Hey guys, I have a 1987 Trans am with a LB9 motor. I was wondering what heads would be good to make more power. I don't want to have to do any work to the bottom end. I'm going to be putting on a new exhaust system to replace my flowmaster catback. It'll consist of Heddman headers to a 2 1/2" X pipe out to 2 Dynomax Bullet Race mufflers (2 1/2" inlet and outlet). i also plan on porting the TPI base and runner along with changing out the cam. Basically i want to get more power out of it, any suggestions? Thanks

 

Factory Vortecs (milled down a little) are nice but you need a pricey new lower manifold to fit them and the EGR system won't function any more (and will probably throw a Check Engine light without deleting the EGR in the chip programming).

If you're going to do heads for a little 305 there aren't many performance choices out there, but Trick Flow did come out with a set of aluminum heads specifically for the 305 a few months back. They have the required bolt pattern and port locations so you could bolt your stock TPI system onto them and go.

Link: http://www.trickflow.com/product/che...3degree175.asp

Otherwise, get your stock heads professionally ported.

 

Except I'd leave out the "Otherwise".

I'd even go for home porting of your stock heads. Follow the Standard Abrasives Do-It-Yourself guidelines. If you're going to port your base (don't see any benefit or possibility of porting stock runners) and plenum you're already set up for doing the heads.

 

Hey thanks for the help guys.

 

I see some possibility in the runners. You aren't going to make them oversize, but clean up where the factory welded the tubes to the flange. This area has large weld bubbles hanging out of it. A dremel and an abrassive cutter make short work of these turbulence causing areas. My TPI setup is pulling over 5,000 rpm on my 305.