UPFLOW THAT HEMI

AFR'S NEW BLACK HAWK THIRD-GEN HEMI HEADS ADD SERIOUS PERFORMANCE TO AN ALREADY POTENT PLATFORM

- JOHNNY HUNKINS

If you're a company that makes aftermarket cylinder heads for Detroit's most recent powerhouses, you've found yourself in a bit of a pickle in recent years, as mass flow rates for OE cylinder heads have skyrocketed in a race for improved efficiency. Driven by the EPA, today's Detroit-built V8s are wringing a lot more work from a gallon of gas than we ever predicted. A perfect example of this is the third-generation Hemi V8, which even in its most diminutive form, offers port flow exceeding that of the most powerful big-block V8s of the 1960s.

This has been a boon to Mopar hot rodders, who can simply clean and refurbish their existing OE Hemi cylinder heads and save some money in the process. Stock third-gen Hemi heads are literally too good to warrant a serious aftermarket assault on the product category-or are they? The performance bar for aftermarket Hemi heads would need to be significantly higher to make the effort pay off, a scenario made more difficult because the Hemi has separate casting and machining operations for driver- and passenger-side cylinder heads.

Late last year, Air Flow Research (AFR) announced a new line of cylinder heads for the third-generation Hemi called the Black Hawk. The Black Hawk third-gen Hemi cylinder head lineup consists of three basic flavors: 185cc, 212cc, and 224cc intake ports-and compete in the third-gen Hemi aftermarket arena with just two other non-OE-based product lines: the street-oriented, smog-legal Edelbrock Performer RPM, and the race-oriented Bear cylinder head by Rhode Island-based Thitek. For an engine family that's now 20 years old, that isn't a lot to choose from, and it only underscores how good the factory third-gen Hemi offerings are.