kgkern01

iTrader: (10)

So I want to get more power out of my LT1 (it never stops haha). My current setup is 12.5:1 385, AFR comp 210’s, LE ported LT4 intake, custom 243/251 .614/.621 hydraulic cam. The car is only driven occasionally on the street, and also autox and probably getting into road racing next year. I am thinking of going solid roller to get more power out of the setup. How much could I realistically expect to gain going to a solid roller setup over the hydraulic roller?

Nostang

iTrader: (4)

IMO, not worth it over your current setup. You would have to go to a ~260/270 @.050 as a solid roller to gain a little of your current cam. You might gain 20hp and 20 ft lbs with a solid but you would need to replace the springs/lifters/cam/shaft mount rockers which would end up being $2500 for ~20hp with more maintenance. You would also need to rev higher to get the true benefits of a solid roller so you would need a pcm capable of turning higher than 7k rpms.

SS RRR

iTrader: (2)

As it's been said before, how much are you wanting to spend and what cam profile you want to go with. My experience is I had a SR cam that was slightly more aggressive than your current HR. It was a CamMotion in the 248/250 .650/.610 112LSA range. It was perfect for a stock PCM because of the ~7000rpm limitation it has and it peaked at 6800rpm. Ran a best of 11.22 @ 122.6mph with a 1.55 60' and 3750lb race weight. Probably could've improved that if I would have opted for aftermarket ported heads. For this setup (and every other one) I've always used ported LT4 heads.
IMO If you go more aggressive you will want shaft mount rockers and a stand alone ignition system. Within the last 10 years there have been some great improvements on HR cams with aggressive lobes. May want to talk with some different shops and see what's out there, or someone here may chime in...

StealthFormula

iTrader: (35)

I can't blame you for wanting more and I've got nothing against going SR, but I vote no. The cost of swapping over to SR for the gains you will get will result in a shitty hp/$$ ratio. If you were starting a build from scratch and didn't already have a stout setup then yeah why not. Since you mentioned doing some auto x and road racing next year, I'd advise spending the coin elsewhere. I'm not sure what's all done to your car but I'd spend the money on a Watts link, C5Z or CTS-V brake upgrade, sticky tires, things of that nature. FWIW, definitely try out the road racing, makes drag racing look silly, best thing I ever did. The only downside is that it's real hard on the wallet.

kgkern01

iTrader: (10)

Thanks for the feedback! So it sounds like it’s not really worth it to go SR over what I have now then? That being said what can I do to further optimize my existing setup? I’ve already switched the valve springs on the AFR’s when I installed them to some Nextek .650 beehives over the heavy dual springs they came with. I was thinking then the only things left to improve is LS coil setup for ignition, a good dyno tune, anything else? Is there anything to be improved over the LS7 lifters? I haven’t taken it to a 1/4 mike track, but I’d like to be able to run 125+ mph with it.

With the autox/RR suspension setup, I’ve already done C5 brakes, Watts Link, full suspension, I’ve autox for years but I’m ready to step up to the track.

kingtal0n

iTrader: (1)

If I have a solid roller, it is from a sponsor, to compete in events and win.

We use miles per event to determine total number of miles, then convert to rotations of the engine. The number of rotations of an engine determines what kind of solid roller it will be: one that goes 5,000 miles or 20,000 miles or 50k or 100k etc...

If I am only going 5000 miles then the cam/guide/spring/etc can fail after only so many revolutions- it means I can use a stronger spring, and more lift, and make more power, at the cost of the life of those components. If we increase the number of miles per event- say now it needs to go 50k miles, we have to reduce the spring pressure for the cam/lifters/guides/etc to live that long of a life (if we look at that many revolutions total). It puts a cap on lift, ramp rate, things that you are trying to take advantage of in the first place by using a solid roller. This is why solid roller is typically associated with those short-life engines that break records and win that one or few races then parts need to be changed. It also breaks the hydraulic barrier allowing use of even higher rpms, which is still a quality represented best by short-lived, race winning engines. They do it for money or fame, but to do it on your own personal engine for any other reason seems useless.

StealthFormula

iTrader: (35)

You have a pretty bad *** setup, I def feel that it has the potential to trap 125 in the 1/4 with your 6-speed.

The LS7 lifters aren’t the best lifters out there but I run them in my LT1 just fine also. You will only see a hp benefit from a lifter change if the current lifters aren’t allowing the valves to do what the cam lobes want them to do. When I cammed my Vette I passed on the LS7s and went with some Morels but I have no idea if my setup or yours will see any benefit from a better lifter from a power perspective. If you do change the lifters keep in mind the pushrod length may change and I would use that opportunity to run the thickest diameter pushrods that you can fit. A thicker outside diameter pushrod will improve high rpm valvetrain stability. Could make a couple more hp there potentially if you’re using 5/16” pushrods now but similar to the lifters there’s no guarantee in a power gain because everything could be just fine as it is.

I am not sure what your intake tract looks like but a monoblade TB is a thought I have. Maybe a C5Z MAF (larger diameter than LT1 MAF and no screen). If you have a traditional CAI I would do an LS1 lid setup or LT1 Ram Air setup. You could also consider going speed density but the additional tuning required may not be worth the marginal potential gains.

SS RRR

iTrader: (2)

I've been running LS7's now for a year with no issue.

LOL "We" who?

