Does anyone have a disassembled engine where they could do a little test?

I was looking at a head gasket on a different vehicle and noticed the coolant holes are much smaller up front and at different sides etc.

For example, if you put the wrong head gasket on the wrong side of a Ford block it can cause an overheat situation as the holes are different and restrict or allow flow.

Chevy has this same design, the coolant hole in the front is small as to allow reduced flow and causes the coolant to flow towards the back also.

Looking at a rover head gasket, the holes are all the same size, I would imagine the flow pressure is reduced at the rear of the head.

I was wondering if anyone had a block disassembled that could essentially bolt down a set of head gaskets to the block, and then spin the water pump and record the flow of water through the block and gaskets.
We would have to get the rpm of the pump pulley correct as well as the flow.
I'm also looking at the size of the pump inlet as opposed to the holes on the gasket. The holes seem kind of large to me, if they are too big, the flow goes through only a hole or two, leaving little coolant flow through the other ares of the head. Hence why head gaskets may have a small hole at one area of the gasket.

Always seems like the passenger rear head leaks...which would coincide with trapped air and reduced flow.

 

I don't follow. What are you looking for, GPM through the engine/head/intake manifold? Why?

The gaskets and heads have the same size coolant passages on both ends, you can swap heads L to R, and it reduces your tooling costs. The block though has a similar size large passage at the rear, but only a small hole at the front. As you said, this pushes most of the coolant to the rear end before it enters the heads.

 

The hole in the block is small in the front, full length in the back. The design is intended to send the flow rearward in the block, up through the rear head port and forward to the intake manifold outlet.



I have seen both sides blow but pass. side rear is common. Might be some block casting difference that cause some minor flow differences. The factory pump is underdriven in my opinion, especially at idle.