This is part fact check and part my story of the day/week/month

I finally brought myself to feel incredibly green and naïve about cars and contacted a performance shop to put this ignorance on display.

On the phone The guys are nice and helpful. At the shop they are still nice and helpful but after about 3-5 mins I get the feeling I am asking too many questions. The guy actually was walking away as we were talking next to the car, and trying to retreat back inside.

I went there because he said he could tell me if I have a cam just by listening. But when I cranked the car the look on his face was anything but confidence inspiring. After about 30 secs and looking under the car he arbitrarily said "most likely not. cause if it did it would have a longer lope." A few minutes later, when he was trying to make his escape from the convo he says, "4l60e cannot have larger cams because they have idle issues."

So I am sitting there thinking ok so it should have a larger lope but I cannot get a cam with a large lope because it would have idle issues...

Fact Check please!!!

Can 4l60e's have racing cams and can they still maintain idle? Seems to me youtube is full of A4's in full race mode at the track.

I almost got the feeling this guy might have just not liked me for some reason. Then as I made my exit it dawned on me. The cars I had been casually glancing over were ALL MUSTANGS. Not a one Camaro, vette, or trans am on the lot. I think I might have been the target of some team hate.

So 4l60e able to hold idle with track cams or not?

 

Sure, just put a higher stall converter in and you can use whatever cam you want.

 

Based on the way you were treated, I would certainly steer clear of this "performance shop".

 

How can ANYONE tell what kind of cam you have from a RUNNING engine. Silly question to start with.

 

That is not completely true. You can tell my car is cammed at idle if you pay attention. There is some extra lope to it. OP, you can have a A4 with a full N/A package with very good idle quality. All it takes is the right parts and good tuner.

 

Anyone that walks away from you while you are speaking to them needs a knot on their head.

Do not ever go back there. Ever.

 

A bad spark plug can fool an ear. The only way to really tell is measure.

 

A) That's the funny part, he was backing away and booking it for the door while HE was talking. But he tried to be subtle, yet failed.

B) I did not ask him to listen, I asked him if there was anyway to tell if the car is cammed. He said he could do it by ear.

C) How does one "measure" to know if there is an aftermarket cam?

 

I would say a few things on this thread... First in regards to the guy you talked to... It was rude, certainly, and he might be a total jack *** that may all be true...

HOWEVER, all the same, you have to recall at a certain point they are running a business, and standing in a parking lot talking shop to someone who is never going to be a customer, is costing them money in the end...

I'm not trying to be rude or callous, but if your right in that he has a parking lot full of fords, discussing gm parts with you costs him time and money that could be spent on customer cars... Many owner/operator/technicians will give you 5 minutes, then have to get back to work unless you are buying.. The performance shop market is INCREDIBLY hard to stay afloat in, parts have very little margin, and there are a ton of shops who can do the same modifications.



NOW about your questions..

You can NOT always tell there is a cam in a vehicle by sound alone. Small cams etc. can have no lope what so ever, or have a HUGE lope. By adjusting idle and timing conditions all of that can be controlled.. sound alone is not a good indication, pulling a valve cover is at least a step, but even that can be hard at best.. Checking the tune is another good way to determine whats going on internally.. The amount of lope in the idle is more a function of fueling/timing/and rpm than it is the cam itself.. Certainly a cam can be designed to add a lot of lope to the idle, but with a bit of time and tuning, i could make it sound nearly stock again, it just might idle at 1500 rpm...


A4's CAN have a big cam in them, even on the stock converter and transmission... HOWEVER the problem is, the bigger the cam, the higher the idle often needs to be to smooth out the idle. If the idle is raised it wants to "PUSH" through the stock converter, and basically you can end up with a cruise control situation (zero throttle input cruising at 35 mph) and low speed surging...

If you run a higher stall torque converter you get rid of most of these symptoms.

 

I agree. "The performance shop market is INCREDIBLY hard to stay afloat in, parts have very little margin, and there are a ton of shops who can do the same modifications"

I disagree. "talking shop to someone who is never going to be a customer"
It's hard to tell who will be a customer and who won't. The more people you're helpful to, the better your chances of earning a customer.
There is so much competition out there right now that a shop can't afford to take me for granted because there is another shop around the corner that will take the extra steps to earn my business. If a shop owner wants to be successful he/she should concentrate on quality not quantity.

 

You need to have the front of the engine off and valve cover(s) off, a Degree wheel and a dial indicator to measure the cam (and the KNOWLEDGE of course to know what your looking at)

 

I suppose that was the part I did not get. I was actually getting his price to do a retune on the car, labor cost to install a cam, advice on when to tune, and how much to tune again once I add another mod. i then told him i definately needed the tune and prefered to use them cause they are literally right around the corner from my residence. Once I asked about a supercharger and an entry lvl setup that is when he started looking for an exit. I was and still might have them do the tune. But for $495 I figured I could ask a few questions too.

But im not angry, or even disappointed. I did get some questions answered and I know I am moving in the right direction in my quest for knowlwdge.

 

Precisely.

If you have poor people skills, you shouldn't be talking to customers (actual or potential) in the first place. Being courteous and diplomatic while running a business is critical. Those that don't understand that are as doomed to failure as much a one with poor mechanical skills or abilities.

I agree with most everyone here regarding the cam situation. It basically boils down to how "much" cam is installed as to how easy (or hard) it is to detect.
In keeping with what 3boys said as far as removing the front cover, sometimes you can get lucky and see the non-factory engraving on the end of the camshaft itself. The vast majority tend to have hand-scribed engraving, i.e. serial number, part, number etc. This is not present on OEM cams I have ever seen.

 

Stick with a shop that works exclusively (or a lot of) GM vehicles, LS in particular. Whether they be F bodies or Corvettes. This guy might be a whiz with Fords or Chrysler products and may tell you "Oh yeah, we can tune anything", but I would strongly recommend someone a solid GM customer base. If this means going across town, so be it.