Last night after dinner I was out with my buddy and we went down to a nearby auto shop and met up with a mutual friend of ours. He was working on swapping his fuel pump for his new LS1.

I was talking to him about my slow-@$$ L03 and about how I am looking for a 350 and he started telling me about one that he had for sale.

It's a 350, with 12# injectors, a comp cam (he said that it was the biggest possible cam he could put in that motor) and it's been completely rebuilt. It doesn't have heads on it, but he does have a Tuned Port intake that he would sell with it. It's been at the track a few times and ran consistant 13's. I'm pretty sure that he's telling me the truth because my buddy has seen him run in that motor before. It's got a little over 3,000 miles on it and he claims that it was well taken care of.

He offered to sell me the motor by itself (which he says he has $2000+ of work into) for $600. He also said that he would throw the TPI setup in with it for $1000 total.

Not to mention that I know that he would help me put it in.

I need opinions on this one guys... I have done very little research on TPI, I know that the wire harness has to be changed as well as the fuel pump... but I am still a newbie with TPI. Do you think that this is a good deal?

 

Screw the tuned port intake, it is not indicitive of performance. Infact tuned port and performance should never be used in the same sentence. Instead put some good heads and a carb on it you will be miles ahead for cheaper.

 

get the tunned port for the wiring harness.. then throw a miniram or superram ontop of some 195cc AFR heads with a 225/235ish cam.. if you can get 10:1.1'ish compression out of the buttom end you can run 12's all day long.. and get better fuel economy then a carb "gets flame retardant suite on"

 

I would if the car was not a daily driver in the summer months.

 

HUh? What does that have to do with anything.

 

A carbed motor that put out that kind of horsepower

a) Would not be even remotely fuel efficient

b) Would be difficult to depend on as a ride to work on those cold mornings.

 

I don't know what kind of horsepower your talking about because you never said. But since you are talking TPI horsepwer i will assume that your not talking about more then 300hp. If that is the case your completly wrong, it would be fuel effecient and would be very dependable if you can setup an electric choke. If you want to make more power, you are not doing it with TPI. TPI only makes power to 4500rpm. It is very hard to make alot of hp at that low of an rpm.

 

First you need to decide what your goals are. If you want it to be a really fast car but still be a daily driver then I would stay away from stock TPI and the carb. Like you mentioned the carb will not be near as good on gas as EFI even on it's best day. I would look at something along the lines of a superram or stealthram, or any aftermarket TPI. But once again, what are your plans for the car? What kind of HP are you looking at trying to get out of the car? If you just want a stock 350 just to have the power difference that it has over the 305 then go with the TPI.

 

you can stay with tpi the superram will support up to 575hp thats fully ported. or you can even use a miniram.. do some research on the intake manifolds avalable for fuel injection.

 

The superram and miniram are not TPI intake manifolds, but they will work with the TPI components and electronics.

 

Not exactly. I have seen many engines making 300-350HP with a carb that get into the low 20's on the highway. I dont think that in that HP range you could expect much better from EFI. As far as cold mornings you shouldnt blame that on your carb. As long as you have a choke and a good ignition system, you shouldnt have any problems in the cold weather. Most people who cant start in the cold blame it on a carb, when in reality it isnt.