Newbomb Turk
Well-Known Member
I get that. Just because it’s being done doesn’t mean it’s good.
Is the OP buying a cam or using what he has?
Now I have to go look…
.480/230 cam in an 8.5 CR 360?
- Thread starter fshd4it
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I get that. Just because it’s being done doesn’t mean it’s good.
Is the OP buying a cam or using what he has?
Now I have to go look…
Pretty sure it's what he has already.
Newbomb Turk
Well-Known Member
Yeah, he does. I had to go look again.
That’s a ton of timing for that compression.
I’d buy something else. But that’s me.
junkyardhero
Well-Known Member
don't let perfect be the enemy of good enough. you want every last drop of performance? then splash the cash and build that ricky racer motor. otherwise knock it fwd a few degrees and ship that mother trucker.
it'll be fffiiiinnnneee.
it'll be fffiiiinnnneee.
It just will not work! Call any cam mfg. and ask them. He would be much better off just using a stock 318 cam. I'll bet he could get one on here for free + shipping. You are giving the man the wrong info.
Newbomb Turk
Well-Known Member
I’m convinced it will run relatively well.
But this forum and multiple others are FULL of guys complaining about “soft bottom end” and things like that.
It’s rampant.
I’m not a Freiberger type who thinks just getting it running is the cats ***. It may be if you are building multiple cars for a tv channel, but for something you want to drive and not keep screwing with you fix it.
In the grand scheme of things a change of cams is relatively inexpensive. It’s far cheaper than trying to get the compression up.
I don’t step over donuts to grab a dog turd, isn’t my way.
Just because you have something doesn’t make it worth using.
Next up, the OP will need a different converter and more gear to get it correct.
I looked at what rolling the cam to a 103 ICL. The overlap triangle gets murdered.
You can do it, but if the OP found something with 10 less degrees duration and put the LSA at 106 he’d be far better off IMO.
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Richard Holdener basically say same thing from all of the dyno runs he's done the curve is gonna be pretty much the same just it's gonna be a little higher or lower overall depending on the cr.
.5 cr ain't gonna make much difference.
I don't disagree with any of your points. That said, the fact is, we could pick apart one of your builds and point to where you could get more power. You always leave something on the table with every single build. I'm not advocating inefficient builds here, I'm simply saying there's nothing wrong with using what's there and building and tuning it to be optimal for what it is. That's kinda what we do with all builds anyway.
BSB67
Well-Known Member
He said budget was not the issue. He has a quality core and good lifters. I personally will never run a new hydraulic flat tappet cam, unless I had what he has. There is no sound reason to stay with that cam as ground.
For his application, keeping that cam is nothing more than polishing a turd.
For his application, keeping that cam is nothing more than polishing a turd.
OldmanRick
Well-Known Member
I doubt the OP is looking for a street killer with his 65'. His original setup with a little bit of cam advance, and a good tune will make a nice street cruiser that sounds good. And probably run some 14's if he really feels the need to lean on it.
Yep, i'm one of the old guys that have made something like this work...
Yep, i'm one of the old guys that have made something like this work...
I wouldn't go that far, but I agree there are "better" grinds to be had.
Newbomb Turk
Well-Known Member
I agree. But I’m not asking for opinions.
I gave him mine. Get the colored t cam and stop using bad hacks to fix issues.
Selecting the correct cam the first time is always cheaper.
I’m patiently waiting for the thread where the converter is too tight and it’s still sloppy down low.
I’m not a prophet but I’ve seen this before.
And the OP can fix it relatively painlessly if he wants to.
Or he can cut a corner.
Edit: there is a few guys I listen to about power on here. It ain’t many though.
Well. I go mow the yard and all sorts of things happen. I may not have made it clear before, but I found the 70cc J heads on the motor are worn out. They were when I put them on there, I just didn't know or care how badly. So the original 1.88" 596s are going back on. They've been cut, so at 63-64 cc, I'm ging to end up around 9-9.2:1, depending on whether I use 8553 or 1008 gaskets (according to the 2 calculators I used). I don't expect perfect, I'm not looking for every tenth... but I respect those that do. None of my rigs will ever see a track (at least not while I own them), and I do want to get this thing reassembled and back in the car. Sure, the converter's probably wrong... or maybe not, as I've never checked the stall on it. 2k was kind of a guess. More gear? You bet. There's a 3.91 741 chunk ready to go in. I don't see them as cruising gears, so the 518 that's sitting against the wall will need to be installed to compensate for that... but as I just stuck one in my '77 D150 2 months ago, I'm a bit burned out on that process. Anyway, I'm not trying to be a dick. I appreciate everybody's (yes, everybody's) input, it has been educational. And if it's not exactly right, I can live with that.
Maybe. lol
If it were me I'd put a Hughes Whiplash in it and let'er rip.