NewOrleansLT1

OP, Lloyd specd that same cam for me and I’m going with the same heads.. Have your car been on the dyno? How much power does it make?

kgkern01

iTrader: (10)

I haven’t dyno tuned it yet, so I’m not sure what it’s making and there may be more in it with a good dyno tune. It definitely doesn’t like low RPM cruising on the highway, bucks a bit, almost feels like a random miss, but smoothed out over 2500 RPM, not sure if that’s the size of the cam, ignition, or the tune?

StealthFormula

iTrader: (35)

It’s the overlap in the cam that is causing that. The surging/bucking can be tuned out to a degree with some time spent datalogging and street tuning; however, a cam of this size will always exhibit surging no matter how much time is spent on the tune. It’s definitely worth working on in my opinion because it may be possible to limit the bucking to a smaller or lower rpm window than now but it’s going to require someone who truly knows what they are doing and some time. Most dyno tuners take our money and quickly tune the cars for WOT (which is super easy) and for idle and screw us on the low speed drivability part since they don’t want to spend the time or they aren’t as good as they portray themselves to be which is total BS so be selective in who you choose if you go that route. I’m dealing with something similar right now, I think buying the software and learning to tune is the right answer despite it being an uphill battle at first.

CamOnlyJabroni

I am running high tech stainless 1.7 rockers with mid level Morel lifters 480ish dollars, still running Patriot Extreme Gold .660 dual springs, Manley push rods and a cammotion LLSR. Valves haven’t came out of adjustment and screams. Call and talk to Kip. Since I already had killer roller rockers, I spent a additional 8-900 bucks for the lifters and Cam. Not including gaskets small things. If it is not a daily driver for me, will never put a hydraulic cam in a car again. Obviously wouldn’t jack around with putting one in the new DI motors. Oil pressure seems to be more stable as well at high rpm.

Below is a video from last last year with my newly installed .629 .637 244/254 110+4 LLSR from cammotion. Car has 185cc LPE hand ported Stock castings. Getting Tony Mamo comp ported afr LT4 210’s and port matched edelbrock intake now. Can’t wait to feel the difference. Should gain quite a bit adding 40-50cfm at .600+ lift. Going up close to 13:1 compression.

SS RRR

iTrader: (2)

With that setup you and I would've been a good race with my last motor.

CamOnlyJabroni

Yea cars are geared the same with a similar cam and heads. Just decided to never get rid of the car so trying to add some more go juice.

LLLosingit

iTrader: (4)

You couldn't be more wrong...as usual.
The reason hydraulic lifters are preferred over solids lifters on production vehicles or daily driven street strip vehicles is the amount of regular maintenance needed to keep then adjusted and the amount of noise they can generate.
There is nothing wrong with solid lifters on a daily driven vehicle as long as you regularly check the lash and you still can see the advantages even in a non race engine, They can last the long life of a street engine as long as they aren't overlooked during regular maintenance.

Hydraulic lifters have come a long way but for a race engine they still aren't as durable as they need to be so in most cases they have no other choice.

kingtal0n

iTrader: (1)

I gave an example of a 200k mile solid roller so I dont know where you get off thinking I said anything about limiting mileage.

In racing applications where you only have to go 500 laps it doesnt make sense to install a 200k mile solid roller profile. lrn2read?

LLLosingit

iTrader: (4)

I read it alright and still stand by my reply, You said "This is why solid roller is typically associated with those short-life engines that break records and win that one or few races then parts need to be changed. It also breaks the hydraulic barrier allowing use of even higher rpms, which is still a quality represented best by short-lived, race winning engines. They do it for money or fame, but to do it on your own personal engine for any other reason seems useless. "
I pointed out that solid lifters work just fine on the street for the life of the engine as long as they are maintained and that would include springs and it's not useless on a street engine as you stated.

SS RRR

iTrader: (2)

Yeah I think kingtal0n was a little high on that last reply.
It all depends on the application and what the owner wants as to whether it is "useless." Seems like an unqualified opinion to me. The novelty of having an SR in a street motor along with the valvetrain noise is what I liked about it when I first did mine, but I didn't pay enough attention to those things which needed it and ended up paying dearly. The best part about the SR is I could pull a Nebraska Oak out of the ground in February somewhere in Antarctica at less than 1200rpm. The car was an absolute blast to drive whether it was with 3.73 gears or 4.56's. If the right amount of money is spent and is done correctly and the proper maintenance is done it is well worth the cost.

kingtal0n

iTrader: (1)

To turn your own personal engine into 500-lap life engine would be useless, and it is. A solid roller can do that if you let. You don't NEED to let it, but it could. And if you did it to win a race, that is important for a career, maybe it was worth it.

As usual I am showing both sides, of course if there are two sides and I am using both you can disagree with either side and still be learning. The "left" side of graph shows short-life engines used for racing that are dismantled whether they fail or not at each race, or even during a race, etc... and on the "right" side is the ultra-long life 1,000,000 mile engine whos owner either had to do nothing with the perfect oem hydraulic lifter or apparently needed to adjust the valvetrain every 50k-(X)90k because solid roller. It gives us experimental data for statistically relevant calculations, if we can figure out some useful comparison equations.

SS RRR

iTrader: (2)

lol... it takes all kinds. still awaiting who this "we" is that gathers all this data for you to read this "ejumikated."
Wasn't it you who recently had trouble figuring out which was a power and which was a torque curve on a dynograph? Why yes. Yes it was.