I've done several searches, read pretty much every post in here back about 17 pages... Talk about a lot of info. Still have a few questions however that I didn't find in my searching (though I'm sure the answer is out there ).

The car: The car is a 2002 Firehawk M6, and the current mods are just the LM exhaust and 4.11 gears. Reading the posts the consensus is that you should be full bolt-on prior to doing H/C. Not a problem. I plan on doing headers (Probably Kook's with the possibility of dumping the LM for true duals) at the same time. Will the stock (LS6) intake and a good ported TB work for a large (more on that later) cam? What else should I be looking at (aside from the normal head/cam stuff like springs, rockers, timing chain, etc.)?

What it's going to be used for: Daily driver and the rare trip to the 1/4. I work mids, and it's all highway between my house and work, I'd say roughly 75-85% of my driving is highway - So my idea of "streetability" is pretty wide. I could care less about lope, noise etc. As long as it passes the MD inspection I'm good with it.

Goals: I'd *like* to see @ low/mid 11's at least and 430+ on the dyno - To much to ask for?

What I'm thinking so far (feel free to correct the crap out of me) :

I'm bouncing between the T-Rex, the Grand Am Cup, or the G5X3. I know flycutting the pistons is required for the T-Rex, and I assume the other two as well? I originally looked at the Raptor Motorsports Dominator top end package, but at over $7k (no core) it's just out of reach.

The Grand Am cam is also a road racing cam from what I'm reading here on the boards, but what will it pull in the 1/4? I couldn't find much info on it as far as actual performance. I'm kind of intrigued by the "road" aspect of it, since most of my driving is highway. Thoughts?

On to heads... From what I'm reading there are a lot of good heads out there, I keep hearing AFR however, so that's what I'm leaning towards. When talking about the heads and cam being matched - It that something I will have to discuss with the head manufacturer after deciding on a cam? For example if I go T-Rex, do I just call AFR with the specs? Or is it something more general like "xxx cam needs ### cfm of air, so these heads will work perfect?"

And last - Obviously if the cam is big enough to require cutting the pistons, it's not going to be something I can do in my garage (not mentioning with no tune and a fresh big cam, it may not even make it to the shop for a tune?). But the heads, headers, and whatever else I can install and not have to worry about the car not running? I'm no absolute stranger to working on a car, just never been *inside* the engine before. Anything I can't do will be getting done at F-Body Central, I got lots of confidence in 'em.

I know this is a long post, but I'll be ordering parts next month, so I've gone from "This is what I'll do!" to "Oh my god, what exactly do I need to do?"
I figure rather than just order stuff on a whim and be unhappy with my final outcome, I'd come out of lurk mode and ask the knowledgable folks here.

Thanks in advance

 

You say you want to pass inspection. What type of inspection? If you're talking emissions, the sniffer is not going to get along with any of those cams at all. And remember, bigger doesn't always mean better as far as cams go. Have you considered some of the smaller cams?

I can't speak from direct experience, but the TR224 coupled with the AFRs has been putting down some respectable numbers, combined with a good tune and some high flow cats, you'll probably keep the sniffer happy.

 

No sniffer

Just plug in and check for codes, and a visual cat check.

I'll do some more searching tonight, if smaller cams/AFR are pulling mid 11's then I'd definitely open up my range a bit (not to mention most of them can be installed and tuned later correct? I'm pretty sure I can do a cam install, just don't want to have to tow my car to F-Body Central for the tune).

Thanks for the advice, I'm off to bed now, but I'll do some research on that TR224 cam at work tonight!

 

No more advice?

 

If you know what you are doing with LS1 Edit you can fool the tester. Do they require your cats to be in the stock location? If yes you can only use shorties. If no, there are several headers out three that fit well with High Flow Cats.

The largest cam I have heard of passing emissions (without cheating) was the TR 224/224 563/563 114 LSA.

Good Luck,

Al

 

you might want to look into the new tsp magic stick. its a pretty big cam and it clears te piston valve reliefs! Its new so you mioght not find much on it but it looks good to me.

 

You don't need that big of a cam to reach your goals... You can also do it with the LS6 intake, ported stock TB, full accessories and pump gas. I just did 436/420 and I don't even have a lot of the high-dollar stuff on my car... PM me if you want a list. Ben

 

your doing it backwards; buy the heads first then spec the cam to the heads.

 

Thanks for the replies all

AKRA: I believe it just has to have cats. At least I've never heard of an LT'ed F-Body failing...

ls1hybrid: I saw a few posts regarding it, but dismissed it since there seemed to be almost nobody running it. I didn't realize it was new, I'll defiunitely take a look at it.

Benjamin: PM sent

jrp: That's one of the things I was confused about. Thanks much for clearing that up .