Like alot of guys, I'm thinking of some winter upgrades.
The Scoggin-Dickey Vortec TPI intake and heads has me revved up,
and I was thinking of using a set of 1.6 rockers along with an LPE superram.
Ok, so here's the rundown,
Vortec TPI intake ($400)
Edelbrock E-tec heads, aluminum looks stock, hehe(~$1000)
LPE Superram($800)
Roller Rockers (under $300)
Good chip from,????? ($200)
Whaddya think guys, I've got a set of TPIS 1.75" headers waiting to go on.
Next up, a set of gears. Maybe about 3.55:1 or 3.73:1.
How will it run?
Will it be worth the $$$ ??

The car is an '88 Z51 with 4+3, 3.07 gears and see the sig for other mods so far.

 

I think the cheapest/easiest way to wake up the car is the gears, when I installed mine i fell in love with the car all over agian. It made it noticiably quicker, and it didn't break the bank because i did all the work my self.(except for setting up the gears

Gears along with your other mods will really wake up your car..

 

Gears to me always seem kinda like a Band Aid for a car that isn't really fast. People are willing to give up any and all top end and fuel economy just so they can accelerate quickly.

If you have a 6-spd then gears make a lot more sense because you can still have some top end and fuel economy. I'm not real sure what they do with the 4+3, but I assume you could still maintain a good deal of streetability and top end. Personally I would suggest that you wake up the motor. If you make horsepower you can accelerate quickly and have top end, anything else is just a compromise. More horsepower usually comes at the cost of fuel economy, but I'm sure there are things you can do that won't hurt that much. I would go with a cam and a decent intake, wake that motor up. A motor that runs out of breath at 4500 rpms just isn't as much fun, I don't care which gears you have. Also note, if you put gears under your car and don't make the motor breath, you'll be shifting a whole lot faster.

IMHO the L98 makes good low end torque and you don't need to worry that much about gears, just more torque multiplication which leads to traction issues as well. Make it breath and turn 6000 rpms and you can get the most out of the gears you have now ;)

Of course the ultimate is to have them both. I've considered 4.09 gears for mine, even after I've done the cam and such. I'll know if I want to do that after I drive my friends camaro (he's getting 4.10's)

 

OK, go to "Search" and type in "Beach Bum". Read the thread on TPI mods, its pretty good. The part where an LT1 owner suggests gears on an L98 car reminded me of it. The other thing is, a Super Ram is not $800, its more like $1,300 once its shipped. You can find them on ebay used for around $750-$1,000 though. I am swapping from 2.59's to a 3.07 mainly because I am swapping from a Dana 36 to a 44. If you have the 4+3 you have 3.07's already, which is a good street gear.

 

It seems that a cam is, by consensus, needed for this to work well.
So let's suppose I get a ZZ4 or LT4 Hotcam,
How much reprogramming is expected?
I've read that the ZZ4 doesn't have to have a new chip,
but the LT4 hotcam will need computer work.
How true are these assumptions?
Scoggin-Dickey said I can run the TPI/vortec setup with
a ZZ4 cam and it'll only need to have a .108" hole drilled
in one throttle blade.Sounds like a band-aid for improper
computer chip to me. What do you guys think?
By the way, thanks for the responses.

 

Corvette bob,

Totally off the subject, but I see that you have Flow Master's Cat Back Exhaust on your car. Would you recommend it and how does it sound? I'm seriously thinking about putting that on my car. What other exhaust mods have you done as well?

 

:rolleyes: That's a pretty general statement.

 

Hey, take it in context before you get mad. Like I said, I have considered gears myself, but only AFTER I make more power. Gears (if tall enough) are a MAJOR trade off between acceleration and top end. If acceleration is all that's important to you, and you want a car that will top out at like 120 that's just fine.

Again, you have an LT1, so gears don't hurt your top end quite as much. On a L98 it can really hurt unless you just so happen to have the 6-spd, there really aren't that many around.

The fact is that if I geared it right I could make a stock civic out accelerate your vette, but at what tradeoff? It would die at about 60mph. That's all I'm trying to point out. You are correct, it is a general statement, but I went on to explain myself as best I could. If you choose not to read carefully then too bad. I could flame every person on this board if I took only 1 line out of their posts.

 

If your using the super ram why not use the cam that was designed for it? The plenum and runner kit itself is 800 and won't be 1300 shipped to your door. I would reccomend a re-program just to get a little more out of your setup. Why not do a little work to your stock heads. I had some portwork done along with a 3 angle valve job and I had a 1.6 exhaust valve put in. I also had a new set of springs, retainers, and locks put on to accomodate the .560 lift cam. All in all I spent 600 in my heads

 

I'm not mad and wasn't really trying to flame you either. I did realize we were talking about an L98 here and not an Lt1 and I agree with the gear issue & what you said in regards to suggested mods in that particular case. Obviously too much gear in any car will hurt. I just disagree with saying gears are a band-aid for a car that is not fast.
As far any tradeoffs are concerned, my stock Lt1 went from running 13.92@101 to 13.23@105.5mph with just the addition of a 3.54 Band-Aid. IMO I didn't give up any top end, I also don't care about the extra 3 cents worth of gas it costs me.
I got alot of performance from a gear and it was alot less work than doing heads & cam and alot less expensive too , but that is just my take on it.
It is exactly like you said yourself, what works on one car may not be good for another.

