When we last saw Project Retro 5.0, we had just wrapped up baseline testing with the factory E7 engine configuration. 260 horsepower and 327 lb-ft of torque from the 30-year-old mill is nothing to sneeze at, but at the end of the day, we want to see how much power we can squeeze out of this trusty little engine. Enter the Trick Flow Twisted Wedge 11R.
Back in the day, the go-to upgrade was a new top-end kit, consisting of new cylinder heads, a camshaft, and an intake manifold, or as it was commonly referred to on message boards of the time, H/C/I (Heads, Cam, Intake). Trick Flow Specialties (TFS) was a major player in the top-end game back in the day, with their revolutionary “Twisted Wedge” design. It eschewed the small-block Ford’s traditional 20-degree inline valve angles, instead, twisting things around with improved valve angles and a revised kidney-shaped wedge combustion chamber (hence the name).
The original complete top-end kit was advertised to make 350 horsepower with Trick Flow’s matched components. However, that was decades ago. We’re almost a quarter of the way through the 21st century. We have significantly more modern technology and understanding now than we did back in 1996 when the original Twisted Wedges first hit the market, and Trick Flow has embraced that.
The first part of a top-end swap is to take all of the stock parts off. It’s definitely not the most fun part of the job.
Twisted Wedge 11R Cylinder Heads
The core of the Trick Flow 11R Top End Kit (P/N: TFS-K525-432-370) is the new Twisted Wedge 11R cylinder heads (P/N: TFS-52515301-C00). With decades of experience on the dyno and racetrack, along with tons of customer data and feedback, Trick Flow decided they were going to take their already successful design and push it further. Besides having tons of data on the original Twisted Wedge design, their design and development capabilities have increased exponentially as well, allowing them to easily and affordably go beyond what was possible back in 1996.
Cast from A356 aluminum, as the 11R name implies, one of the new features of the updated design is the valve angles. Where the original Windsor head has an inline design, with both the intake and exhaust valves sitting at a 20-degree angle, the original Twisted Wedge design stands up the valves, with the intake valve rotated 5 degrees to a 15-degree angle, and the exhaust moved 3 degrees for a 17-degree…
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