keeso6z

I just got my 2006 Z06 back from 21st Century Muscle Cars after adding a MSD Performance Atomic Airforce intake and a Nick Williams 102mm TB. The car made 525.1rwhp and 491.6rwtq. This is with the stock cam. My other mods are a Calloway CAI, Stage 2 heads, Dynatech SS long tube headers, X-pipe and high flow cats. On the last round of performance upgrades, the car picked up 18.1rwhp and 25.7rwtq and I can definitely feel it. The torque gain is huge over the stock intake and throttle body.

The first round of upgrades I just did the Calloway CAI and a dynotune and the car made 482.5rwhp and 442.2rwtq. The second round was the Stage 2 heads and headers/exhaust and retune and it made 507rwhp and 465.9rwtq. Matt said that these cars typically make between 440-450rwhp, so I have really gone up with mostly bolt-ons, with the exception of the Stage 2 heads, which are .020 mill. This car feels like a different animal now. But I know some of you would say it is begging for a cam, and I have not ruled it out, but I think I am done. I don't track or race the car and want to keep the stock drivability with out the smell or surging. It drives like stock, but just with a lot more power.

Silver Bullet C6

Nice gains there for simple mods.

ATOMIC ORANG

you should of made that with cold air intake and headers with tune

Ghost Knight

Those are strong numbers, especially on stock cam! Your numbers seem in-line.

Is this a dyno jet, and if so, is it SAE or STD?

RamAir972003

That's where my first build was on my own heads matt tunes conservative I'm in Dallas also is your msd intake ported...

Undy

...or uncorrected.

cseaman

Man, even a very easy cam like a BTR stg 2 could have pulled you another 40-60whp..given the labor and re-tune involved with everything else, can't imagine leaving that on the table given the low cost of parts!

keeso6z

The dyno is SAE. They don't give corrected or uncorrected figures. The MSD intake was right out of the box, so I would assume unported. Matt never discussed porting it, although I have read that it can be. They initially estimated it would give me another 6rwhp, but it made 3 times that much. And the increase in the torque in the midrange is significant. I tried to post the dyno graph last night but got an error message that it could not upload a PDF file. Tried to confert it to jpeg, but got tired of messing with it.

As far as the BTR Stage 2 cam, I can't imagine how beastly it would be with another 40-60 HP. It's a handful now. I found it interesting what Matt said when I left. He said cams ruin cars and their business is high performance. But I think he was just talking from his own personal preference for his own car. He said if he did one in his own car it would be very, very mild so you couldn't notice any difference from stock. Apparently they get quiet a few Corvette owners and muscle car guys that want big cams and big power.

cseaman

I'm far from an expert around here, but did quite a bit of research prior to my C6Z purchase and immediate head/cam (primarily to fix the heads) build. And through all my searching, it seems that the 'big' cams people were doing five years ago are the mild cams people are doing now. Seems that people have just been hunting for more and more lope and aggressive power bands. You can absolutely do a cam that will not surge or suck to drive, it just won't sound like the spawn of satan...just closer to that than stock.

Nonetheless, your car and your happiness!

keeso6z

What are you rwhp a rwtq numbers with your setup? And do you get any smell from the cam? Thanks for the input.

I am mostly likely an odd ball in that this is a collector car for me and will not be driven much, raced or tracked, but I wanted to make it the best performing car with stock drivability and not impact the value. I have also kept all the stock parts in case I sell it down the line and someone wants to return it to stock. I don't know why they would because this car is more exciting to drive now than it was stock. My feeling is that if a car has a big cam in it, people think it has be raced and rode hard. It also impacts wear on the valve train I believe (no expert either) and it becomes a different animal, or more of an animal. I agree that a mild cam that is close to stock would be a better choice for me if I were to go in that direction.

Mordeth

Nice gains!

Let's face it though, your car is never going back to stock. No one's ever does with mods like this. And if you are worrying about what the "next guy" who owns your car is going to think, then you are doing it wrong. I really don't give a **** what someone WAY down the road thinks, I care about what I think and what will bring me enjoyment now.

So you are saving all of your original parts simply for the emotional satisfaction of "knowing" you have them (I do the same thing, but I don't fool myself by denying reality). And I guess I can hand over the OEM parts in a cardboard box to the next guy if I ever sell it (which is highly unlikely - but anything is possible). And if he thinks I have raced it, he would be right (doing exactly what the car was built to do, not piddle around town getting groceries or collecting dust in my garage).

I have a mild cam. There is NO smell (READ - NONE - ZERO - ZILCH - NADA). The car is completely driveable, with no surging, bucking, or other low-idle issues. It feels normal, until the GO PEDAL is mashed, and then all hell brakes loose and she screams like a banshee. And the lope is faaaaaantastic. The LS7 loves a good cam and a proper tune. LOVES IT.

outhouse

We have told him this over and over verbatim, but this matt guy keeps talking him out if it because he has a different wrong opinion.


I'm guessing matt has little experience with certain cams and stereotypes all cams as large cams.


he could pick up another 15hp just by porting the msd as well, they should never be installed without porting first

Mordeth

Well this "Matt" guy needs to have his head examined. Cams do not "ruin cars". Big cams with shitty tuners do though. Any good tuner of LS7s knows how they respond to a proper cam and tune, even a mild one. Hell, even my wife knows this, and she has NO clue what is going on with my cars. And yes, or course the MSD should have been ported. Completely ridiculous and absurd not to.

But either way, he has nice gains and a very nice ride now. He just really needs to get out of his head "returning it to stock". This will NEVER, EVER happen. Complete waste of brain power to even consider it at this point.

outhouse

Absolutely !!!! a sweet ride and he did it his way which is all that counts

keeso6z

Not sure why Matt didn't mention porting the MSD. These guys are the top performance shop in the Dallas area. I'm going to ask him about that. What do you guys think I would pick up with a BTR Stage 2 or the Kahtech Torquer 116? I'm guessing about 40rwhp? No, the car will never return to stock while I own it of course, but if I sell it down the road, some collector might want to return it to stock - who knows. The car has 2,400 miles on it and is pristine. I plan on keeping that way.

outhouse

Don't get hung up on actual numbers, dynos vary.


But porting the msd and a 116 would scare every person you took for a ride and retain perfect street manners.


40 with porting the msd yourself should be easy, but its the torque that matters.


As the older saltier dogs state, get a cam custom ground. I like the 116 but it does well for stock exhaust. You might be leaving some on the table with headers, going that route, over what a good well respected cam guy would recommend.

Ghost Knight

If your shop expected only 6whp from an MSD, I wouldn't go there again because they clearly don't do any research. A simple 10 min search will show a solid 20whp gain with an imported MSD. 40whp is common with a ported MSD vs. stock manifold. Ditto on the cam comment. Easy 40-80whp depending on what you choose.

Lastly, unfortunately this won't be a collector car. They simply made too many of them. Look at C5z cars. They are priced very low and are generally undesirable (relative performance, technology, dated looks). Then think about C4 cars..

I say enjoy the car and do what you want with it for a few years. Kind of a like dating a hot girl.

Cheers!

outhouse

That age limit is truth


Clean C5,s around 12k


There was one with a blower low miles for $25 not to long ago.

JasonSB

What did they charge for the install on the intake the TB?

Unreal

SAE=corrected
Thats 100% what it means, that a SAE correction was applied. So saying "The dyno is SAE. They don't give corrected or uncorrected figures." is false. You have one or the other, and in this case you have SAE corrected numbers.