 

Bob,
I know your excited about your mods!!! I know i am about my mods, and i know our minds jump here and there when we are looking through our catalogs and making our wish lists. well i have an 85 L98 as well as my 95 LT1, i am in the process of following a recipe someone else on another forum has done with the LT intake on an L98 motor, and if you look you'll find that an LT4 manifold can be had for $187 and im certain that you could build the rest and have machine work done for well under the cost of a superram. this manifold is much better for high end horsepower which would actually like a set of gears installed. people have told me that i would sacrifice my torque by camming my car but the hot cam was a very nice addition i think and would only raise your estimated cost of rockers by 200 dollars to obtain the complete hot cam kit which has the cam and roller rocker as well as all the miscellaneous parts for your heads ie.. shims, springs, locks, retainers, etc.

as far as heads, i am a big Fan of Brodix, i think these heads would be very nice fitted on this combo with a little bigger cc runner and the bigger valves, with some mild port work, they would definately add to the mix! if you already have headers and exhaust, thats a big plus, and adding the new distributor to fit the LT4 manifold is an ignition upgrade, so basically you spend very near to the same amount of money, but wow, you really get alot of nice parts, i will see if i can find the article where the manifold is converted, it is very detailed and informative and truly did not seem to be a very hard thing to do! i am ordering the manifold soon to start on my project car, mine is also getting a pair of GN turbos :yesnod: , but when i get the manifold, if its something you might be interested in doing i will be happy to document my progrees with pictures and the sort!

good luck, and these are only ideas i had, but figured it would maybe open another option for ya!

chris :cheers:


[Modified by lcvette, 8:31 AM 11/29/2001]

 

Fair enough, I just know too many people who put in too much gear and then whine about it later. I beat a VERY fast mustang at the track one night because he ran out of top end at 90 mph!! He got there fast, but that was all she wrote. He even had Nitrous, he claims it was set up for 1/8th mile. Nice guy and all, I just don't see why he was racing his 1/8th mile car on the 1/4.

 

Nathan, i am crossing the traps at 6200 in 4th now and trapping around 116-117 mph in the quarter, in my opinion this is about perfect, when i add the juice i am aware i will be sliding her into 5th to finish up, but so be it, when your car goes that fast in the quarter you have to make some sacrifices. coming out of the hole is a big plus, and one i was certainly willing to shift into 5th on the juice to have. so you are right, the gears will limit what gear you can effectively cross the traps and in some cases they will lose what gains you made in the holeshot by adding a shift further down the track. so why do gears? because i can :lol: vand i got tired of everyone saying oh "i had you man", they never had me, they had gears, now they don't say that, they just don't want to race anymore :D so both answers are correct, gears can help and gears can hurt, on a stock car that is not going to see upwards of 110 mph i say do it, they will allow you to use more of your power through the quarter, on a slightly modded car be careful of what ratio you choose, i went big with 4.10's and almost wonder if a 3.90 would have been better, but i will make these work!! and so far i think they will be sufficient, as for stop light racing first and secoind gear..... :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: .... forget about it! un real :D :D :D

whoo hoo :cheers:

 

I guess you want to use your stock lower manifold. Fasyguy is right, the entire Superram setup is about $1300 (including the lower intake, runners, & plenum).

Vic

 

I can't wait to see my friend run his 95 Z-28. He spun a few rod bearings and had to rebuild. He's got close to 10k in this motor. Callies crank, Oliver Connecting Rods, SRP Pistons, all forged of course. Oh did I mention it's a 396? His heads are the works from Total Engine Airflow here in town, his pistions are a 14cc DISH and he's still making over 12:1 compression.

Why does this matter? Well being that the stock Camaro rear end is about as strong as a wet paper bag, coupled with his street twin clutch, it lasted all of 12 hours behind his new motor. He's got a new 12 bolt on the way with 4.10's in it ($2.5k). This coupled with his ET Streets should make one beast of a car, he may well get thrown out of the track for not having a cage. The thing is that he's not concerned with top end so much because we calculated it out, he's got the HP to actually push it in 6th gear if he needed to, and the motor will turn 7k RPMS.

I so want to drive that car, he'll let me do it after he gets the gears in it, but I want him to break everything in first. I sure don't want to be the one who tears up his $12k project. The sad part is that the car's a piece of junk, nothing works right, it's just fast. The best part is the custom gauge setup my dad built for him.

Check out this list of mods http://24.17.202.123/htmls/z28.html


[Modified by Nathan Plemons, 8:51 AM 11/29/2001]

 

Well, you're both right, depending on what Bob meant by "LPE SuperRam". The runners and lid are $800, the lower is $460. When I hear SR I think of the whole thing. You can click Lingenfelter's link on the toolbar to the right to price it out. The good thing is that its hard to "wear out" an intake so used is a viable alternative. It just sucks that its not like a regular SBC intake that can be had new for $150 and used for $75.:(
I can't comment on to the power the SR alone will make since I'm putting mine on a 383 but the guys I race with a lot (L98 Terror and Smallblock) have very similar setups to what you have described and run high 11's, low 12's. If you go to http://www.baystatecorvetteclub.com, you can get a decent idea of what they have done to their cars. These are both totally streetable 350ci L98's and are driven the 4 hour round trip to the track.

 

Band Aid??? Ya I'm made a big mistake with my 4.09 and I've got a a4.
I'm sorry I didn't go to 4.88. Well maybe for next year.

:D

 

lcvette can you send me that article if you find it because I have a old LT1 intake that I would like to look in to using that intake on my 91 L98 engine.

Thanks
Jay