cam choices ( help me out guys )

brian15

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Oct 16, 2003
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well i recently acquired a 88 t/c 5 speed with 90 k miles .... for 900$ awesome deal

and ive been bitten by the mod bug .... i want to do minimal mods and make it as fast as possible .

i ran the car bone stock with a k @ n cone ... on the end of the vam
and i went 15.34 @ 88 with a 2.3 60ft .

so this weekend i took the stock wheels off and put my et streets and centerlines on the car ..... hopefully tommrow ill knock some 14.8's or so off at the track .

im thinkin a 3in down pipe and hooker max flow muffler for exhaust .... since its only got a single on it now im sure anything would be better .

i also would like to know what my cam choices are , this is my daily driver and im probally not going to get into the head ( unless the motor lets go one me ) ....

i want something with nice pull dont really care about down low

in the future the car could possibl see a t3 swap but soon the ihi will see 17.5 psi ...

reccomendations would be awesome

thanks guys
 
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There are other, better things you can do now besides a cam swap.

Definitely do the exhaust, get a short throw shifter, and get a boost controller.

If you do want to swap to a bigger cam, of course there are choices out there. How much are you looking to spend, do you want a roller cam or flat tappet?
 
Red_LX said:
There are other, better things you can do now besides a cam swap.

Definitely do the exhaust, get a short throw shifter, and get a boost controller.

If you do want to swap to a bigger cam, of course there are choices out there. How much are you looking to spend, do you want a roller cam or flat tappet?

ok thats what i was curious about i didnt know if the head flowed well enough to benifit from a more agressive cam ..... i know the ranger roller swap is popular but what benifits come from that ...

im gettin the 3in stinger downpipe soon so i feel that will help out alot ..... but other than that and a boost controller im kinda clueless to what mods i should do .....

im gettin a tweecer for the stang soon so i believe i will have tunning capabilities for both cars also
 
With the ranger roller, and now that I think about it, really most cam swaps for the 2.3L, you won't realize the full benefits of the cam without an adjustable cam sprocket. The Ranger Rollers run best at 4 degrees retarded, and really you could do that with your stock cam and get basically the same effect. Adjustable sprockets aren't cheap (around $90-100 alone), but they are a real nice thing to have.

I will soon be installing a Ford Motorsport A237 cam in my Turbo Coupe. They aren't produced anymore, but you can find people selling them for around $100 or so. It's a roller cam (the flat tappet version is the A234), has about .420" lift and is more for top end power although with a adjustable sprocket, you can advance it to get some of that power back.

And then of course there are aftermarket cams, but you're looking at $150+ for a flat tappet cam there and usually around $300 for a roller.

BTW another good mod you can do on the turbo 2.3L is a front mount intercooler. The stock one is in a really bad location.
 
sweet i looked into the front mount that stinger has and supposedly it only fits 83-86 t/c ..... is this because the t3 turbo ?

i took the car to the track today and went 14.97 at 89 so its a strong runner i have a feeling the exhaust will help greatly ..... maybe i will look into the adjustable sprocket ....

is there any direct swap turbo's out there or my stock ihi really not that bad
 
It might be because of how the front of the car is, I'm not sure, I haven't looked at it.

Anyway you don't have to get a kit...check out my cardomain. I used a Starion/Conquest intercooler, mounted it myself, and made my IC pipes out of some mandrel bent exhaust pipe. It took awhile but didn't cost very much, and wasn't that hard. '87-88 TC's also have the advantage of tons of room in the nose for an IC.

The IHI is good for quick spooling but heats up the air a lot at higher boost levels. T3's from SVO's, Merkurs and older Turbo Coupes will swap right on. You have to look at what turbine housing you're getting though, the .48 (which was on some SVO's and merkur's) spooled sooner but wasn't quite as good up top, the .63 (which was on tc's) took a little longer to spool but made good top end power. I have a .60/.63 T3 on my car and I hit full boost around 3000 RPM, that's with a ranger roller cam.
 
thanks red ill def look into that intercooler set up and how hard it would be to get the intercooler it self ...

would you happen to be familliar with our turbo cars and gears ..... i understand that boost builds power under load i think ....

but wouldnt my heavy car still benifit from a set of 3.73's or maybe even 3.90's or would it like hurt boost .

thanks
 
Red_LX said:
5 speed turbo coupes did have 3.55's with a trak-lok.

Going to 3.73's would be a negligible difference. Deeper than that, say 4.10's, would make first gear almost useless, but you would get into the powerband faster. It's up to you I guess.

Oh, and I got my intercooler off ebay.

im may go half way and try a 3.90 ..... the car has no problem hookin with the et streets i have laying around ...

would you happen to be familliar with the volvo front mount that can be used on our cars i may look into that ....
 
the volvo ic is good only till about 280 hp. i heard they begin to lose efficiencey after that. the large npr is a better choice but they are about 200 bucks. im sure if you contact stinger he can help you out and tell you why his intercooler wont fit.
 
I didn't even know anyone made 3.90's...

The reason I said first gear would be almost useless is that it's already a 3.97 gear, you'd have to shift at like 15 mph with the deeper gears.

Anyway I personally think the volvo IC's suck...plastic end tanks and all that. That's why I got a starion. Nice design, plus I wanted something with the inlet and oulet on the same end.