Cam for L92 Heads: Lessons Learned
Wow I forgot to answer *man*(lol). I clicked on this thread very randomly!
The car is a M6, 3:42. The cam was perfect, and it was a custom cam by Ed Curtis (godfather cam). Spec were 229/236 62x' 62x' IIRC. It was meant to go in my 5.7l block with stage 3 ported heads. The day of the install, the engine had a good knock. Decided to go with a used LS2 with ported/milled LS3 heads.
Drivability was great, power and torque were very very strong. Id get the same cam again if I ever rebuild a 5.7-6.0 . New Era did the work. The car is sold now. Never made it to the track or a dyno. New Era told me it was a good 460rwhp car. I did race car that were pretty strong in this hp rang and had the upper hand everytime So I feel the hp estimation was spot on. I had a 150 nitrous shot on top of that. Redline was 6700rpm. Shifting at 6500-6600. I used lunati linked lifters; I read to many failures because of lifters on LS forums.
The car was never tracked much because it had the stock rear end. My best mph before was around 116-117(crappy 2.4 0-60ft) and the guy who bought the car said it made 119 with serious shifting problem. The car needs a good rear end with real tires. The gearing wasnt great for the 1/4 anyway. No excuse, just stating the obvious. The car had a killer top end on the street though, which was the most important thing for me.
It had little to no surge, the stage 3 Monster clutch was making it worse. I could lug the car in 6th at very low speed; under 55mph!!
I didnt reread the whole thread, hope my post make sense.
The car is a M6, 3:42. The cam was perfect, and it was a custom cam by Ed Curtis (godfather cam). Spec were 229/236 62x' 62x' IIRC. It was meant to go in my 5.7l block with stage 3 ported heads. The day of the install, the engine had a good knock. Decided to go with a used LS2 with ported/milled LS3 heads.
Drivability was great, power and torque were very very strong. Id get the same cam again if I ever rebuild a 5.7-6.0 . New Era did the work. The car is sold now. Never made it to the track or a dyno. New Era told me it was a good 460rwhp car. I did race car that were pretty strong in this hp rang and had the upper hand everytime So I feel the hp estimation was spot on. I had a 150 nitrous shot on top of that. Redline was 6700rpm. Shifting at 6500-6600. I used lunati linked lifters; I read to many failures because of lifters on LS forums.
The car was never tracked much because it had the stock rear end. My best mph before was around 116-117(crappy 2.4 0-60ft) and the guy who bought the car said it made 119 with serious shifting problem. The car needs a good rear end with real tires. The gearing wasnt great for the 1/4 anyway. No excuse, just stating the obvious. The car had a killer top end on the street though, which was the most important thing for me.
It had little to no surge, the stage 3 Monster clutch was making it worse. I could lug the car in 6th at very low speed; under 55mph!!
I didnt reread the whole thread, hope my post make sense.
Last edited by Johnnystock; May 29, 2014 at 04:36 AM.
great thread and read ive read this twice now as im in process of picking a cam for my L76 auto my intentions are a streetable cam that will put down some respectable times and noted that some smaller cams for these are hitting 11s makes me pretty excited
anyone on here with the 216/218/217I cams have slip times i can refer to ,to help me pick a cam for my duties here in OZ thanks to everyone of u for ur input im truly apprectiative
anyone on here with the 216/218/217I cams have slip times i can refer to ,to help me pick a cam for my duties here in OZ thanks to everyone of u for ur input im truly apprectiative
Joined: Jul 2007
Posts: 1,500
Likes: 177
From: ELSA, South TEXAS (956) 802-7700
great thread and read ive read this twice now as im in process of picking a cam for my L76 auto my intentions are a streetable cam that will put down some respectable times and noted that some smaller cams for these are hitting 11s makes me pretty excited
anyone on here with the 216/218/217I cams have slip times i can refer to ,to help me pick a cam for my duties here in OZ thanks to everyone of u for ur input im truly apprectiative
anyone on here with the 216/218/217I cams have slip times i can refer to ,to help me pick a cam for my duties here in OZ thanks to everyone of u for ur input im truly apprectiative

I will go ahead and add to the thread. My L92 motor took a dump with rod knock. I was running ported L92 heads, stock 10.5:1 compression, TSP VVT3 camshaft with 231/239 @ 113 + 3, 1 3/4 x 1 7/8 stepped merge headers and ported throttle body and LS3 intake manifold. With an unlock Yank SS3200 stall made 469/421 unlocked on a Mustang dyno.
So now I am going to install a 415" short block and leave everything else the same except the camshaft. Patrick G had specked me a 236/242 @ 114 +3 cam with lift at .629"/.629". I have had a couple of other quotes with similiar results.
