ChrisLSx

Okay, so let me start out by saying I ALREADY OWN the DRE Rev Kit. It was bought for another project that ended up going a different direction, so now it's just sitting on the shelf.
(borrowed the picture)


2004 Manual C5 Coupe. I'm about to do a high lift ASA cam and a set of 243 LS6 heads (off of an 04 Z06). The heads have ~45K miles on them so I'm going to lap the valves (more to ensure they don't need any work) and install new PAC 1218 springs. Factory 0.051" gasket.

I realize that I absolutely do not "need" the rev kit, but I've never been a big fan of the lifter trays (I've seen what happens when they fail). I don't mind having to pull the heads to change the cam because I'll probably never change the cam again (if I do, oh well). I'd rather have a reliable setup and I've got friends that are constantly poking me to go to road course events with them, so who knows.

So, I've got them, do I run them? If not, why not?

NSFW

I had not even heard of rev kits until your post, so I'm not here to give advice... but this got me curious and I did some googling. Here are a couple of interesting threads:

https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...-rev-kits.html
https://ls1tech.com/forums/generatio...1-rev-kit.html

There's a link to a product listing at AFR's web site, and as far as I can tell, AFR no longer makes a rev kit. Neither Summit nor Jegs carries an LS rev kit today, but they do have them for older engines.

It's also interesting that most of the threads about rev kits are 10+ years old. It kinda sounds to me like today we have the components to build valve trains that will run well past 7000 RPM without the problems that rev kits used to solve.

ChrisLSx

Hey. Yeah, that gives you an idea of how long they have been sitting on my shelf. Rev kits are still used in extreme situations, but they never really caught on in the LS world because for the most part they weren't needed. For 99.9% of situations, a good beehive spring will work fine. The nice thing about a Rev kit is that it:
1) removes the bucket that can crack/fail (allows the lifter to spin/twist and bad things happen)
2) holds the lifter on the cam (removes the lifter's weight/inertia from the valve spring) without needing higher valve spring rates (helpful with hydraulic lifters)

davidfarmer

I'm with NSFW, I've never heard of this. But the ASA cam isn't all that big, and unless you have a defective lifter tray, I've never had one fail (GM had a bad batch cast in late 2000/early 2001).

67Ranger

I'd go with don't run them because you dont need them. You say you'll never change the cam again, but this would also make changing the cam in the future a job where you would have to pull the heads again, instead of being able to do it with the heads still on. Probably wont hurt anything, but its just unnecessary extra parts to add to your engine.