If he's a diesel tech, he probably hasn't done many cam/valvespring swaps. Here's a link that both of you should read up on before you start. Lots of good tips in here. http://www.ls1howto.com/index.php?article=23 The article was written for an F-body, but almost all of it is the same for these trucks.

 

Just did mine this weekend, replaced the timing cover gasket ($26), water pump gaskets (2 of them, $4 each), and crank seal ($14, iirc). We did the air compressor hose in the spark plug hole to hold the valves up and the 3/8" wooden dowel to hold the lifters up. Since you have to pull the plugs, might as well replace those too, NGK TR55's.

 

^^^ All good advice here.

Off topic--how do you like that GT2-3?

 

na he does pretty good he works at the mine and is on a rebuild crew. but neways ya i just put new plugs in about 2 months ago same as you all mentioned so should be good there, i just gotta get all the gaskets i guess, then pray my lifters are still good haha. on the timing chain i figure ill change it if its warn, is one set better than another tho?

 

To be honest, it's pretty nuts. The truck pulls all the way to redline (6200 right now), and pulls harder 70 to 90 than it seemed to 30 to 50. I did a before dyno of 402/455 on a Dynojet with the outside temp at 108 (typical Houston summer, haha) but haven't got it on the rollers yet for an after. I am going to start a thread up about it, but haven't had time to scan the graph in yet, soon though.