Cams

You're not gonna get much more than generic information on this page...I must apologize. I didn't do my own cam work :)

My engine was burning oil like mad and I didn't know what part to suspect. While talking to Tim84NA, I was offered (by him) to trade my old heads to him in exchange for his heads which had low use upgraded cams and lifters. His engine builder did a valve job on the heads for $100 and I paid Tim my old heads and $150 for his set of heads (w/cams/lifters). After tearing apart my engine I sent my heads off to him and I simply slapped in the "new" heads and thats my story. My engine is not broken in quite yet, so I can't give you a really good idea of what kind of power/redline I have now, but I'll get to it someday...for now I can't hit the gas hard.

You should generally replace many things along with your cams. Motorsport Auto suggests (also to make money of course :) that you replace lifters, springs, and lash pads...in fact, they void your warranty of their cams if you don't.

The cams control the timing of many critical engine operations, including valve timing (exhaust and intake duration). Upgraded cams effectively change the duration of these strokes and allow for higher redline and higher HP. I am not too savy on all the reasons why, so I won't attempt to explain it until I know a little more about it. From what I can see, Motorsport has the cams, which are a regrind. You must turn in your old cams at a core charge of $350...basically, you're paying $169.95 to have a stock set of cams reground to the new specs. You can purchase three grinds (and many others from other performance sellers): 260, 270, and 280. 260 is a very mild regrinds, 270 shifts your redline up considerably (about 500 rpm for every 10 degrees of extended duration can be expected...stock cams are 252/252. So you can expect a redline shift of about 1000 from 5500 to 6500 for the 270 grind (which is what I have).