camshaft questions?

[casper sc/1ss/rs]

im just wondering where i can get a camshaft made for a supercharged engine, what stage does people recomend or if they even offer stages in the blower camshafts? also about how many hours does it take to install a cam in the ls3? would it be worth the extra work sense i have already installed my supercharger or would it be better to wait until the motor goes and then beef up the bottom end at the same time im not planning on doing any head work now just the cam about how much rwhp will just the cam add thanks

[Crime2]

Originally Posted by casper sc/1ss/rs

im just wondering where i can get a camshaft made for a supercharged engine, what stage does people recomend or if they even offer stages in the blower camshafts? also about how many hours does it take to install a cam in the ls3? would it be worth the extra work sense i have already installed my supercharger or would it be better to wait until the motor goes and then beef up the bottom end at the same time im not planning on doing any head work now just the cam about how much rwhp will just the cam add thanks

Talk with Ted @ JRE. He has some nice blower cams! Hope to get one in my car over the winter.

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[TriGun]

Sure, Ted from JRE is the man. Give him a call and he will give you some recommendations.

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[Motion427]

Check here.

http://www.camaro5.com/forums/showthread.php?t=177497

[Stingr69]

Its a lot of work to swap in a blower cam. Any aftermarket cam will require a valvetrain upgrade along with the swap. You could see over 100 added HP but the cost is pretty high and you will have to re-tune.

You could do the Corvette ZR-1 (LS9) cam and just change out the cam and the drive gear. Super smooth stock-like blower cam that adds maybe 30 HP. Cheap and easy. You might not even need a re-tune. That is only worth a few HP but it costs about $200 plus labor where an aftermarket blower cam swap is about $1600 as far as parts are concerned plus even more labor.

[cammed06]

Driveability is very important as you go up in size. These transmissions are setup to drive the car at low rpms and get good mileage, so at lower speeds in say 6th gear, you could experience some bucking. taking off to low of an rpm can buck as well. Different stages just break up the extreme level of the cam. Mild would be a much improvement over stock, wild would get you great power, but worse driveability. Some of us have figured out over the years of trial and error, that under the curve power is what makes you go fast and driveability doesn't suffer. Big sounds nice, makes big peak numbers, but drives like crap.

[casper sc/1ss/rs]

Originally Posted by Motion427

Check here.

http://www.camaro5.com/forums/showthread.php?t=177497

thanks

[calbert1999]

Originally Posted by casper sc/1ss/rs

im just wondering where i can get a camshaft made for a supercharged engine, what stage does people recomend or if they even offer stages in the blower camshafts? also about how many hours does it take to install a cam in the ls3? would it be worth the extra work sense i have already installed my supercharger or would it be better to wait until the motor goes and then beef up the bottom end at the same time im not planning on doing any head work now just the cam about how much rwhp will just the cam add thanks

I woulnd't recommend doing anything if you're not going to do it right. If you just change the CAM chancese are you trunions, or springs are going to have a problem, I'd say forge your engine before you do any power adds, if you've done power additions already don't be too hard on the eingine until you forge the bottom end, reason being if you wait until you engine blows you may end up destroying heads, pistons, block, crank, et al, and at that point might as well go with a complete new engine.
If you forge now it will be cheaper, and you'll have a solid platform to build on without having to worry aoubt the crappy stock parts breaking up your engine.

[doomsdayjesus081]

Originally Posted by Stingr69

Its a lot of work to swap in a blower cam. Any aftermarket cam will require a valvetrain upgrade along with the swap. You could see over 100 added HP but the cost is pretty high and you will have to re-tune.

You could do the Corvette ZR-1 (LS9) cam and just change out the cam and the drive gear. Super smooth stock-like blower cam that adds maybe 30 HP. Cheap and easy. You might not even need a re-tune. That is only worth a few HP but it costs about $200 plus labor where an aftermarket blower cam swap is about $1600 as far as parts are concerned plus even more labor.

