I have a 350 engine I want to build up a little to get more horsepower but more importantly, more torque. I love torque

I'm looking for suggestions for a cam upgrade. I hate the choppy idle sound of a lot of the cams. What would be a good cam upgrade that wouldn't give me a choppy idle. I was looking at the ZZ4 cam and love the way it sounds but i'm looking for a cam that would be a good performance bump but with a smoother idle. I haven't decided on heads yet but they will be aftermarket and ported along with my aftermarket intake and runners.

Maybe i'm going about this all wrong but I just don't like the big cam choppy idle sound

Thanks

 

What upgrades have you already done in regards to intake and exhaust?

Examples: CAI, Runners + matching the plenum, intake base, headers, catback?

 

Edelbrock headers, high flo cat and magnaflow 3" exhaust. That's all that has been done so far. I purchased an Edelbrock hi flow TPI intake and will be purchasing SLP runners and having them ported.

 

I wouldn't bother with the cam then. Been down that road. just about every cam out there will overstep the heads potential.

Save money finish all of the bolt-ons and enjoy the car as it is now.

When ready, do a heads+cam package at the same time.

As far as not wanting any chop, none of the cams that really have chop from overlap really function well with a OEM based TPI system anyways. An LT4 Hot-Cam is more than most TPI setups like, and its still smooth. A choppy cam will just perform like crap all around in a TPI car.

 

I was just going to do the cam now while the engine is out of the car. I wouldn't be driving it until i'm done converting the car to a manual. The cam would go in now, and then whatever heads I would decide on would go on the engine before it would be driven. My original thought was a ZZ4 cam, ported vortech tpi manifold, ported vortech heads and ported SLP runners. I would also be open to getting a HSR depending on how much torque I would lose.

Sorry if I'm all over the place but I am very new to this.

 

Vortecs are only worth it in the most budget based builds. They flow similarly to stock LT1 heads. They can take you to about 330-360whp if the intake will support it. But being iron, most people don't bother with the effort needed to port them.

Is your existing aftermarket base a Vortec base? If not, it won't work with Vortec heads.

 

Wow, I thought you could get a bit more than that out of a set of vortec heads...We just got our test motor in our bracket car, (2900 lbs, 89 RS) and are using vortecs for a while, perhaps Im going to be disappointed...

 

Those numbers are the average attainable numbers for most people using stock LT1 heads. Others have gotten more, its not a hard deck, just the average.

Auto's on the low end, T56's on the higher end. With a few people around 370-410whp, using custom cams, nutso compression...etc.