germ79

I'm looking at purchasing a nice lt1 WS6 TA and it has a pretty aggressive cam in it. The specs are 24x, .58x, and 111lsa. I'm somewhat mechanical, but know nothing about cams. He's done all the upgrades on the fuel side of things to support this, but everything else is stock. The car is ridiculously well maintained.

What I need to know is how drivable is this gonna be? This is solely a fun, cruising around town, drive it a few miles to work, fair weather car for me.

Any advice you can give would help a lot.

Oh, it's an M6 with stock gears.

hrcslam

Is that at .050? Or is that advertised? What's the lift?

If that's at .050, walk, no, run away! That cam shouldn't be near stock heads or gears. You'll hate how it drives, the power will never peak (rpm limited by pcm), and it'll be way slower than it sounds. And no, it won't be enjoyable to drive.

If it's advertised duration, should be fine. But, you'll still want the heads, valve train, and bolt ons done along with at least a thinner head gasket.

germ79

Well, all I know is what he sent me. It says:

custom grind comp cam (24x duration .58x lift 111 centerline)

It's 4 hours away, so I'm trying to figure some of this out before I drive to see it.

Thank you for your help!

I can ask him to clarify if you can tell me what to ask.

germ79

Here's the description for that stuff. He said he had the tuner raise the redline to 7k.

Motor has custom grind comp cam (24x duration .58x lift 111 centerline), valve springs, and hardened push rods. New timing chain and all seals and gaskets when installed. 6 speed with stock shifter. Hurst roll control line lock. ECM tuned by Solomon for car with EGR delete, air pump delete, skip shift delete, rear 02 delete, etc. Fuel is walbro 255 pump to 8AN braided line to aeromotive fuel filter and up to stock fuel rails with an fittings welded in. Return is through an adjustable aeromotive regulator and then back to tank running 50 PSI. Bosch 30 pound injectors, 8.5 MSD super conductor plug wires, AC Delco opti with Mitsubishi sensor, NGK plugs, K&N filter in stock ram air box, stainless long tube headers with ORY and 3" polished stainless Magnaflow catback.

germ79

Got more info.

That's st .050 duration advertised is 309.

guppymech

iTrader: (7)

Yeah, like hrcslam said that cam is way too radical. Stay away unless you're going to change it. Any cam in a M6 will need rear end gears to perform best.

germ79

So, if I got it and changed the gears, it would be better? To what? 4:10?

azmarkus

Slow down...think this through...listen to the advice.

Just because a car has been well maintained and/or looks nice doesn't mean you could be buying a potential mechanical basket case from a poorly planned build.

As stated here, having a vehicle with an aggressive cam with stock heads will get you a car that might sound good, but you'll have trouble merging on the freeway and outrunning soccer Moms' new Siennas and Odysseys. Raising the PCM to 7K sounds like someone is trying to baffle you with numbers; 7K on stock valve train?

VoyagerCamaro

Yeah stay away unless your going to de-cam it. The cam I run (cc503) is the largest recommended cam to use with stock heads. Which is a peanut compared to the one in the car your looking at. A V8 motor is basically like a big air pump, the more air you can get in and out the more power you'll have. Having that large of a cam in a stock headed car is like trying to have a bonfire on the moon! No air you'd actually be LOSING power using that cam, sure it'd sound good... But as stated above you'd get smoked by soccer mom vans! As well as 7k on stock valve train? Yikes!

Badazz 97 TA

iTrader: (18)

If it's a clean car, overall , buy it and change the cam in a weekend. Problem solved.

germ79

Thanks guys. It is SO clean. Less than 50k miles. It's been taken such good care of.

I'm debating whether to get it and plan to change the cam out. It's a few hours away though and I'll have to drive it here on the highway. Any harm in that?

Also, can someone explain to me what you mean by the "soccer moms" thing? Why will power be so low with that cam? Will it be real high down low or something?

Thanks so much, fellas!

VoyagerCamaro

That cams power is no where near what your valve train can provide. The power is all in the top end...

germ79

So, is it unsafe or just annoying? If the latter, I can always plan on swapping the cam.

KW Baraka

iTrader: (7)

If you got it and changed the gears, you'd have a car with 4.10 gears and a crappy, over-cammed engine.

That car certainly needs a cam swap and a tune.

If you're willing to spend the money do that to the car, then go ahead and buy it.....

No....shouldn't be unsafe at all.

It should only be a lot slower the it should be.....and with the amount of overlap a cam like that would have, it'll run poorly and guzzle more gas than it should.

KW

KW Baraka

iTrader: (7)

It means that a mommy with five kids in a Dodge Voyager would dust your *** .

Buy the car if you really want it.....but plan a cam swap ASAP!!!!

KW

germ79

All right, I think I'm going to go ahead and get it and just plan to do a cam install over the winter. With the current monster cam, what can I expect on my drive home on an interstate where the speed limit is 70 mph?

guppymech

iTrader: (7)

With 3.42s @ 70mph you will no doubt have to be in 5th (@ 2300 rpm) cause the engine will be unhappy in 6th @ 1500 rpm.

germ79

Oh, ok. That makes sense.

So, how will I know it is "unhappy"? Surging? Sounds like it is going to die?

With this cam I should expect low end power, but not top-end or the other way around?

You guys are the best!

hrcslam

You'll know..... I would not be surprised if you grabbed 4th...... Actually I would, that's an exaggeration.

That cam is huge for my build. I already need to rev to 7k (I don't though, my redline is 6800 though and there's still cam left) on my 230/238 .565/.565 110+6 Lunati spec'd by LE.

That cam will need more rpms than the LT1 PCM can do. It will need a forged bottom half (minus crank), big heads, high high compression, a very good valve train, 24x conversion (or something similar), etc., etc., etc.

What are your plans for the car? He's got some supporting mods already, so if you do buy it maybe we can help you put something better together that better suited your needs/wants.

guppymech

iTrader: (7)

Driveability will suffer. Instead of having a stock like lower rpm limit of 1200 rpm or so the car you're looking at it will be higher. My hotcam won't cruise much below 1400 rpm in 6th, you're probably looking at least a couple hundred rpm higher than that.