I'd be pretty tempted to try a set of E-tecs, I hear they perform very well!

 

heck yea its alot of work... and money. im runnin a lil under 300 hp rite now(estimated) all my friends are runnin about 400 hp. id like to be up sumwhere around them... but i know id be bustin major bucks to do it. could i run a cam and rebuild my heads without all the intake stuff? if i could bypass all the intake work... how much power would the rebuilt heads and cam give me?

 

You could do a computer friendly cam, and maybe see around 325-350HP, my suggestion would be a small cam (of course bigger than what you have) and maybe a Vortech supercharger use the FMU to make up for the lack of intake manifold options.

 

is that 350hp with a dyno tune and rebuilding the heads? could i get more power if i swapped the 170cc etecs or the iron heads Hog mentioned earlier and used a comp. friendly cam?

 

heads won't do any good without a matching cam, and if your keeping the stock intake manifold, you won't be making full use of either of those heads with the cam you would be using. just my opinion. The factory intake really blows haha

 

I realize most of you may have seen this thread about teh Voretc 350 marine intake manifold setup. There is lots of info about using a carb intake and plumbing the intake with custom fuel rails etc.

There is even a drill bit tool that cuts the injector bungs in the manifold if you want.
the link has info on the different injector connectors and where to get them. I am usingteh LS2/LS7 style USCAR injector connectors.

As far as wiring, there are 16 splices that must be made in the factory injector harness to wire the squirters up.
the rest of the existing sensors should be able to be installed in some sort of arrangement on a carb style Vortec intake manifold.

In converting a carb intake to work as a Vortec EFI intake, there is a bit of fab work that must be undertaken. This is the main reason I chose the marine intake, its a complete setup, that was designed by GM.
Also the marine intake:
1. allows Vortec style air intake systems to be used as well as L31 Vortec 350 truck superchargers.
2. Allows the use of the stock throttle body therefore cruise control and throttle cablescan be used.
3. Looks almost stock
4. Has much more plenum volume than stock.
5. No airflow restrictions like the stock L31 truck intake does.
6. Allows any sized injectors to be used.
7. Allready has an integral fuel rail/fuel regulator assembly.


if you do choose to do a Vortec carb intake to EFI conversion, you may want o look at getting some LT1 fuel rails/reglator and fabbing them to fit.

Then there is always the Ramjet 350 intake manifold. It has shorter runers than the Marine intake and less pleum volume, but is all aluminum where as teh marine intake has an iron lower and aluminum upper(stock L31 truck is alum. lower and plastic upper).

Another good thing about the marine intake is its iron lower plenum, whiule it is heavy, it is the same material as the Vortec heads. This means that as teh engine warms up, both teh intake AND the ehads expand at teh same rate thus not having the intake mnaifold gaskets go into a state of shear stress.

the Bowtie Vortec ehads are available in both 175 cc smallport and 207cc intake port largeport designs. the largeports do have a D shaped exhaust port though.

the ETECs are available in 170cc and 200cc intake runner volumes. If I were looking at an aluminum head with teh Vortec raised runner desgin, I owuld go ETEC 200 or Bowtie small or largeport iron, or teh FAstburn 210cc GMPP aluminum cylinder head. The Fastburns also have a D shaped exhaust port which requires either a 1 3/4" or larger primary tube header to seal overtghe D port, or D port headers or a set of headers that has been welded up and then contored for the D port.

James B is running the ETEC 200's on his GMPP 383/Whipple/marine intake setup.
I would really like to see someone take an edelbrock Vortec RPM Airgap intake
manifold converted for use on an EFI Vortec 350.. With cam and exhaust, that would be a killer setup.

I for sure noticed increased power from 3500rpm to 5800 rpm with my marine intake and I find it hard to find traction now. The styock L31 truck intake is a horrble design. GM should have used it in teh boats and used teh marine intake in teh trucks inthe 1st place.

goodluck

peace
Hog

 

How much work would be involved in turning one of those manifolds into an EFI set up? I know the manifolds themselves are cheap enough. Could almost any performance shop drill out the spots for the injectors? I would really like to get some performance mods going that I could transfer over to another small block easily if I upgrade later. If I could get one of these things goin for cheaper then the Ram Jet manifold then sign me up.

-Rob Nap

 

Thanks for the info Hog I'm RamAirZ over on the pacificp board and hadn't gotyten around to grabbing all the info from there about the wiring etc

 

seriously... the marine intake sounds like a much better decision. how much did converting the marine intake cost overall... and i cant use my stock injectors right?

 

Nope, you would need new injectors. I had a marine setup awhile back. They get pretty expensive though, but not anymore than the carbed intake would end up costing. Check out pacificp, they have EVERYTHING you need to swap it listed over there