The interesting thing is when I run all these cams thought my Dynosim5 engine dyno simulator my existing 231/239 cam comes out the best. Only down 10hp at 6500 but higher eveywhere else with the highest being 34hp at 4500.
So now I am going to install a 415" short block and leave everything else the same except the camshaft. Patrick G had specked me a 236/242 @ 114 +3 cam with lift at .629"/.629". I have had a couple of other quotes with similiar results.
The interesting thing is when I run all these cams thought my Dynosim5 engine dyno simulator my existing 231/239 cam comes out the best. Only down 10hp at 6500 but higher eveywhere else with the highest being 34hp at 4500.
cheers i was gonna base my stall and gears to accomadate the cam i pick ty for your response both cams mentioned look very decent
Considering what you have done, these are fantastic numbers for your setup! Nice!
that's less than I was making with the previous 347 LS1.What is the minimum ICL/ECL to completely eliminate all bucking behavior within the cam design (without needing to find a competent tuner) and for OEM parking lot manners?
No need to fly cut an LS2 with this cam, recently fitted bigger CompCam 235 243 .620" .624" 113 to friends manual LS2.
ok im going to clear up my engine for better understanding here in Australia the L76 is the same as the U.S. L92 (sqaure port heads) same bore size and stroke (6litre) it comes standard with ls3 intake and 90mm throttlebody
LS2 has cathedral port heads ive seen my heads off theyre definately sqaure port heads
standard the L76 come with AFM/dod and are not vvt like some of ur truck L76s
now thats clear do u think this cam would clear in a L92
cheers for your input
The bore diameter is irrelevant to PTV as well. A bigger valve will reduce PTV the same regardless of whether it's atop a 4" bore or a 4.200" bore.
Minimum PTV isn't at max lift, it's usually within 10-15 degrees from TDC, so it has more to do with the lobe profile and centerlines than max lift.
The bore diameter is irrelevant to PTV as well. A bigger valve will reduce PTV the same regardless of whether it's atop a 4" bore or a 4.200" bore.
The bore diameter is irrelevant to PTV as well. A bigger valve will reduce PTV the same regardless of whether it's atop a 4" bore or a 4.200" bore.
Tappet lift @TDC I've found is the most relevant to P to V clearance as KCS said.
Do you guys find cam selection less critical with an automatic as the convertor absorbs some low end drivability fluctuations? My extra cubes will like the extra duration too I think.
Bortous's experiences are very interesting.
Re Ed Curtis- I emailed him for a cam recommendation and he said I have to order first then he will reveal what cam he sent me .... I am not comfortable with this idea, did you guys that bought Flowtech custom cams buy them this way?

Bortous's experiences are very interesting.
Re Ed Curtis- I emailed him for a cam recommendation and he said I have to order first then he will reveal what cam he sent me .... I am not comfortable with this idea, did you guys that bought Flowtech custom cams buy them this way?

I was satisfied and purchased and then specs were given.
He used a voodoo LX lobe on the intake a LHR lobe on the exhaust.
The LX lobe though is very harsh on the valvetrain and after a few years of normal driving with this cam my lifters failed and cam was rubbing on the block.
Now Im in the middle of a getting my engine fully rebuilt stroked to 408CI
a slightly larger cam using comps LSL lobes 223/231 .610 .617 111LSA+4 and retuning engine for pump e85.
I feel stroking the engine will bring my cnc ls3 heads and fast 102 to life.
There are a lot of threads claiming you need at least 400CI of displacement for the ls3 heads to have very high port velocity like the cathedral type heads.
Because the intake port is so damn big.
This might be true because since fitting ls3 heads on my LS2 the torque feels kind of airy and when you nail the throttle the torque is there, but it just doesn't feel as urgent or as brutal especially in the low end.
Will see what happens.
Any opinions or questions?
Cheers
That's a great post. What pcm you using? LS1-B. Do you have a COS like efilives COS-3? That can be useful.
When tuning cammed L92 headed engines with an e38pcm, I find airflow adjustment is the only thing that dials out surging that occurs normally between 1200~1600rpm. It has an electronic TB(90mm). The e38 has a setting called max idle area. It shows up at 1.82 stock. This equates to 18.8% throttle opening. So if you are idling over the airflow correction may pull it back to 14% to obtain correct idle but as soon as you apply throttle to drive it-18.8% is the minimum throttle opening and hence minimum amount of airflow. So if we are applying 3% Pedal at cruise our total TP% is 18.8%+Pedal Percentage(3%) So that is 21.8% Total throttle.
