I recently got a 1987 Iroc-Z from Florida and was thinking of doing some mods to get some better performance out of it. Just wanted to get some ideas on what would be good to do and a ballpark cost of whatever you can suggest for me.

It has a 350TPI motor in it. However just to throw it out there... it was originally a 305tpi. It was taken out and replaced with a rebuilt 350 from an 89 Firebird. That being said... any ideas on what I could do to the car would be awesome.

By mods I pretty much mean anything other than throwing on a supercharger/turbo. Im not looking into doing that... at least not yet! Thanks to all in advance!

 

Exhaust from headers back.

 

talked to a guy at a car show one time who had an 91 with a 350 and he said one of the first things he did when he got it was change the "runners" to some aftermarket ones. His reasoning was that the stock ones caused the torque to drop off dramatically in the high rpm ranges, actually he said it was anything past 4,500 i believe. Anyway he said he got them for less then $200 and then did the work himself. had this convo with him couple months back so im sure i didn't do it word for word but bottom line was the runners where bad and new ones were better. Hes got a profile on here so maybe he'll check this out and could tell you more. Whatever you end up doing let us know.

 

TPI motors can have extreme amounts of torque, but the horsepower drops off at around 4500..just changing the runners won't help this much, if at all. If you want to get into that, read the sticky "Our Quest for a better flowing TPI"

 

+1 I think an exhaust is going to be your best bet. I think thier is WAY more power to be unlocked in the exhaust of the car than the intake...at least for the same price. Plus who doesn't like firing up the car and hearing YOUR OWN combo of headers and muffler growl.

If your hell bent on the intake mod I would get ahold of someone who has porting equipment, bribe em with some beer and hog out your plenum and runners. I did it and picked up about 400 rpm more range. Which was worth what I spent on it...NOTHING!

 

Thanks so much for the quick feedback guys! My buddy is actually doing most the work for me he really knows his stuff. He did work on my 87 Grand National and the thing is a beast! He wanted me to do some research and see what I really wanted to get done and discuss it with him. So thats what im doing!

Heres a question for you guys... would it be better to Keep it TPI or not?

Any more ideas greatly appreciated ^_^

 

I don't really know to be honest. But from what i hear (and this is hearsay), Tpi is more full efficient and also delivers full at a better ratio(?)... I've always heard though that you can do more mods easier to a Tbi. Like i said thats all hearsay on my part and I'm sure someone else on here knows plenty more about it then i do, good luck with your project!

Also i've been wondering is this gone be a daily driver or a weekend driver. Is it gonna be strictly drag strip? Or just likely to see plenty of time on one?

Ohh P.s. suspension and tires is always a good place to start, along with the gears. Do you know what gears you have? there was a thread the other day here that was quite lengthy about having the correct gears for the application

 

This will be a daily driver but keep in mind you are talking to a guy that drives around an 11 second GN as well. So I feel like I have alot to live up to with this Iroc, haha.

I know it must sounds crazy with the gas prices what they are now but I just want something that has kick to it.

I will be looking into the gears yes but as of right now I do not know whats in it.

I was wondering what is the best time you can ever expect out of a 350? I really love the body style and fell in love with these cars but always heard "Dont expect it to be super fast without throwing a supercharger on it"

At this point I just wanna learn all I can. My friend Jim wont steer me in the wrong direction but like I said I wanna get as much info as I can on the boards and get more familiar with everything.

Thanks very much for your time!