doorstop material...you can only repair what you can see and what you can't will get you....

The deck surface is not hard anodized and this still happens.

Yes the heads can be repaired. I have seen worse; than this. I see the jelly in the port and what is the reddish tint? I take it; the engines were not flushed out after use, nor was a neutralizer used? Where you also; using a Cometic gasket? If so; Alum/stainless/iron/water or saltwater, is going to give you the perfect; corrosion situation.

Depending; on what you have invested; in these heads, will determine the offset for the repair cost. You need to find someone; that is an experienced welder on alum. Breakdown heads, get a die grinder, first get them cleaned up, some type of alum cleaner or a mixture of water and muriatic acid. I would; pre clean the corrosion off the areas to be welded than leave the rest up to the welder. You can use a new gasket as a templet for correcting the bad areas. Insure the welder, knows they must be preheated before welding. Question; him of this process first, if he doesn't know of preheat, pick-up your stuff and keep looking.
The water jacket holes, need not to be perfect, in shape. They need to be free on any voids or porosities in the sealing area of the combustion chamber and water jacket. The heads will need surfaced after wards along with a valve job. If you go back with a Cometic gasket, the surface is going to be critical with the finish and or any voids in the area of the raised surfaces on the gasket, which seals the water ports and combustion chambers.

closed cooling system?

Ok so after speaking with a few local shops I decided to fix these heads. We used a bore scope to check as much of the ports internally as we could see and they looked fine. I had these heads milled .060 and port matched and flowed during the original build. New I was looking at over 2000.00 for a set without the work. So for the 650.00 I decided to just repair these heads and reinstall. Just where the head met the block was really bad. So they were blasted, ground out, cleaned, then pre heated and welded. They then decked the heads and final weld and decked again. Im very happy the way they came out. We also did new tool steel springs and a valve job. Now my question is...I used ARP head bolts originally on this build. Had the heads off once before for a freshen and now they are off again. Can I reuse the head bolts for a third time or replace them?

Thanks Anthony

I've had heads off and on more in one day and reused the bolts and gaskets with no problem.

I thought the big deal with ARP bolts is that they are reusable, I think I saw that in one of their ads, I've re-used mine. My engine builder recommends spraying MLS gaskets with copper gasket sealer. I actually take the rivets out on side of the gasket and spray between the layers as well. It improves sealing and reduces electrolysis.

if the bolt holes go into the water jacket the head bolts are usually ate up.if blind holes the bolts can be reused.

Ahhh. Copper and aluminum do not like each other at all. If you insist on using a sealer (I use rtv around the water holes) I would use an aviation sealer.

the arp's seem to get eaten right to the bottom of the threads.I've done both,new and reused them.new ended up like the ones I replaced in 1 season.now those oem bolts seem to take it,corrosion wise.