Hey guys,

I'm going to get my car tuned tomorrow and I was looking to raise the rev limiter on my car to take advantage of the top end ability of my cam. It's a stock bottom end LS1, stock balancer, with ARP rod bolts.
What is a safe speed? What do you guys rev yours to? I was thinking of looking at the curve and seeing where a good rpm would be. I was thinking 6500 at the highest, but want some input.

Just looking for a safe rpm for a sbe LS1 with 170k miles

Thanks in advance!

 

My 99 TA with the weaker early stock rod bolts, ATI balancer and mods in sig is set to 6,800 rpm. We spun my car to 6800 dynoing it and saw it wasn't necessary to go that high. I've hit the 6,800 rev limiter a few times but normally stay under.

However, my best shift point is at 6300, with the current set up so the rev limiter could be dropped to 6500.

6,500 is probably a good starting point.

 

Every setup is going to want something a little different but generally speaking You would want to shift 200-300 above peak hp for the best times at the track. I shift my LS1 at 6600 (6800 Rev limit) and my LR4 at 6800 (7200 Rev limit so I can push it more if needed) with good results. both are completely stock internally other than camshaft and valvespring upgrades.

 

when do the stock rod bolts become marginal on a 99?

 

this is a big debate on here. some have luck and some don't. I personally think you have a better chance screwing something up replacing the bolts as you would if you just rolled the dice and run it as is.

 

Like others have mentioned it really is dependent on the setup. I spun my stock bottom end LS1 to 7200 and never had any issues.

 

When I have a street car, I care less about extracting every last ounce of power and more about preserving the engine.

That said, I usually set my limiter about 500-1000 rpm below what the engine would actually tolerate. This way, I can bounce from it whenever I want, by accident or not, and the engine just laughs at the "abuse".

I run the limiter up for a dyno run, or track pass, but then I turn it back down for the daily driving spirit.

 

FWIW - My two friends that did my HCI install were both SAM grads that work in professional racing. I asked about replacing my 99 TA's stock rod bolts when we plannex my HCI back in 2002. Both had extensive LS experience from MTI & LPE before moving to pro racing.

They both agreed just replacing the rod bolts without pulling everything apart and checking all the details created a greater risk of causing an issue than an occasional spin to 6,500 rpm. They also said people do just replace the bolts and get away with it but its not the correct way to do it. They had also seen people do it and get burned like you mention. In short, i was told if i wanted to spin to 7,000+ and not worry about - we need to pull the motor and do it the right way. 14 years later with the stock rod bolts and 120,000 + miles on that head and cam package I'm still grateful for their expert install and skill.

 

7,000 - 7,200 on mine and it stock bottom end.

 

interesting. and what happens when the bolts "let go"? they stretch, bearings become loose and you get knock or something worse?

 

You also have to think about valvetrain.

 

I ended up having my limiter set at 6800. I did a couple highway pulls before putting the car away for winter and didn't hit higher than 6300. It's nice having the ability to go higher though. I honestly don't plan on ever going higher than 6200 unless I'm at the strip.

 

7200 on my sbe.

 

im upgrading the valvetrain right now and have been told 6700 was the limit for my 99 rod bolts. i had a look at arps site and its really bad, no info whatsoever (although you can read it in chinese). but if you assume arp bolts having a higher torque what happens to the bearing, would it not get distorted? this might be where the problems mentioned come from and there is no easy fix.

are you guys really taking a STOCK engine to 7200?

joecar, are you joecar from efilive?

 

7K on mine. My car makes peak power at 6800RPM.

It really depends on your setup to be honest. Stock valve springs, cam, etc are all a lending factor in how high you would spin it.

No point in revving up to 7K if you make peak power at 6K or etc. Look at your powerband and talk to your tuner. If your tuner is worth his salt, he should take care of everything for you.

 

Yep, that's me

 

I've run my sbe '98 with the factory rod bolts with the limiter at 7200 for about 5 years. I have called for my shifts at 6500, but with a slippery converter, and the slow shifting trans it usually peaks about 6950, on the 1-2 shift before I get the extension. Not so high on the 2-3 shift because it isn't accelerating as fast at that speed. I have hit the 7200 in 3rd, with the car in D as opposed to OD. It hits the rev limiter hard at that speed, on a race track, or was that in Mexico? Hitting the rev limiter at that speed is probably harder on the engine than running it to that speed.

I was talking to one of the guys from Lingenfelter at LS Fest, and we discussed where we were shifting at, he said he was comfortable with the SBE LS1 up to 8K. Said they had run them there many times in testing. I'm not that comfortable with 8K, but 7k doesn't concern me at all, that's business as usual, and I'm approaching 150K miles on my engine.

 

Shifted my arp rod bolted lq4 at 7500 for about three years until a cam bearing walked out while cruising down the highway.

 

When I installed my ARP rod bolts, they were torqued to 40#ft. In the instructions, it says you must have the rods resized when installing their rod bolts. I read a few forums and people were saying that Katech rod bolts require higher torque, but no resizing when installed, so I decided to just install mine without resizing. Haven't had any problems so far.

I had my limiter set at 6,800. My cam made peak power right around 6k, so pushing it the extra 400rpm to 7,200 would have been pointless.

 

I've seen stock pushrods warp at 6800 pushing comp 918's on a stock cam. I never really worried about the bottom end at that level.