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Jim Brierley · 10-13-2019, 11:41 AM

Brent, Some of the OHV's had very high compression, most did not. The last of the aluminum Riley 4-ports were 10:1, Cooks and other racing OHV's were only 6.5 or 7:1 high for the day but considered low today. The diesel conversion that I am aware of was built by a trade-school teacher in L.A. It was an F-head design, OHV on the intakes, exh still in the block. Yes it was very high compression, necessary to ignite diesel fuel. Story goes something happened to the B engine he was running, so he hurriedly built an A block for it for his honeymoon. It worked well for that trip. I once had a set of B rods that he had supposedly built for the diesel, they were double I-beam rods, 2 stock rods welded together, 4 bolts, extremely heavy. I thought too heavy for racing, so sold them to a friend. That friend raced them at Bonneville, and one broke! There was a reinforcing rod in the middle of them! Yes, we are still friends!

10-13-2019, 11:41 AM	#24
Jim Brierley Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: Temecula, CA Posts: 4,091	Re: Max Compression Ratio Brent, Some of the OHV's had very high compression, most did not. The last of the aluminum Riley 4-ports were 10:1, Cooks and other racing OHV's were only 6.5 or 7:1 high for the day but considered low today. The diesel conversion that I am aware of was built by a trade-school teacher in L.A. It was an F-head design, OHV on the intakes, exh still in the block. Yes it was very high compression, necessary to ignite diesel fuel. Story goes something happened to the B engine he was running, so he hurriedly built an A block for it for his honeymoon. It worked well for that trip. I once had a set of B rods that he had supposedly built for the diesel, they were double I-beam rods, 2 stock rods welded together, 4 bolts, extremely heavy. I thought too heavy for racing, so sold them to a friend. That friend raced them at Bonneville, and one broke! There was a reinforcing rod in the middle of them! Yes, we are still friends!