Panhead verses Shovelhead

Actually, the pan head was a good head for porting and dual carbs. The trouble was the lousy rocker arm set up. In “the” day the Shovelhead was the head to use but there were a lot of problems then with hardware. The only place to get good stuff was from Burkhart Engineering but he was about as reliable as an old shoe. I used him in the beginning but eventually started making my own stuff. If you wanted 4140 cylinders you had to go to Burkhart, there was none better back then. Valve springs were a real problem, in the beginning I use Offenhouser valve springs but later changed to Chev because they were taller and easier to get the right coil bind set up. Burkhart valves were stock HD with the stems ground to 5/16, you could see the split line in them where they were welded together. I finally went to Manley when he started making them and used Winona Guide Coils, made my own 4130 guides in the beginning until MTC started making them for me.