My friend just told me that if I would do a port/polish to my pistons in my engine, it will boost up my horsepower up to a Acura TL Type S equilvant. Is this true? Does anyone know anything about this port/polish heads?

 

umm assuming you drive a TL-P, there are very few things that would boost you to the power of the TL-S. A combination of upgrades will, but not one single thing onhand. I think your friend is just playing with you.

 

I have a 99 and with all my mods listed(minus the stereo) have been able to take 2 cl-s's off the line by about a car till 60 and from a 50 roll i was able to pull about 3 cars on them till 100 anything over that i would pull hard because my 3rd ends at about 125. I have members on the CL forum that will confirm this namely rondog. But to be at a type s level without the bolt ons I have you will need the type s cams, pistons, heads, intake manifold incl. throttle body and rpm switch for the dual stage setup, exhaust and computer for raised redline. If you have a 99 then you will need an apexi vafc to control the air/fuel mixture and lower you v tec engagement by a little. The car will need the vafc to be dyno tuned.

 

There are three people on the a-cl board who have done the port and polish--and spent an a$$load of money--and they actually lost power. Two had dyno's to show it, the third had time slips that were down.

I'm not big on the technical details as to why, but this is what happened...Save your $$$...

 

I spent eight years as a cylinder head engineer for one of the big three and I will tell you that unless you are going to do some major modifications to a Honda engine, port and polishing the heads would not gain anything. Honda cylinder heads are some of the best cylinder heads for performance straight from the factory. I have a griend who works for Edelbrock and they were seriously investigating in making after market cylinder heads for Honda engines and after it was said and done they decided they could not improve upon the design enough to justify the investment. So they just stay with the factory heads. The biggest thing that is overlooked with porting and polishing heads is you might improve your flow numbers but you might kill the swirl and tumble in the port. This will cause you to lose power especially in a fuel injected engine. Also should never do major head modifications without modifying your cam profile. The change in flow pattern in the head needs a change in the cam to gain the full benefit of the port and polish. But with the car save your money and leave the heads alone.