If we reduce max idle area gradually until it drops to around 17%, You will notice at the same speeds with the same 3% pedal added(Total of 20%) The surging will be completely gone.
So in this case if there is to much airflow passing at low rpm surging will occur and reducing max idle area will fix the problem.
Having said that, Auto cars have Max Idle area 1 and Max idle area 2. Once Drive is selected it defaults to Max idle area 2, which has a crazy high figure of 3.0. This means when driving with only 3% pedal applied there may be a total percentage of over 25%! Surge city! The factory settings may be fine for a stock like camshaft with little reversion but with a camshaft starting to approach 0 degrees overlap @ 0.050" lift reversion starts to set in.
I have no dyno figures for you, but I have a 218/224/112+0 cam(.605",.601") xfi lobes in a L92 6.0L and it works awesome power hits hard, It is very aggressive when you want it to be and pulls from idle to 6600rpm and gets great economy. Sonny from Marranos spent $40000 dollars testing camshafts in aussie delivered L98s(6L with L92 heads and LS3 intake) and he told me he gets the best results with xfi lobes with L92 heads with small intake durations.
He told me the 218/224/112 cam is his favorite. I specced it up myself last year and I posted it on LS1.com.au in my sig and he asked me how it was going and that he had great real world results with this cam. Combined with SD tune and OTR intake and comp bump to 10.8:1 lets just say my brand new falken tyres are not looking good after only 3000kms, and I dont dump the clutch lol.
He also uses a 210 218 xfi cam and this cam is a stump puller.
He has been getting big power with the 224 230 112 and 114 cams on xfi lobes. I would like to try this too.
When tuning cammed L92 headed engines with an e38pcm, I find airflow adjustment is the only thing that dials out surging that occurs normally between 1200~1600rpm. It has an electronic TB(90mm). The e38 has a setting called max idle area. It shows up at 1.82 stock. This equates to 18.8% throttle opening. So if you are idling over the airflow correction may pull it back to 14% to obtain correct idle but as soon as you apply throttle to drive it-18.8% is the minimum throttle opening and hence minimum amount of airflow. So if we are applying 3% Pedal at cruise our total TP% is 18.8%+Pedal Percentage(3%) So that is 21.8% Total throttle.
If we reduce max idle area gradually until it drops to around 17%, You will notice at the same speeds with the same 3% pedal added(Total of 20%) The surging will be completely gone.
So in this case if there is to much airflow passing at low rpm surging will occur and reducing max idle area will fix the problem.
Having said that, Auto cars have Max Idle area 1 and Max idle area 2. Once Drive is selected it defaults to Max idle area 2, which has a crazy high figure of 3.0. This means when driving with only 3% pedal applied there may be a total percentage of over 25%! Surge city! The factory settings may be fine for a stock like camshaft with little reversion but with a camshaft starting to approach 0 degrees overlap @ 0.050" lift reversion starts to set in.
I have no dyno figures for you, but I have a 218/224/112+0 cam(.605",.601") xfi lobes in a L92 6.0L and it works awesome power hits hard, It is very aggressive when you want it to be and pulls from idle to 6600rpm and gets great economy. Sonny from Marranos spent $40000 dollars testing camshafts in aussie delivered L98s(6L with L92 heads and LS3 intake) and he told me he gets the best results with xfi lobes with L92 heads with small intake durations.
He told me the 218/224/112 cam is his favorite. I specced it up myself last year and I posted it on LS1.com.au in my sig and he asked me how it was going and that he had great real world results with this cam. Combined with SD tune and OTR intake and comp bump to 10.8:1 lets just say my brand new falken tyres are not looking good after only 3000kms, and I dont dump the clutch lol.
He also uses a 210 218 xfi cam and this cam is a stump puller.
He has been getting big power with the 224 230 112 and 114 cams on xfi lobes. I would like to try this too.
I am currently doing a 408CI stroker for my ls2 which has cnc ls3 heads with 60 thou shaved off and a fast 102mm manifold and also running e85.
Compression will be around 13:1 if not a little more.
I was going to use that exact cam you specified a 224/230 112lsa however using the newer comp LSL lobes.
In the end I went with something similar as I need a little extra overlap to bleed off some compression.
a 223/231 111LSA camshaft on LSL lobes which has 5 degress overlap versus 3 degrees with the 224/230 cam.
This should be a stump puller too.
Your thoughts on this please?
FWIW, overlap does not bleed off compression. The compression stroke is after the intake stroke, which is after the overlap phase. You want a later IVC point to bleed off compression at lower RPM.