This is not a very good idea, the cam should be matched to the springs and the pushrods. Stock cams are made to ultimately satisfy emissions in factory vehicles, while making the most power. The idea of trying to save a little work is misguided, valve springs and trunion upgrades are fairly easy and take about 4 hours with the right tools. The most time intensive work is installing the camshaft itself or rather removing and relocating the interference to so. Now for the camshaft specs a zr1 camshaft specs are as follows: 211/230 @.050 valve lift and .558/.552 lift with 1.7 rockers and a 122.5 centerline. That is not much of a gain from the stock camaro cam of 204/211 .551/.525 117 lsa.
I personally opted for the JRE 470 cam package which sells for $1364.00. It includes the cam, springs, pushrods, trunion upgrade, new 3 bolt timing gear and bolts, new crank bolt, new water pump gaskets, new timing cover gasket, new timing cover seal and a custom tune from JRE. The only other things to purchase besides tools or locktight, antisieze, and rtv hi temp. Out of respect for JRE I will not divulge the new cam specs but I will say it is more stout in every regard to both factory camshafts listed above. The drive ability is great with this cam, while still producing a nice lope at idle.
As for the original poster, pick your shop of choice, and talk to them about your end goal and they will recommend a cam that will work well. JRE, ECS and many more shops specialize in superchargers and cam packages that work well with them.

[Stingr69]

Originally Posted by doomsdayjesus081

This is not a very good idea, the cam should be matched to the springs and the pushrods. Stock cams are made to ultimately satisfy emissions in factory vehicles, while making the most power. The idea of trying to save a little work is misguided, valve springs and trunion upgrades are fairly easy and take about 4 hours with the right tools. The most time intensive work is installing the camshaft itself or rather removing and relocating the interference to so. Now for the camshaft specs a zr1 camshaft specs are as follows: 211/230 @.050 valve lift and .558/.552 lift with 1.7 rockers and a 122.5 centerline. That is not much of a gain from the stock camaro cam of 204/211 .551/.525 117 lsa.
I personally opted for the JRE 470 cam package which sells for $1364.00. It includes the cam, springs, pushrods, trunion upgrade, new 3 bolt timing gear and bolts, new crank bolt, new water pump gaskets, new timing cover gasket, new timing cover seal and a custom tune from JRE. The only other things to purchase besides tools or locktight, antisieze, and rtv hi temp. Out of respect for JRE I will not divulge the new cam specs but I will say it is more stout in every regard to both factory camshafts listed above. The drive ability is great with this cam, while still producing a nice lope at idle.
As for the original poster, pick your shop of choice, and talk to them about your end goal and they will recommend a cam that will work well. JRE, ECS and many more shops specialize in superchargers and cam packages that work well with them.

You say the LS-9 cam has near identical specs to the LS-3 cam but still we need to upgrade everything? The cam IS matched to the pushrods and springs BY GM! The factory uses the same parts in an LS-9 engine so how is doing that yourself a bad idea? It's a safe cheap effective reliable mod.

-Mark.

[Go Fast Kid]

My understanding from ComCams is that they have worked with Jenetty Racing for about a year and have created a great profile cam for the LS 3 supercharged motor. Call Com or Jenetty, they are both well respected.

[doomsdayjesus081]

Originally Posted by Stingr69

You say the LS-9 cam has near identical specs to the LS-3 cam but still we need to upgrade everything? The cam IS matched to the pushrods and springs BY GM! The factory uses the same parts in an LS-9 engine so how is doing that yourself a bad idea? It's a safe cheap effective reliable mod.

-Mark.

You are still missing the point, they are different which means that the lobe sizes are different. This in turn means without changing rocker arms that the pushrods will need to be different. If you want to spend a couple hundred dollars on an ls9 camshaft for little to no gain go ahead. Just don't misrepresent the facts to the original poster, you still need more parts than just the cam and the cam gear. Oh and just because GM uses it doesn't make it a good part. Go ask some of the c5 z06 guys about how their stock valve springs were breaking. Also if you think the ls9 has identical internal parts to the ls3 you really need to read one of the many articles about the differences.

In order to not turn this into a pissing match though, feel free to build yours the way you think works and I will build mine the way I think works.

[honeybucket99]

dude I ran the ls9 cam for many miles with nothing done to the valvetrain; just swapped cams. From my experience the ls9 nets 30-40 hp at the wheels. Are there more powerful options? Sure, but the ls9 was a good choice for me to bridge the gap between supercharging and my all out motor build.

[94guy]

adm has used the ls9 cam and it has shown about 20hp not bad for $120