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I dont have much experience but I would say getting 500+ hp out of either one for 3-5 grand would be hard unless you already had one or the other. Dollar for the dollar I would say a LS motor would be much easier to get to that range. But then you have the added cost of everything needed to put one in our cars. Not to mention other upgrades such as rear end, trans, etc needed to support motors when approaching those power levels.

 

why do you "want 500HP" ?

Do you want that 500HP to be street friendly? Or, is this strictly for the track?

 

To get to that mark you're going to spend half your budget on cylinder heads for an LS1 and you still have a BUNCH of other stuff to worry about throwing your money at.. not to mention 500HP is definitely well within the range of easily breaking things, so you'll want to put money into the car itself to be able to handle it. Considering most places want $4500 for a decent engine/tranny pullout for an LS1 (going with an auto will cost less as far as comparison), you could make a good SBC stroker or use a 400 SBC, but you'll spend a majority of your budget doing it right. 500 is a big number to pull off. I know I'm a little under that mark and I've spent around that much while getting fantastic deals on the way. It can be done, but you need to be realistic about it... besides, power doesn't mean anything if you can't plant it - or you're breaking parts every two seconds because you didn't do it right the first time.

 

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Many reports of an honest 500 HP from H/C LQ4/9's.

A Dart block will cost you half your budget.

The more the displacement, the easier to make the power.

 

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