Building my lightning engine

651 lift....

IDT-572 wrote:Dave, were these aftermarket cams?


I have ordered adjustable cam sprockets for this one. +6 0 -6

These were aftermarket cams. On a previous 4.6 4 valve build I used adjustable sprockets which worked fine but on the 5.4 the guy didn't want to use them because he had heard bad stuff about them causing problems. On the 4.6 I had to move the cams forward about 12 degrees the factory drive is horribly inaccurate. The 4.6 build was one with two turbos that the customer had built several times before I got involved. Moving the intake centerline from 120 to 108 made a tremendous difference in the performance of the engine so much so that his formerly fine torque converter ballooned and knocked the thrust out of the engine in about 10 passes....

DaveMcLain wrote:

IDT-572 wrote:Dave, were these aftermarket cams?


I have ordered adjustable cam sprockets for this one. +6 0 -6

These were aftermarket cams.  On a previous 4.6 4 valve build I used adjustable sprockets which worked fine but on the 5.4 the guy didn't want to use them because he had heard bad stuff about them causing problems.  On the 4.6 I had to move the cams forward about 12 degrees the factory drive is horribly inaccurate.  The 4.6 build was one with two turbos that the customer had built several times before I got involved.  Moving the intake centerline from 120 to 108 made a tremendous difference in the performance of the engine so much so that his formerly fine torque converter ballooned and knocked the thrust out of the engine in about 10 passes....

Wow good info , thanks Dave. I may give you a shout on this deal if I have trouble, if that's ok?

I guess you degree it like you do a Lima 2.3 engine?

IDT-572 wrote:

DaveMcLain wrote:

IDT-572 wrote:Dave, were these aftermarket cams?


I have ordered adjustable cam sprockets for this one. +6 0 -6

These were aftermarket cams.  On a previous 4.6 4 valve build I used adjustable sprockets which worked fine but on the 5.4 the guy didn't want to use them because he had heard bad stuff about them causing problems.  On the 4.6 I had to move the cams forward about 12 degrees the factory drive is horribly inaccurate.  The 4.6 build was one with two turbos that the customer had built several times before I got involved.  Moving the intake centerline from 120 to 108 made a tremendous difference in the performance of the engine so much so that his formerly fine torque converter ballooned and knocked the thrust out of the engine in about 10 passes....

Wow good info , thanks Dave.  I may give you a shout on this deal if I have trouble, if that's ok?

I guess you degree it like you do a Lima 2.3 engine?

That's no problem. Degree it like a 2.3? If you mean picking up the centerlines from the valve spring retainer then yes.

DaveMcLain wrote:

IDT-572 wrote:

DaveMcLain wrote:

IDT-572 wrote:Dave, were these aftermarket cams?


I have ordered adjustable cam sprockets for this one. +6 0 -6

These were aftermarket cams.  On a previous 4.6 4 valve build I used adjustable sprockets which worked fine but on the 5.4 the guy didn't want to use them because he had heard bad stuff about them causing problems.  On the 4.6 I had to move the cams forward about 12 degrees the factory drive is horribly inaccurate.  The 4.6 build was one with two turbos that the customer had built several times before I got involved.  Moving the intake centerline from 120 to 108 made a tremendous difference in the performance of the engine so much so that his formerly fine torque converter ballooned and knocked the thrust out of the engine in about 10 passes....

Wow good info , thanks Dave.  I may give you a shout on this deal if I have trouble, if that's ok?

I guess you degree it like you do a Lima 2.3 engine?

That's no problem.  Degree it like a 2.3?  If you mean picking up the centerlines from the valve spring retainer then yes.

That's what I was referring too.............. Thanks