Looking for an LS3 cam suggestion - mild, slight idle lope, great driveability...

[Chris@Livernois]

Originally Posted by Bad Karma

I'd like to see the Livernois on a reletively stock LS3 however.

-Ivan

Ivan,

We recently installed this camshaft in a customer’s 2009 G8 GXP (6-speed manual). We’re very happy with the results. The car was baselined stock and made 351 RWHP / 360 RWTQ. When finished, it made 490 RWHP / 442 RWTQ…. A gain of 139 RWHP / 82 RWTQ! After it came off the dyno, we did fine tuning on the street and I'm not going to lie and say it's "tame", because you can't lug it like you could a car with a stage 1 cam, but drivability is very good and it pulls very strong through the entire band. We were able to cruise at 45 mph or so in 6th gear with no rough jerking.

Modifications were as follows:

Livernois Motorsports CNC Valve Job
Livernois Motorsports L92 Stage 2R MAX Camshaft
Livernois Motorsports LS-Series Dual Valve Spring Kit
Includes: Livernois Motorsports Dual Valve Springs, Titanium Retainers, Valve Spring Locators, Locks, & Valve Seals)
Hardened Pushrods
Livernois Motorsports Ported Factory Intake Manifold & Throttle Body
Kooks 1 7/8" Longtube Headers & X-Pipe w/ Cats
Factory Catback
Rotofab Cold Air Intake System
Powerbond U/D Pulley
ARP Head Bolts
GM MLS Head Gaskets
NGK TR6 Spark Plugs
Synthetic Oil Change w/ Filter
Professional Installation
Livernois Motorsports Dyno Tune



VIDEO

CLICK HERE FOR VIDEO

Regards,

Rick LeBlanc
Livernois Motorsports

[Andy@Livernois]

Originally Posted by Bad Karma

Yeah, it really depends on how you plan on driving the car.

For me I don't know if I could go the Livernois after really drilling down on all the specs. If my car was going to see high RPMs (read:track time) I'd be all over that cam myself.

But I'm wanting to go with something a little more Daily Driver friendly and still not sacrifice a modest power gain.

I mean, if you're going to go through the trouble, pick the right bumpstick right?

Both of the cams (Katech and Livernois) I narrowed it down to were pretty close when it came to LSA (113.1/114 respectively) but when looking for a DD application, the Katech comes up a winner for me.

I'd like to see the Livernois on a reletively stock LS3 however.

That Lunati looks like a monster as well.....huge power gain.

I wouldn't discount that one for your application.

-Ivan

As Rick put it, it does have pretty good drivability on the 2r-max, but here is the whole point, we offer at least 10 different grinds that we use depending on the goals and wants of the customer. We weigh factors like desired sound, drivability, HP/TQ goals, and future plans in our recommendations. I could honestly recommend our 2c cam for an every day driver, where the 2r-max is more of a weekend toy type cam (although I personally could drive it every day if it were my own car )

There is no "one cam fits all" type camshaft, and unfortunately, running something on an engine dyno really cannot properly gauge things like drivability either...

[g-townmach]

Originally Posted by Rick@Livernois

Ivan,

We recently installed this camshaft in a customer’s 2009 G8 GXP (6-speed manual). We’re very happy with the results. The car was baselined stock and made 351 RWHP / 360 RWTQ. When finished, it made 490 RWHP / 442 RWTQ…. A gain of 139 RWHP / 82 RWTQ! After it came off the dyno, we did fine tuning on the street and I'm not going to lie and say it's "tame", because you can't lug it like you could a car with a stage 1 cam, but drivability is very good and it pulls very strong through the entire band. We were able to cruise at 45 mph or so in 6th gear with no rough jerking.

Livernois Motorsports

Awesome #'s. Sounds like a strong car. But 45 in 6th?? I can barely stand 65 in 6th... It's like a brick wall!!

Can you please tell me what LSA that cam was on?

[Ivan @ Southwest Speed]

Wow. Really great of you guys from Livernois to chime in. I appreciate the tech info without a doubt.

I was sold on the Katech piece but now it looks like I might have to give you a call and talk shop to determine what path I need to go.

