How much boost can you run safely (or even unsafely) on a LS3 with a tvs2300 and forged rods & pistons? Assuming the car had 1 7/8 longtubes.

 

I know on stock ls3 they usually run what 7-8pounds? What would be a safe number with he forged pistions and rods? Unless I need to change my crank? Anybody?

 

An LS3 with forged rods and pistons, the sky's the limit really. Probably as much boost as the TVS can put out. The crank is good to ~1000 RWHP.

 

good to know

 

Hold up there Bill. All forged rods and pistons are NOT created equal. There are many rods and pistons (piston pins, and rings) that are NOT up for that task.

Setting up proper tolerances can also make the difference in a combination staying together with 1000hp or not, even if the correct parts are used.

 

OK yea, but I don't see a TVS pushing 1000. Should have said sky's the limit for whatever the TVS can dish out. Assuming correct tolerances, etc. You certainly would know better than I.

 

What parts would you suggest? Reaching 750-800rwhp level. Where less is more when buying parts. I want to do it on pure boost no cams heads ect. And it would be nice to be able to adjust my power down as low as 550rwhp. I,d basically want to build a over built 500-550hp car that I can easily and accessibly crank the boost up too like I said before 750-800rwhp. I can scrap the tvs2300 if it's easier to play with boost levels on a procharger or other method of power.

 

The only real way to have a proven adjustable solution is turbos with an ebc. You can do a procharger and restrict it down.. But imo going to 550 from 700 wouls be choking the crap out of it.

 

A 300rwhp swing is going to take changing out the pulleys, probably regardless of what head unit or SC package you go with.

 

All it takes is one time for luck to not be on your side. One time to punch it "one last time", one time to have "just one more go", one time to get bad gas or one time to have a hiccup and you're done playing the game.

There's guys that go 25k, 50k, 75k miles with twice the boost I ran, and drive it twice as hard as I drove mine - and their engines last forever.

Also, it's not just your engine you have to worry about, there's also the flywheel and transmission, drive line parts.. and all the money you'll be spending on new tires

At any rate, I'll definitely agree with the saying that if you can't afford to replace your engine or transmission (or both... ), don't mod it - because **** happens when you least expect it

Lessons I've learned.. drive gentle, don't try to break land speed records, enjoy the hell out of it while it lasts, and pray you get to drive it the next day.

 

This is what i was thinking. Maybe have two different pullies and a hand held tuner that has both my "550hp tune" and my "700hp tune" saved onto it.

So just swhitch over the pullies and up load my tune??? It dosent have to be a 2sec thing like a boost controller

 

Simplyphp l thankyou your wisdom. You suggest staying at 423rwhp?

Lg 1 7/8 super pros
Haltech killer bee II
Tune

 

Well it's my experience from learning the hard way, I guess you could say if I didn't have my engine blow up I wouldn't have learned the lesson. You can't go back in time, so even though my engine blew up and I beat myself up with "man I should have left it all stock" - it doesn't change what happened.

I know for certain I would NOT have modified my car, if I had known it was going to blow within about a year. Of course it was my understanding it was a very conservative tune and that it was unlikely anything would happen, but it just takes once for something to go terribly wrong.

But pushing forward, once your engine blows you're left with about 3 basic options:
1) Let it sit in your garage dead forever while you make payments
2) Throw in another stock engine, remove all mods and sell them at huge loss
3) Replace the engine and/or transmission with parts that are built to handle the power, prepare the rest of your car for the worst and pray for the best.

I chose option 3 because I love the car and didn't want to sell all my stuff for a loss. To me it's better to change the way I drive and over build the car, than it is to go back to stock and miss what I had.

Not building a car from the ground up to handle the power you want to make is like Reverse Jenga; the more you pile on, the higher the chance its going to topple over.

I don't really want to persuade you either way, just want you to know what can happen when you start making power the engine/etc. wasn't built for. If you're happy with what you've got, enjoy it. Hell you may go on to make 800rwhp and have it last a hundred thousand miles

 

Which LS motor were you running?

 

Making that kind of power with a TVS2300 isn't easy. Expect to spend a lot of time and money doing so. Check out the 'Vettethret' saga for more info.

But why do you want the huge power difference option? With a well sorted out combo, I think you can have a reliable setup making 700+ rwhp. Just because you have the power doesn't mean you have to use it all the time. I guess if you really want that adjustability, go with a good turbo setup.

 

cough, cough...... boost-a-pump turned OFF....

 

I am a very level headed driver but don't want to have the temptation every day it's my DD. If I could have the low & high boost settings. I'd say " you know what, this weekend I'll the the vetted ***** hang.."

Any suggestions on a turbo? I would like to avoid rear mount systems. Possably big single turbo??

 

Stock LS2 but it could happen to the LS2/3/7 just as easily because the internals are not built for boost like the LS9.

It's all a conspiracy theory, everyone I've talked to has a different opinion on why it happened.. all I know for sure is the aftermath sucked

 

Ok, that makes a little more sense. But, you know what? I think that's the beauty of a centrifugal supercharger setup. The boost doesn't really come on hard until 4000 rpm, unless you have the thing pullied way down with a restrictor plate. My car was at 68x rwhp, with potential to make more with timing and leaner A/F (that was 11.0 A/F). We ended up backing it off to 665 rwhp for safety's sake with stock pistons.

I guess my point is that I wouldn't hesitate to drive this car every day. Yeah, it can be really fast if you want it to be, but is also really mellow if you stay out of the high boost/rpm range. It isn't like a PD blower (I've had a Magnuson on another car) or a turbo that hits hard out of nowhere and will spin you into a ditch. Very linear and predictable power.

Just keep in mind that you want to have a matched engine combination to make big power. I've seen more than a few guys who just keep trying to throw more boost at a stock engine (stock LS2 heads, intake and stock/mild cam) and hit a wall. A good head/cam combo will help you make power more efficiently with less boost and less fuel requirements.

My 2 cents, anyway....