Increasing CR one point from 8.5 will produce more HP than increasing HP one point when at 11.5.
With this cam, the power increase is hardly going to be felt through the mid range to whatever the top end will be. Where it will be felt is in better idle quality, more vacuum & more 'snap' when you punch the throttle.
With this cam, the power increase is hardly going to be felt through the mid range to whatever the top end will be. Where it will be felt is in better idle quality, more vacuum & more 'snap' when you punch the throttle.
AJ/FormS
68 Formua-S fastback clone 367/A833/GVod/3.55s
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No IMO that's backwards. But it depends.
Start with:
what do you want this car to do? and
what octane gas are you willing to pay for?
Ok well since I have been paged and missed it, and since you're willing to set a spell; here goes, Firstly I like that cam.
If you want all the power that cam is capable of making,
that's a different build than trynta get a heavy car moving with 3.23s and a lo-stall, which is a different build if your going for fuel economy.
And in most cases, once the build is chosen, you may not be able to alter the course of the build, without making multiple changes.
Depending on the engine displacement, every degree of Intake Center Angle change, can make between 1.2 and maybe 1.8 psi change in cylinder pressure, and it matters not if the change is due to installing a different cam or, if due to retiming the cam, the results are the same.
If you choose the right cam in the first place, then you won't need to advance the cam. When you change the cam-timing on the intake side, this drags all the other timing events along with it, which is usually a bad thing.
After you subtract the intake and exhaust durations from the total time available (in degrees) , you are left with a number which is all that is available for compression Plus power.. So you have to share that number between them. If you give more to compression, in the quest for cylinder pressure, then you will have less available for power. and vice versa. Less power duration means that some work is sacrificed and goes right out the tailpipes, costing you low speed power and fuel economy. If the power cycle gets to be too long, the piston ends up pumping the exhaust out, costing you torque and you guessed it, fuel economy. So with a single-pattern cam, you do not want to give too much to the compression cycle; it is better to just start with a higher compression ratio.
Another thing that happens when the cam timing is changed is that the overlap cycle gets moved. With a single pattern cam, you can easily destroy it's effectiveness, by moving too far. However, if you do not have headers, this is no big deal cuz with log-manifolds the overlap cycle doesn't contribute much if anything anyway.
The thing about cams is that, most FTH cams have been rated for decades at 050, so cams with similar 050 intake durations will make similar power. But that don't mean they will perform the same. The clearance ramps can be fast or slow and that is gonna affect both how they idle, and how bad they waste fuel at low-rpm.
So, I mean, there is a ton of stuff going on in every cam-grind.
Your cam for instance, by the 050specs, has just 12* of overlap. That doesn't sound like much, but in fact is a lot, because overlap is actually working a lot longer than that. We really need to look at the advertised numbers to get a better idea.
Say your 230/230/109 cam specs out at .008 tappet rise of 274/274/109. Now the overlap is rated at 56* which is a lot. But if you slam the exhaust valve down too early, or the intake opens late, then you are effectively reducing the TIME, available for the overlap cycle to do it's job, which reduces absolute power. So if yur going for power, with headers, you gotta keep this in mind.
Sure you can advance a too big cam to build cylinder pressure, but at the expense of every other "stroke", but IMO that's not what you want to do; instead just put the pressure up where it belongs. Yeah it will cost you a good chunk of change, but it might save you buying a convertor and gears, be more drivable, and with increased fuel-economy.
And you know, tapping the gas pedal, to get a lil tire noise while exiting the burgerstand is always cool, right. Well, a tap on a 8.5 engine at 135psi, gets you nothing but maybe embarrassed.
If you know the exact compression ratio of your engine, and you have decided what octane gas you want to burn, then you can optimize your ICA to build peak pressure, and then just dial in the rest of your cam specs, according to your usage, and thus you will have the perfect cam for your combo. If you engineer it this way with the right quench, then you will have the option of going at least one and maybe two sizes bigger, at a later date.
But if you stick that 230* cam in with a 61* Ica into an 8.5 engine, the pressure is predicted to be down at 134 psi, which, at sub 3500, would be a bit of a dog, and with 3.23s and a lo-stall, that means until about 32 mph. and there ain't darn thing you can do about it. But worse is that you got no where to go but down in cam-sizes. Every bigger cam with a later closing ICA will make even less pressure.
If you advance that cam 8 degrees, stealing them from the power stroke, the pressure is predicted to rise to 144, which is still a dog; AND now your wasting energy right out the exhaust.
But if you increase the Scr to ~10/1, the pressure rises to 165, and now your power stroke is back on line, still with an Ica of 61*.
Now, far be it from me to tell you what to do,
but I can tell you what I wouldn't do,
which is, that notta chance would I install that cam in an 8.5 engine, in your combo.
