buy their crap, it's probably O.K. with them, but if they drop the marine side tomorrow no one would probably care???
Bought mounts there because I did'nt know of any other sources. We are looking at producing these as well???
Loved the catalogs though! especially the old ones with all the boat pictures inside the back page. One of a Stream with a turbo JohnRude as I recall????
Instigator






[Edited by Instigator on 06-05-2001 at 09:44 AM]

[Balzy]

Touchy Gary, I think your right. They would just as soon dump the marine side. Or at least it seems that way from their phone edicate. What else do they do? It sure seems like they are doing you a big favor, doesn't it?

[Instigator]

Don't know anyhting about it but, they have seperate catalogs and I think sections to their web site.

[84exciter]

hey everyone,
thanks you guys talked me into taking my heads off(l&s 255x).i didn't notice any change but i still have to check it on gps.i'm glad I didn't buy them.
hey instigator,I'll throw them in to for the balsa core,but keep it in a plastic bag,i don't want it to go stale or dry out!lol

[Instigator]

When I offered to trade my Balsa core, I meant for something of value!! Heh, Heh, Heh

[84exciter]

the heads alone must be worth a 30 pack of coors in scrap alum.

[MrCougar]

HI, You are talking about the Double Plug Heads; and what about the Single Plug from Land & Sea (35 cc)???????
Does somebody has a BAD experience with that???????.Thanks

[84exciter]

we started out on the double plug heads then went to some old Twilite Zone episode

[Raceman]

Mr Cougar: My opinion is that the L & S heads offer vastly inferior cooling because of the design of the water passages. It doesn't matter how many plugs are in them.

Russ: The set of heads that were on the 2.5 when it melted were ordered for a 2.5. Both sets were ordered new and not "trickled down from a race team". I specifically said though that I didn't blame the heads for the failure, rather than suspecting fuel mix and/or age. I had my first V6 race motor in '77 and countless others since, and I assure you I've been around 'em enough not to interchange heads that would leak purely from an application error. Also as far as chamber design, within the boundaries of compression ratio and fuel compatability, I believe the actual shape may be somewhat overemphasized too. I've seen em trenched, swirled, desquished, 5 degree squished, squished and chamfered and far as I know most folks are runnin fairly simple chamber designs. As an example, for a number of years many people felt that the old hemispherical shape of the earlier two piece Merc heads was superior to the later shape. My whole point was that I don't believe the 2 plug heads help.....at all. My basic criteria for something that helps is simple: If you cant read it on a radar or a speedo and it doesnt register on the seat of the pants meter either, then it didn't help. As far as the F1 OMC folks running them, that may be true, but my information was that the Merc people found them to be ineffective. They may very well be illegal now, but I think we would've seen em extensively in years gone by if the unlimited budget boys ever found they helped.

[Russ]

Raceman, fair enough. Also, no offense mean't either if you were sensing one. Im still interested in the subject though, and very curious as to who you directly got those heads from and what year it was? Some of the gains seen with these on the dyno, are incremental, i.e. 6 to 8 hp at the peak. and yes, that is not enough to see a realtime advantage on a course. You would need 8-10% to have a real edge, everything else being equal. If anything...let me know on the above question. Takecare now...

[Raceman]

Russ, I'll get back to you in a day or two on the heads. My business partner is a whacko when it comes to buying stuff. They were his and I know one set was on the bridgeport drop on when I bought it from him several years ago. He also had a 260 drop on which I ended up with and some extra stuff too. He's one of these guys that buys everything on the planet and never uses it. He's got a Triad Intimidator thats about 4 or 5 years old with a drag powerhead that was made the first year they made em as drop ons with R rotation instead of having to buy an S3000. He had the powerhead and Champ center section air freighted from Wisconsin, and rushed the hell out of Steckbauer for an XR 6 gearcase for it, then none of it has ever been wet. I'm working on getting all that stuff bought now. I don't see him but every several days, so I'll find out about the source on the heads and get back to you.

[spooky]

i own an 18' 6" skeeter with a merc 175. my goal was to hit 70 using bolt on parts. boysen reeds and a bob's tuner did nothing for top end. the guy at bob's told me my boat was too heavy to realize any gains. the reeds did help a lot with idle quality, though. charlie lockwood at l&s suggested i try their single plug heads. after bolting them on, i increased cranking compression from 120 to 135 lbs at 4,100 ft. elevation. the top end rpm's increased by about 250, and top speed went from 68 to 70. overheating hasn't been a problem in the seven years i've run them. the head swap was done in less that an hour and lake conditions were identical. speed was clocked on a stalker radar gun an elephant butte lake. granted i'm nowhere near the speeds of allisons and bullets, but the heads did help in my case. IMHO.

[Raceman]

But Spooky, you would have seen the same increase with any head that produced a similar increase in compression ratio, including your stock ones shaved to a similar volume. I've told everybody that would listen about the tuners for years. You wouldn't have seen a top end increase with it if your boat weighed 150 lbs. They're Ssssssssssnake oil. (I love sayin' that)

[spooky]

true raceman. i was, however, told that machining stock heads can interfere with "squish designs" and flame fronts and so forth. since that doesn't seem to be the case, what is the recommended anount of shaving needed on a stock head to come up with @145 psi cranking compression. i have two sets of stock heads laying around off of a 1985 175 and a 1984 merc 200. do you think i'd see any improvement on a 70 mph boat? thanks.

[Raceman]

I don't know the answer to your "how much off" question, but there are a lot of people on this board that do. If it doesn't get answered under this thread, why don't you try it as a new one. Jay Smith does a lot of that stuff and can answer it off the top of his head if you get his attention. I'm sure he can tell you what's safe with what octane too. I've seen a set of his and they're nice. I think it's worth doing on what you described.

[Jay Smith]

Spooky,
For a non race motor and the compression @ pump gas lbs you canot simply cut off an amount in thousands of an inch as each casting on each head is different.
I CC the heads before I start to take the first cut and have in mind on a 2.5 ( according to the thickness of the head gaskets used )that I want 35 cc with a "thick " gasket and 34 cc with a thin will render you about the maximum
( in my opionion )compression 145 on pump gas. On the "umbrelled style Mercury losfoam head " the rule of thumb is for every .010 that is taken off you will deminish the CC by .7 ths of a cc. Example if you cut off .020 you will deminish the CC by 1.4 CC's Again this is a rule of thumb and not etched in stone that is why I CC the heads at least 4 times while coming down !Most stock Hi Per 2.5 heads are 38 cc's!Some fishin 2.5's are 40 ccs but after cut they are all the same in the performance.I haven't seen ANY advantages in performance with the 3 degrees angle cuts on the squich bands done em both ways and O gaines
( another Mercury "smoke show " )

Good luck and good boating !
Jay @ JSRE

Good luck ,

Jay @ JSRE