Question About L98
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Burning Brakes
Joined: May 2006
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From: Avatar Nazi Land Orange County, CA
Question About L98
I am researching and looking into upgrading the power in my Vette, as some may know, and never really bothered looking at the L98 as an option.... Is there anything that can be done with this beast to get it unruly...? Or should I just keep lookin at swaps. Reason I ask is because it may save some money and I heard that it actually wasn't too bad of a motor. It has 79k on it so that's a con... but I don't know so that's why I asked.
Safety Car
Joined: Aug 2002
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From: New Albany IN
St. Jude Donor '03-'04-'06-'08-'09
Actually 79K ain't too bad if its been well maintained. The problem is that it runs out of breath around 4500 rpm or less. The bottleneck is in the intake however it is the force behind the torque. Swap out the intake for a superram and change out the cam and possibley re-work the heads and you should get some more useable power. Better yet, stroke it to a 383!
Drifting
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 1,428
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From: Jacksonville FL
The L98's drawback is the TPI. It limits the revs to about 4800rpm. Otherwise it's a SBC. Cam, heads, intake, headers and everything else that you would do to a SBC to wake it up will also help the Torquemonster.
NOS is cheap and effective if you use it correctly. If you don't, you can do lots-o-damage real quick.
NOS is cheap and effective if you use it correctly. If you don't, you can do lots-o-damage real quick.
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Burning Brakes
Joined: May 2006
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From: Avatar Nazi Land Orange County, CA
Originally Posted by Bruthish
Actually 79K ain't too bad if its been well maintained. The problem is that it runs out of breath around 4500 rpm or less. The bottleneck is in the intake however it is the force behind the torque. Swap out the intake for a superram and change out the cam and possibley re-work the heads and you should get some more useable power. Better yet, stroke it to a 383!
See these are the things that are good to know... I am more familiar with LT1s as I had a WS6 that I was going to work on... in another life. I noticed the 4500 RPM thing... definately a difference between the L98 and LT1. My end goal is to not have a super drag 900 HP car... I honestly though would like to have at least 450 to the wheels then work on other parts of the car too. This thing has more ***** than my 2000 neon
but still should have way more for being a CORVETTE....
Thread Starter
Burning Brakes
Joined: May 2006
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From: Avatar Nazi Land Orange County, CA
Originally Posted by Midnite 88
The L98's drawback is the TPI. It limits the revs to about 4800rpm. Otherwise it's a SBC. Cam, heads, intake, headers and everything else that you would do to a SBC to wake it up will also help the Torquemonster.
NOS is cheap and effective if you use it correctly. If you don't, you can do lots-o-damage real quick.
NOS is cheap and effective if you use it correctly. If you don't, you can do lots-o-damage real quick.
SBC? So I am pretty much limited then with the fact it is a TPI?
Burning Brakes
Joined: Mar 2003
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From: NW MN
Originally Posted by Dostovel
SBC? So I am pretty much limited then with the fact it is a TPI?
Team Owner
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From: Athens AL
C7 of the Year - Unmodified Finalist 2021
C4 of Year Finalist (performance mods) 2019
Its just a small-block chevy, youre only limited by the amount of money you want to spend.
TPI limits it because of the intake, not the injection system. Thats what we are talking about when we say its limited, the runners are just too long to make extreme power levels, and it cant suck air in at high rpm well enough.
my website has many suggestions on what you can do
TPI limits it because of the intake, not the injection system. Thats what we are talking about when we say its limited, the runners are just too long to make extreme power levels, and it cant suck air in at high rpm well enough.
my website has many suggestions on what you can do
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St. Jude Donor '08-'10
if you can find some back issues of Corvette Fever, or maybe the website, they have covered this in detail several times in the past 6 months. The condensed version is that the engine needs to breath more. Get more air into it, better intake, and then get more exhaust out, headers. Throw in a new cam and a few other odds and ends and it shoud scream.
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Burning Brakes
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From: Avatar Nazi Land Orange County, CA
Originally Posted by 86Pacecar
You can make a TPI run in the 12's, there are a few guys here who do it. My 86 with a cam swap and headers, stock heads runs 13.5 and it has 115K miles on it. A good chip tune and it will go a little faster. My buddies 89 will get to the 12's this year, and that's with bolt on stuff from TPIS. It ran 13.1 a couple of weeks ago with an outside air temp of 99 degrees. A little cooler weather and some more practice with the extra ponies and torque and it will be there.
Thats some good stuff!