Thinking about picking the hotcam kit up for my ls1. Any opinions on the kit?

 

I think you will get mostly thumbs down from this forum. However, the cam seems to make decent power and is very easy on the valve train. The price is pretty decent as well.

 

why thumbs down?

 

The common argument is that there are myriad "better" cams out there. Those other cams will all make more power but will generally require expensive valve springs and more tuning. The Hot Cam is a good choice for someone that doesn't want to screw around with it a lot but wants at least some of the benefits of swapping a cam. For example, you can use it with ~$50 "LS6" (blue) springs It sounds pretty good at idle too.

If you want all-out power and many more mods in the near to medium term, you may find yourself upgrading from the hot cam to take advantage of future mods and that burns a lot of guys. Sounds like you might not be the guy that wants to check his valve springs every 20K miles..and that's what you get with some of the bigger cams.

Good luck.

 

Mine has been in since 2003. I haven't modded anything on my car in years. I made 381/373 with it. It has been a fun summer and weekend car just to take out and enjoy. Will you get more out of more agressive designs, absolutely. It fit my purposes just fine.

 

It's not the best cam for max power but if you want a cam that you just put in and forget about then it's the cam you want. You could also contact Brian Tooley, Marten@Tick or Kip from Cam Motion and get a cam that makes more power than the hot cam but is still easy enough no the valvtrain that you can run beehives for 50k+ miles.

 

I put mine in a 4.8 that is in a very light car (mgb) and I love it . also sounds awesome at idle

 

Okay, thanks everyone. I wasn't looking for something to extreme as of now. Just wanted some easy power and a nice idle sound. From what I'm being told it will suit my purpose just fine. Maybe down the road I'll get something more aggressive.

 

You won't get any thumbs down from me on this cam. It's a great choice for a worry free, durable setup where maximum longevity/minimum maintenance are the priorities. And there is still room to grow with a head swap in addition.

But for those looking for max effort/max power, this is not the right cam.

 

I can never find the hot cam or ASA cam for sale -_- been wanting one just for the sole fact that it makes good power and it's a reliably cam. I have the LS6 cam now and want to move to the ASA cam.

 

You know, I went with this cam specifically for reliability and sound. And I must say I couldn't be happier. You will love it. It even was drive able on the stock tune, although it will hunt for idle for a few seconds each time you start it. Fortunately I bought hp tuners and made a few small adjustments here and there, and now it fires right up and settles to 800 rpm perfectly. My only recommendation is that you check the base circle compared to your stock cam, because although the low lift doesn't necessitate new pushrods, a lot of these hot cams are re-grinds of stock cams with smaller base circles. I failed to account for this, and with using stock pushrods my valve train is MUCH louder now. Such is life with these motors and any cam swap though...

 

The stock push rods should of been thrown in the garbage...

 

Yeah....don't rub it in, haha.

 

Sounds like you have an M6 car then. For an A4, some tuning is definitely required with the hotcam to get decent idle manners both in and out of gear. Stock A4 idle rpms are much lower than the M6 (550rpm in gear, 650rpm P/N), so idle stability is an issue with any cam beyond stock. I would consider tuning to be a requirement for this cam if you have an A4.