Me personally in a 5.3 I would go with cam #4 listed above. Should be very well mannered, very streetable, and a nice gain across the board. ( I am guessing this cam is on a 114 lsa?)

You could do #1 but thats a pretty heavy exhaust bias, whats your exhaust setup? Non the less I feel 228 exhaust duration is a bit much for a stock headed 5.3

 

I would get it an 112 lsa. Love the choppy idle.

My exhaust now is just stock manifolds with cats removed and test pipe welded in that goes to a magnaflow turndown.

Appreciate you guys help!

 

i would say get some other supporting bolt-ons before a cam then. sounds like your just getting started into the performance. a good torque converter will cut more time than a cam. headers is a nice mod too

 

I can do it all at once. I work at a dealership and my tech can do it all in a day. I was planning on a a converter, cam, trans mods and headers all at once.

 

Cute, and yes we do talk, but contrary to what you may think I do have a few opinions of my own.

While yes you say you picked up 7/10's with your cam, but what size cam were you running before. What company ground it? How much did you drop switching to a better head though? And according to you it wasn't even that great of a head. Just an economical worked head the f-body guys like to use.

Yes it's true that the valves will stay open longer, at what point do you draw the line? Hell I have a flow chart of stock 5.3L heads where the CFM's actually dropped between .450 lift and .550 lift.


Check that out. You say that the valves will be open longer, but what's the point? Between .400 lift and .550 it gained 11 cfms. Between .450 and .550 it LOST flow. Do you really think you're going to notice a big difference between a cam with .530 lift and a cam with .580 lift?
The answer is no.

And if you argue that "how come the f-body guys run bigass cams with .600+ lift on stock heads?" It's because they're running massive duration cams in a light car with a 4000k converter or launching close to 4000 rpms with an m6.

Duration, lobe grind, LSA are the most important aspects for a cam WITH STOCK HEADS.

 

Ha I like this guy ^^

 

So how much difference is there in a tr220 and that 215/218?

 

Well what is the lsa going to be on that 215/218? If it matters to you it's not going to lope as hard as a 220/220.

It's hard to say the differences because a thunder racing 220/220 .551/.551 on 112 lsa may react differently than a 220/220 .551/.551 on 112 lsa ground by Comp Cams.

I would say that cam is close to comp's 216/220 as far as the specs are concerned. That 216/220 cam is great and a lot of people love it.

As you can see by the chart, the flow numbers increase at a greater rate on the exhaust side so that's why many people like running a larger exhaust duration.

In the end it's hard to say exactly how it's going to react in your truck. There are many variables. It looks like a pretty good medium sized cam and I bet you will like it.

 

Ok so the 215/218 it is. What stall? 3000?

 

haha a direct quote from hitmanX. i totally called it haha. is that chart from hitmans photobucket? i see yall share alot of the same thoughts. ill agree to disagree. i think lift=free HP to an extent, and it also gives room to grow if you ever step it up. i lost 7/10 going from the stock cam to my current cam on the stock 853 heads. i only lost 3/10 from the heads. the budget head comment was a joke cuz everyone on tech calls them budget heads but i picked up more than i expected. 5mph on top is a huge jump to me. so who is cutting times anywhere near bluecajun, v8, adrenaline or any of the vally boys with cams below .550 lift?

wheres sportside at? im kinda curious what he has to say about the subj.