I have this conversation with people all of the time.
This head is adding to the debate, but I'm glad you asked the question. We do not have a visual interpretation of the flow numbers at this point like a dyno graph, but that is a great idea. A lot of people are more visual as opposed to crunching data and interpreting how the data will affect their trucks. I will say that on street trucks, .100", .200" and .300" data is much more important that higher lift numbers. I will see if I can find a way to quantify airflow at a given lift for a given duration.
Here is what I tell my customers: Before flow numbers can be considered, you need to know what the RPM range of the engine is. I was setting up an engine for a gentleman and I asked him what rpm range he was going to run. Well I drag race so just off Idle to when I shift at 4000RPM.
Alright, you need the 188-220 cam, I tell him. It works better than any cam we have done to date from just off idle to over 4300 RPM. Well that is good he says, but lift is only going to be .533" at the valve and this head does not peak until .675". I need more lift he tells me. To get you to the .675" you want, I will have to put a big duration sled pulling camshaft in your truck that does not come on until 4000rpm, you will need a big stall convertor, and a very large pump that flows well as high as possible. Well how am I going to get the Flow I need with such a small cam? he says. This is a guy coming from a stock head, stock cam to this new setup.
This is where a customer needs to be realistic with what they need. RPM range dictates duration. Duration(since I push the designer to the limits of lift vs. duration)dictates how much lift you can have.
If the rpm range dictates what duration cam you run and the duration camshaft dictates the lift potential, then in a round about way the rpm range dictates where you want the head to flow.
It is pissing in the wind to get the head to flow well at .800" when you are lifting the valve .500"! I am constantly told (in the nicest way possible) that I am an idiot because I tell customers that they do not have to cut the pistons on their 4500rpm drag truck to get the best cam for them. One of the biggest mistakes people make with their builds is over porting the head and over-caming the engine. This is true in Gas engines and as more and more hard parts become available to the diesel world, it is true for us as well.
Matched parts will always kill a mismatched "superior" combination.
I put as much lift as I can into all of our designs. This lets the valve open as fast as possible to get to the higher flow numbers as fast as possible. Due to our higher lift designs, we keep the valve at the higher flow numbers as long as possible in a given duration. That being said, lower lift numbers for 90% of all customers are the numbers that need to be looked at because their rpm range dictates it. Street trucks spend most of their time from 1800rpm to 2800 rpm. At 1800 rpm, velocity of the port is VERY important. This means that a conservative port job with a nice valve job is the best for the application. Another way we are seeing to increase low lift numbers considerably as well as increase swirl is pocketing the head around the valve. This greatly increases the ability of the air to enter or exit the cylinder at very low lifts and is very important in power production at lower rpm ranges.
The downside? Lower compression which hurts lower rpm performance. This is why we are working on higher compression pistons for the 12v!