If you do, I can almost guarantee that a 3500 stall and at least 3.91s are in your future, as bandaids for lack of cylinder pressure, and guess how many miles per tank that car is gonna roll. Not many, and with the price of gas going up nearly every hour, it's only gonna get worse.
Well I mean unless yur just gonna idle it around.
BTW
at 134 psi, a 360 will feel like somewhere between a hi-compression 318LA and a 5.2Magnum; until the cam wakes up.............. you know, about 32 mph in your combo.
So what's my opinion?
Well for that cam, here's my plan;
closed chamber iron heads, and a compression ratio boost to close to at least 9.8/1 @.040Q, is what I'd target; plus headers for sure, a free-flowing dual exhaust, and the finishing touch would be a 2800 convertor; I love those things.
With 162 psi @040Quench on tap, I'm all set for up to two cam sizes bigger, ending around 153psi, with no other changes. Advance that biggest cam(say 242@050) to in at 64*, and the pressure is predicted to rise to 157psi, Badaboom!
Pressure makes heat, which makes torque and power.
Oh just in case you don't know it, bigger cams move the power up, to a higher rpm; meaning a higher roadspeed. Each bigger cam is about 200 rpm.
To maintain mid-rpm performance after the stall is done, You can bet each bigger cam size will want a gear change of ~5%, to get the roadspeed back in check. Your lo-stalled 230* cam already wants 3.73s. Next cam will like 3.91s and next is 4.11s
If you don't regear it, the power peak will climb ever higher in roadspeed about 3 to 4 mph per cam. This really only makes a difference, if yur looking for zero-to sixty performance.
For hiway economy, that 230 single pattern is a bit of a pouch , and the slower you try to run it, the worse it's gonna get. With 3.23s she's gonna go down the road at about 65=2600, about as slow as you want to go. As the rpm goes down, the engine loses timing, and fuel economy takes a dive for lack of it; and the lower your cylinder pressure is the worse it's gonna be. But at 2600 it is still possible to get about 50 degrees of cruize-timing with only a little trouble. So with that cam, I wouldn't run any less gear.
Btw, I have over 12 years experience with a Hughes 230/237/110 FTH cam, advertised at 276/286 and lifts of .549/.571.. It's been retimed a couple of times and I've lost track of where it is today, possibly straight up. I have lots of pressure at 11/1 Scr, so I've run a lotta rear gears from 3.23s to 5.38s, plus all three A833s plus the od model, plus the GVod behind all but one of them. What I can tell you about all that is this 195 psi (alloy heads) is infinitely better than 177,, no comparison. and once you driven 195psi, yur never ever going back to paltry numbers like 134, no offense. 177 was hard enough for me to get used to.
That's only a difference of 10%, same as from 134 to 146 with iron heads. Imagine banging that 134psi up to 160! an increase of over 19%.
Yeah so, these are my opinions
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One of my fellow FABO members, IIRC mentioned running a 360 2bbl cam. IIRC those are 252/260/112 cams. With an Ica of 56*,
at 8.5 Scr this might make 140 psi. runs of anything.
At 9.4 it climbs to 160psi, about the highest for 89 gas.
At 9.6 to 164 about the highest you can run on 91 gas.
Any of these will feel way stronger down low to past 3500 even, than that 230 cam @8.5Scr ........ and the fuel economy will eclipse the 230, but you know it's gonna power peak at around 4400, so the 1-2 shift is gonna need to be around 5000. Headers are still preferred, but not that big a deal cuz this cam only has 32* overlap. But I'd still hit her with the 2800
Yeah I know, I think he actually said 318 cam; but there goes another 400 rpm, lol and honestly, the 318 cam has a power stroke that is way bigger than it needs to be ........ but
I have installed one in a 340 with early 318heads and that was a funtastic lil engine. I drove it like that for two years, until the trans burned up. Over 200 psi, Yeehaw! back in the 70s when we still had gas for that.
Fantastic fuel-economy too.
I approve this combo.
even in a 360, maybe even a couple of degrees retarded.
Ok no, I changed my mind. nobody will believe you when you say 318 top-end.
Anyway, Ima getting sleepy finally, so TTYL.
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Geez.
No, he has it right.
Actually in the beginning I said a stock 340 cam then just to kick them in the pants I said the 318 cam. I owned a couple of 1979 Chrysler 300's. They came with the 340 cams dual exhaust ect. They sounded great, had a little power but overall they were dogs. One of them I rebuilt and the final comp. came out at 10.3 and I still used the stock cam. Night and day from idle to 5500. Cylinder pressure is what's it all about. I always tell people it's the combination of what works sometimes not just you have. I've used that 230 cam also many times in my 340's it likes 10.5 or higher and in a 4 speed with 4.10's or auto's with a min. 3500 conv. With todays cams out there I just would not use it at all. I used to use the 68 340 stick cams with crane 1.6 rockers in a lot of cars, that was a great cam. But it still needed 9.5 to 1.
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