I'm putting a camaro 3.8 into my 1986 Porsche 944 and I'm wondering if there is any performance upgrades I should do before I put the engine in the car.
#1 are the L67 supercharged heads or camshaft better than a stock 2002 camaro heads/camshaft??
#2 I've heard about people deleting the balance shafts and putting upgraded timing chains, what are the pro's/con's of deleting the balance shaft??
#3 what are some other "bang for the buck" upgrades I can do to my engine (aside from porting the heads and bigger cam) ??

 

1. NO! They are designed for the SC engine only and will not work for a NA engine. The cam is profiled for the SC and will not give any advantage to the NA engine, it will actually make a NA engine run poor.

2. Deleting the balance shaft will simply lower the amount of rotating mass the engine has to deal with. This will add a few HP but nothing you will really notice. What you will notice is a rougher running engine expecally at idle.

3. Use heads off a Series III engine. The intake valves are .030 larger and the flow characteristice are a little better. Porting them can only help. As for the cam there are lots to choose from and it seems that Comp Cams is one of the better cams for this engine. Of course a tune for your car after it is all together will not hurt since the porche will be geared different and also weigh different. Headers are a plus, deleting the EGR really does not help since the EGR does not rob any noticable HP but deleting it does make a cleaner looking engine. Larger injectors are just about a must if you go with a larger cam so keep that in mind too.

Hope this helps

Massey

 

P.S. look up the Tom Henry RS, They push a 3.8L close to 300HP with only a few top end mods.

Massey

 

Also if you plan on pushing the motor I would suggest upgraded Pistons and have the connecting rods check/resized and the main and the rod bolts replaced. This goes for just about any GM motor. The bolts GM uses vary in quality a lot. Stock bolts are ok for stock application but how good they are above that is luck of the draw.

 

cool thanks a lot, I'll definetly get some series 3 heads since they're almost free and I'm gonna open it up to go thru it anyways, I scored some ARP rod bolts second hand but new in the package for it too, I'm gonna look for a good cam and then porting and hopefully that's enough, but anything has to be better than the 160hp 4cyl

 

Here:
- Tom Henry RS V6 Camaro Project

 

This sounds like a sweet project! I look forward to hearing and seeing the progress. There's an old Porsche you'll see at shows and meets in NW Ohio with a small block in it, just barely stuffed in there. I don't know much about Porsches, so I couldn't tell you even what model it is. All I remember is that car had a sound like you wouldn't believe...