I’m wondering what the limit of an ls3 with a turbo specific cam and associated valve work would top out at. The current plan is the TSP bald eagle boost cam, and a 78mm single turbo. in this setup what’s the power/psi limit? (93 pump gas maybeeeeee e85)

If the lifters look like they may be rough based on the old cam coming out then heads will be pulled, ported, and polished and i’ll get a thicker gasket to drop compression down to 9.5:1 and ls7 lifters. what would the limit be in that scenario?

my dream number is 900 on high boost and like being able to run off the gate at like 700 ish. To hit that goal would i need to check ring gap/ gap the rings, would I need a set of forged drop in rods and pistons? i’m hoping for a no to both lol.

 

@ls3fox has pushed his SBE LS3 well past 1,000whp for a while now.
Perhaps he'll chime in but pump gas will limit power but be able to hit that 700hp on gate mark easy, E85 will do 900hp and beyond.
I don't know what the intended use is but you say 78mm turbo which makes me think a 7875, if that's the case I'd go bigger.
Don't port the heads, just run them, gap the rings if you're in there just to be safe.
Buy good lifters and valve springs so you can spin it up, turbo engines love rpm.

 

You would need a head gasket thicker than 0.100" to drop an LS3 compression to 9.5:1. Not happening.
A bald eagle boost cam in an LS3 is also too much cam for a majority of the 78mm turbo options that people are going with right now. You'd need something like a borg frame turbo in T6.

 

I'm not familiar with that cam but a 7875 on a 6.2 is a little small I would go with something like a s480

no need to drop compression it'll make 700 on pump gas easy after that I switched to e85 and have made over 1300

Ls9 head gaskets, arp head studs , btr cam and valve springs s480 should be good for 1000whp

Be sure to check ring gap as mine was .006 on the top rings I gapped mine to .026 and .028

 

I was pretty confident that cam would be bigger than i could realistically make use of but i have a big ole cam 550 wheel all motor V1 i daily right now and that chop is something im completely willing to lose some power to keep around lmao

 

so looks like i’m just gonna have to pull the motor instead of doing the cam swap in the car, haven’t pulled an LS before but shouldn’t be too bad from what i’ve seen. especially with the absolute comical size of the 5th gen camaro engine bay

 

I was planning on some dual .660 springs titanium retainers and since it sounds like it’s a much better idea to pull the motor and gap the rings it’ll get some LS7 lifters.

does that hardware sounds good enough to spin it up pretty good?

 

@ls3fox also you seem to be the go to guy here, so if i already have the motor out, and the pistons out to get the rings gapped, should i just throw in a set of forged drop in rods and pistons? It’s a kinda budget build but not really, spending the 2k on rods and pistons would just have me wait an extra week or two to buy a drag pack which not really a big deal cus i don’t get to the strip that often.

 

Just be mindful on the LS7 lifters and buy genuine ones.
The Johnson lifters are also very good, you pay more but you don't have to worry about a seized wheel shredding the cam and engine rebuild.
I use the drop in BTR .660 springs, tool steel retainers, Brute Speed FI cam (which chops very nicely) and factory lifters to 7,000-7,500rpm for reference.

 

Rods and pistons are totally up too you. Can you do it without them yes will it hurt to have them no. So if it's in the budget why not

 

I didn't say it was too much cam for the engine, it is too much cam/engine for the turbo.

 

You can get away with a LOT less cam than most think when running a turbo. You can always raise the boost to increase flow in most cases. I run the BTR Stage 1 v2 cam in my twin turbo street driven LS3. The turbos are definitely the limiting factor in power, not the cam.

 

It's crazy how the turbo can move the power out farther with more boost.
The Brute Speed FI cam I'm running isn't particularly big although at an 800rpm idle it's very choppy.
I was told this cam would peak around 6,500rpm but it pulls incredibly hard out to 7,500rpm easily.
If I shift at 7,500rpm, by the time everything takes place its at 8,000rpm so I'd imagine it'll go higher.

 

My wife’s c10 made 930whp with a sbe ls3, brodix br1 heads, BTR stage 3, s485 t4 on 19psi. I’ve ran 21-22 at the track but it dropped fuel pressure. Just put a larger pump in yesterday. May put it back on the dyno if I get time. I feel you will need more turbine so at least a 80/96 min.

 

how did it spool with the s485 on the ls3?