I know i didnt want a ms3 after i drove my dads...auto 3.73, 4400 stall, ms3 car...it does not have lower end power and stumbles alot around idle...yeah it makes good high end power shifting at 6900 but how often do you see that on the street...In the end get what you want but i wouldnt recommend jumping on the MS3, MS4 bandwaggon...you will be plently happy with 400+ hp with a custom cam, or patrick g cam...I know i am...

 

I had the MS4 in my M6 and it didn't drive like a stock car down low, it buckes and surged in the lower rpm's or in traffic was the worst, when I would sit and idle you could feel the car shake from the idle and watch things around you vibrate also, when I had the MS4 the wife was scared to death to drive the car and she even had the MS3 in her T/A with a 3400 stall (she loved driving the MS3 but not the MS4) she couldn't keep it from dying down low. Since the weather is so cold here it takes like 5-10 minutes to let the car warm up just so it can hold an idle. Does this sound like a stock car to you?
http://s27.photobucket.com/albums/c1...idlevid001.flv

 

I guess I just got lucky then. MS4 cam, stock stall converter, and stock gears, and it drives great. 20 degree day fire it up idles right away without having to touch the gas.

 

question, on your sig is says you have the gears and stall, but in your comment your saying you have a stock stall and stock gears?

 

Something that drives me crazy on this site is that people post stuff they've read with little or no experiance on the particular piece. And many times there is bias because it's not the route they decided to go so they bash the living heck out of it.

So here is my experiance with the MS4: It rumbles and is a blast to drive. Makes plenty of power. Below 1500 rpm, mine tends to buck and surge but I think a lot of that is in the tune. I do not have the dyno sheet with me, but it does have a very nice torque curve. I will post the info from the dyno in a new thread because I am tired of people bashing the power band. They are full of crap.

Is it good for a daily driver? probably not. It drives fine at low rpms but milage suffers and the piston to valve clearance is tight, and limiting your choice of heads.

Am I saying it is better or worse than other options? No. What I am saying is don't believe everything you hear on this board. Keep an eye out in the next fiew days, I will post the dyno sheet.

 

Yep. I HAVE a stall and gears for it, but they are still sitting in my room. Im waiting for a friend to get a lift in his shop so we can yank the trans and put the stall in, and then toss the gears in.

 

MS4 Bashing Again? Its all in the tune! My car will crankup with it iced over first time. And when it gets warm enough it lowers the idle to 900 and it stays there. No surging or stumbling at the stoplights even when the ACs on.
I guess if you judged the MS4 by the posts of people who only know what they have read before you would be looking at a twin peaks dyno sheet. Not true? I have no trouble at all with the MS4 as a daily driver. It has plenty of torque to get you moving. And I'm still running stock injectors on a LS6 intake and a stock MAF.

 

My ms4 starts up and idles...rough, but still it doesn't die out on me like so many of you said it has done to you. It does lack a little low end torque, but if you're not a gaping ***** about it its not that bad. you guys that want a tame, well mannered, good driving car...go get a civic with a fart can so you can act like you have something fast... but in the end you're just like all the other cars. quit getting butthurt about this cam, I have the ***** to run mine to 7300 and it pulls like a mother from 4K until then. So I am happy with my cam, and if your not an old man that wants to just look cool, I would recommend the ms3/ms4 route.

 

hmm, MS3 owner says he would want a smaller cam if he had to daily drive
hmm, former MS4 owner swapped to a smaller cam
Ok, we've established some of it is in the tune, but even a tuner says smaller is better for a DD.
I bet you can't, and how do you define "not horrible"?
Another good reason not to DD with this size cam.
Most people don't have any problem with bucking or surging in 6th, its at low speeds in lower gears, 20-30 in 2nd or 3rd...
Yes, one wouldn't logically conclude a bigger cam would drive any better.

Key point here, power where you can use it - every time you leave a stop, or need to accelerate without downshifting or scaring the crap out of everyone.
Condensed this one some, but you get the idea this in not the best case for a daily driven car.
Didn't own it, but rode in it enough to know that it was too much cam.
I'm sure this one could be improved with a tune, but you get the point...
Another MS4 owner lays it out there, not the best choice for a daily driver because the tune is tougher to nail and the fuel economy goes to
Guessing you have an A4, but your dyno curve that starts at 3600rpm doesn't tell us much about the low end.
So it is not "well mannered" or "good driving", and lacks some low end, til about 4000 rpms?

