Nathan Plemons

Friend and fellow forum member Brian Blum has just come across a set of TEA ported and polished cylinder heads, very similar to mine. He likes my setup and is essentially going to copy it in due time, but right now money just doesn't permit doing everything at once. We have the heads now just because they were a fantastic price and we could not pass them up or they would have been sold to somebody else, etc, etc.

Now here's the deal, his car is a 92 6-spd. The only real performance modifications thus far are 1.6 rockers (of course this required springs) and hooker long tube headers. When received the heads will be completely ready to bolt on, springs and all. When Brian decides to do a cam he's going to want the new style opti, a new timing chain, electric water pump, of course the cam itself, etc. He can't afford all of that crap right now, but heads would be easy.

A few bucks spent on gaskets, head bolts, and a weekend's worth of work and the heads could be installed. Furthermore, the heads would not need to be removed again when the cam is done, so it's not like you'd have to be doing a lot of work twice if you didn't do it all at once.

So the question is, what would you do? You have a set of P&P cylinder heads sitting in your garage. Would you install them now and take whatever performance gain you may see, or would you wait and do it all at once?

Cozmo

I would install them. That way, you can gauge the performance gain by this. You can also make sure everything works before doing the other mods. Just MHO.

p.s. patience is not one of my virtues.

Pete K

What he said!

aeronautica86

do it now

bogus

ditto here!

Chevy Guy

I would wait a bit and do the cam as well. The heads will do nothing without a cam to compliment them, they might even make the car a bit more sluggish on the street.

SLOWRIDE

KyRP2NITe Corvette

Did I read this correctly?!?! Not like you'd have to do a lot of work twice?!?!
Hello! To get the cam in and out the only thing you don't have to take off the motor that you would take off the motor to change the heads is ..THE HEADS!! You still have to remove the rockers.pushrods, the intake, the lifters, everything on the front of the engine like the water pump, the opti spark, the balancer and hub, then drop the oil pan to get the Timing chain cover off and not to mention at minimum pulling the radiator shroud to give clearance enough to pull the cam out and slide in the new one!!!!
Have you ever done a job like this If he is planning on doing a cam do it when you do the heads! Talk about wasting man hours...
Buy the stuff in stages and drool over it until your ready... or save and get it all in one flew blow but don't waste your energy tearing apart the motor twice if you know what your plan is! That just = more time with no Corvette

comp

do all

c4sforever

bigger heads+stock cam=less power

RichS

I totally dissagree. I had a 95 6/speed that was stock when I bought it. I pulled the heads and had them done and left the stock cam in. The car definatly did not loose power. With a real good set of heads you should still see a good 20-30hp.

Gee it's not that big of a deal to swap out heads, easily done over a weekend or 2 nights after work. I would do it if that's all I had.(which I did )

LD85

Do the heads

JackDidley

Just do it!

Nathan Plemons

By replacing the cylinder heads one has to remove the intake which is a 20 minute job and unbolt the accessory bracket, along with the headers . All of which can be done in a few hours. Drain the block of coolant and unbolt the old heads. Spend more time prepping the block than you do anything else, and then bolt it all back together in one weekend. A cam swap requires the removal of the intake, valve covers, rocker arms, pushrods, lifters, oil pump drive gear, water pump, distributor, oil pan, harmonic balancer, distributor, crankshaft hub, timing chain, camshaft thrust plate and radiator. Once all of this stuff is removed you can pull the cam all the way out until you figure out that it will hit the front crossmember, to make it clear you must unbolt the torque arm and allow the engine / transmission to tilt backwards, which also requires removal of the exhaust.

Thanks for the complete lack of confidence, but I've been around the block a few times. I know full well what is envolved in every step, and trust me, heads are a lot easier to deal with than a cam on a LT1 Vette. Now if you want to talk about a Camaro I would much rather do a cam, but I'm not talking about a Camaro.

OneRedLT4

Relieve yourself of all this stress, and ship the heads to me. You'll sleep better at night.

Really, I have no patience with stuff like that. I'd do the heads now. Unless teh other stuff is "right around the corner" then I'd wait.
JMHO

chriswtx

Just do it....

RichS

[QUOTE= Once all of this stuff is removed you can pull the cam all the way out until you figure out that it will hit the front crossmember, to make it clear you must unbolt the torque arm and allow the engine / transmission to tilt backwards, which also requires removal of the exhaust.QUOTE]

By undoing the motormounts you can raise the engine enough to clear the crossmember. It worked for me 2x on differant cars.

rick lambert

Do it now-it's no big deal-why wait? crap happens.

Maniac

Much depends on his time frame for aquiring the other parts. If we're talking say 2 or 3 months or less, I would wait. If it's going to be much more than that, why not do it if you have the time to spare?

Nathan Plemons

Yeah that's more or less my thought process. We're talking years on the other parts, not months.