Offroad-Express

Ive cracked my head on the poor old 3l my mate has a second hand head the tested up sweet $500 bucks or a new chinese nason head $370. Im rebuilding the motor and turboing it while its out and just unsure what to go for. Any experiance with chinese heads? Cheers

Why risk it , we all know what made in China means when it comes to carparts.

Core engine components I wouldn't skimp on.

I put a Chinese one on my 1KZ first time round, soon after I replaced that with a genuine Toyota one.... you can guess why...

Yea its a hard one some have been known to have a really good run out of the chinese heads but i do wonder on build quality

well, I changed my c-head almost 4 years ago and went chinese ...
fully assembled head with valves and camshaft, all bolts and full gasket set for the entire job for GBP 600 delivered compared to a naked toyota head for 2000...
didn´t regret it yet, did like 40k since then, upgraded with IC plus chip tuning, still good.
but you never know. I have purchased another 5 or 6 for a friends garage and we had one c-head failing within a year, the valve bushings have worn out within 15 or 20k. unbelievable, hope mine will last though. there are better quality products from Italy for around 1100 now which is probably what I would choose next time, toyo still too expensive

True havent seen any itailian ones around. I ended up buying a second hand head that tested up well had new valves put in and checked over at the shop cheers for replys guys!

sorry, they are not italian but from spain
http://www.amc.es/en/

AMC are excellent, I cooked the #### out of my 300tdi land rover with an AMC head and it didnt even need a skim

I just got an aftermarket head fitted with my original cam/valves etc and was happily working away fitting stuff to it on the bench before putting it on the block and spotted this.

Major kill joy. Just as well I was doing this work on the bench, not after I torqued it all up!!!!

All 4 injector seats where the crush washer goes are roooooooooted - that sure ain't gonna seal!!!!
I'm gonna see if I can get a refund on the head, and supply them a genuine head and get them to swap my cam/valves into that.

Totally killed any faith i had in the aftermarket heads (and I was a bit dubious already), but to find an basic manufacturing fault gives you NO faith in the quality of the part and how long it will last!!!!

The machine shops had forgotten to fit/supply these which go in the holes.

Faith restored a bit......

I was about to say that there´s something missing

I worked through the issue of which head to fit months ago.
The only two options are Genuine toyota or AMC (spanish)
I spoke to a bloke at a workshop here in chch who had worked for a large car parts supplier, and the "branded" chinese heads supplied had a unacceptable failure rate. There are plenty of chinese head available, but I'd stick with genuine toyota.

little update from my side.
I still run a chinese replacement head without any problems for almost 50k now.

that´s why two friends installed chinese heads as well very recently. what shall I say. both broke in no time doing less than 20k. the valve seat bushings came loose leading to one valve damage but head was repairable + new camshaft needed. the other one same story but valve broke loose, fell into combustion and was smashed by piston and parts blew all the way through the air intake to do more damage to the cylinderblock and pistons leading to a fatal engine damage.
supplier claims they have sold like 100 units and ours the only one failing. very strange. given this I would also not buy chinese again.

Mine was a Chinese head supplied by a reputable cylinder head shop in Hamilton, and the fitted all my genuine Toyota parts (valves, camshaft etc) to the head.

I reckon that's a good option, better than a Chinese head with all the cheapi Chinese valve gear in it

Done over 10,000km so far so good