Fastback302,

I hope you found the answers you were looking for. You asked about daily driving either of those cams, and got a lot of responses. Looks like we've established that the MS3/MS4 certainly can be daliy driven, but there are better choices out there. Good luck with your project!

And to those whom I quoted, I'm sorry if it seems like I'm picking on you. There are a lot of strong opinions in threads like this one, and the truth sometimes hurts. After we read between the lines, the picture becomes a little clearer.

When coupled with the right converter and gears, this cam flat out works in an A4 car. But if daily driven, the fuel economy is going to suck. In an M6 car, the difference comes down to the tune, and drivability is going to suffer if your tune isn't spot on.

Cam selection is all about compromise - without VVT, you just can't have your cake and eat it too.

 

Appearently you missed the part were I HAVE an MS4 in my car! There is a lot to be had in the tune, which is why I have EFIlive V2 on the way. A tune done by a tuner on a dyno is simply not enough to get the best out of a daily driving vehicle. By the way, mine starts right up as well, and idles around 750rpm when warm.

Though I plan on posting this in another thread if I can get the scanner to work, the cam made over 300ft/lbs of tq from 2,700rpm to 6,500rpm. That is on a conservative Mustang dyno by the way.

 

Well, I need a memory card for the scanner-which I do not have. Anyways, here are the numbers typed in.

RPM.......TQ.........HP

2700......300........160
2900......305........169
3100......315........190
3300......325........210
3500......335........230
3750......340........245
4200......345........275
4600......350........315
5000......360........345
5500......350........360
5850......335........375
6280......325........390
6500......315........400

Give or take 5 on these numbers. I was using the graph for these. Will get the dyno posted when I get the scanner to work. This is a cam only bolt on M6 car. I posted more lower rpm figures to give a better idea of what it looks like. The dyno starts at 2700rpm.

Like I said, the cam has a very nice torque curve. Mine does drive a little sloppy at <1,500rpm, but much of that is in the tune and M6. Not to mention street driving, even when I had the stock cam, was very rarely below 1,500rpm anyways.

 

I agree these cams are not for everyone but I just hate to stand idly by and watch all these fake horror stories about these grinds. I have never dealt with my car dying at a stop, nor have I had any problems with it not having enough power at low end. It still has good power down low just not as much as smaller ones, but why does it matter if your going to race then put it in a low gear, get the rpm's up, and stick your leg off in it. Ive done that so many times up against "smaller" grinds and handed them their ***. That is why it is going back in my forged engine.

 

Ryan know's his ****, if the car has a dead on tune, it's not that bad on a ms4. so if you got a tuner in your area that's good with our cars, I'd say go for it.

 

Wow this information is great! I am leaning both ways here! I would like to see cam only on stock heads graphs between the MS4 and the TR224 and the Pat g cam! That way I could easily identify how much the torque is sacrificed for top end power!

 

#'s and dyno's vary so much it would be hard choose based on the #'s unless it was same car, same dyno. You would be better off looking at the curve more than anything else, the #'s don't mean much.

 

This is how my MS4 idles. Stock tune, 25 degree day, fired up, and pulled it into the parkinglot next to my house. Like I said maybe I just got lucky with mine, but it doesnt buck or surge or anything. And has plenty of down low power.

 

The curve between the pat g and the MS4 seem to be pretty close from 3.5K
up to about 5500 where the MS4 starts to really shine putting down around 20hp more till redline! I really didn't get to see what these cars do below 3,000 but that is where you just drop a gear and let that clutch hold on for dear life! Again seems like torque and horsepower are pretty close until about 5.5K! I guess the reason one would choose the pat g over the MS4 is the everyday driving around 2k to 3k, I would assume would be much smoother! Am I getting close to understanding this?!?! The everyday driving range is more importnat to me than 20hp in the last 1000 to 1500 RPM's!

 

I have an MS3 in my car , you can daily drive this or the MS4. My car does take about 5 mins. to warm up. Once the O2 sensors are heated up and switching the car runs fine. It will load up sometimes, you just have to clear the motor. Like the post stated about down shifting and standing on it, these cams will pull hard from 4000 to 7000+ RPMS. I get good hiway milage with mine. They also work well on the bottle. I had a 224 and their is no comparison with the MS3. It all depends on what you want to do with the car.

 

Heres a Cam only graph from my BRE custom cam. Its overlays my bolt on graph so you can see where you pick up over a bolt on setup. Cam is 230* on the intake but differs from the others mentioned.

 

Im running the MS4 in a daily driver.. Ive rode in cars with them and there a little pesky at times, But Im not sure of its my friends tune..