139/82 gains are absolutely insane. I can see that some of the mods are relatively "stock" and that's a huge gain for someone like myself to consider.

With regards to your 2c and 2r-max cams. What would be the considering factors that one might think of the latter as a weekend toy? Is the driveability just horrible to where Ione would have to literally feather it at red lights?

I have no qualms with that, as long as it weren't rediculous.

I definitely want room for growth and don't want to be scratchin my head in 7 or 8 months saying "I shoulda...."

Thanks again for the time from you guys,
Ivan

[Ivan @ Southwest Speed]

Originally Posted by wbt

I read into the numbers and the Lunati does make nice top end power but is not as balanced as the Livernois cam.

The Katech cam looks great also. Little more power under the curve. I could not find it on their site.

I didn't see the LS3 Torquer cam there either but you can call them and they'll be happy to tell ya about it. lol That's what I had to do as well.

It's retailed at $500 like the rest of their cams are.

-Ivan

[Jason 98 TA]

Checkout my thread on my heads cam 500rwhp 2010 that I have less than 4K in mods.

The camshaft I'm running makes 50rwhp & drives very well in a M6 car. Not to mention it has proper p/v clearance which seems to be something people are missing when designing a LS3 camshaft.

[wbt]

Originally Posted by Jason 98 TA

Checkout my thread on my heads cam 500rwhp 2010 that I have less than 4K in mods.

The camshaft I'm running makes 50rwhp & drives very well in a M6 car. Not to mention it has proper p/v clearance which seems to be something people are missing when designing a LS3 camshaft.

List of mods?

[Jason 98 TA]

This is a LS3 on the engine dyno with headers on it. It's our engine dyno test motor we used to develop our camshafts. Without spending time engine developing camshafts you don't get a good idea of what's exactly changing & what's not. The engine dyno allows us to make one change at a time & properly study the camshafts & how they react to the LS3.

[Andy@Livernois]

Originally Posted by g-townmach

Awesome #'s. Sounds like a strong car. But 45 in 6th?? I can barely stand 65 in 6th... It's like a brick wall!!

Can you please tell me what LSA that cam was on?

On the G8 GXP we did it on there are a few things to consider. a GXP uses a 3.70 gear and a 26" tall tire, where as the Camaro has a 3.45 and a 28" tall tire. Basically at 1200-1300 RPM it was content with cruising around in 6th with very minimal bucking, by 1400 rpm it was butter smooth...

In regards to drivability, we are extremely picky in what we call good drivability, and acceptable drivability. The @c cam can be driving exactly as the stock cam was, lugging it low in every gear without complaint from the engine, where the 2r-max cam likes to be above 1200 rpm. Really, this is about the only differences between the cam's as far as drivability goes...

[g-townmach]

What about the lsa?

[Andy@Livernois]

2c is 117 2r-max is 114, sorry about that

[g-townmach]

Originally Posted by Andy@Livernois

2c is 117 2r-max is 114, sorry about that

I guess you're not allowed to post duration and lift of both cams right? Man, everyones keeping stuff so secret these days.

[Andy@Livernois]

Originally Posted by g-townmach

I guess you're not allowed to post duration and lift of both cams right? Man, everyones keeping stuff so secret these days.

we publish specs on all of them, here it is:

2c Cam
224/236 .612/.612 117LSA

2r-max Cam
235/242 .603/.618 114LSA

[Ivan @ Southwest Speed]

Originally Posted by Andy@Livernois

we publish specs on all of them, here it is:

2c Cam
224/236 .612/.612 117LSA

2r-max Cam
235/242 .603/.618 114LSA

Andy,
Those are some pretty huge intake and exhaust lift numbers aren't they?

How concerned should one be running the 2c or 2r-max on stock heads in relation to p/v clearances? Is a spring upgrade in order to run one of these two cams??

I'm still in the "learning" phase as well and the only two times I bought a cam were both off the shelf HotCams for the old LT1 cars when I had em.

What would be the major concerns/differences in these two cams?

Thanks alot for the crash courses guys.
Ivan