Two questions

[5.0PiMpin]

waz up guys, i gotta couple of questions i hope u can help me with. the first is that i wanna add some more power to my 89 5.0. it has 150,000 miles on it and i know it time for either a new engine or a complete rebuild. i was thinking about adding a cam to my engine but i was told by the guys at ford that i CAN NOT and a cam until i change the heads, the upper lower intake and a whole slew of other things. it didnt seem like he was being strait with me and i want to know what you guys think.

2nd question- i just added a 190 lph fuel pump to my car and i was wondering if i needed to add a fuel pressure regulator as well? i havent felt any difference with the new fuel pump but it seems to do the job. do i even need a regulator is my question?thanks for all the help ---danny

[DRASTiK]

1. Yes you can add a cam without changing anything else. I ran an aftermarket cam with stock heads, intake, etc. for quite a while. Just make sure you don't get a cam that's too big (lift in the upper 500's). You don't want to have piston to valve clearance problems.


2. No, you don't need to get an adjustable fuel pressure regulator unless you want to. Upping the pump to a 190lph was a good choice. With that many miles on the car, you're lucky the stock pump held out this long. You shouldn't really feel a difference in the pumps. The only time you'd feel a difference was if you were running a combo that required more fuel and didn't have a big enough pump to begin with. Then when you put a bigger one in, you'd feel it. The 190 will be fine for almost all modifications you may or may not make in the future with the exception of a power adder. If you were to spray a LOT, then I'd up it to a 255. But other than that you're fine. I run a 190 with ported aluminum heads and upper and lower aftermarket intake with a big cam. It's still plenty of fuel for me.

Hope that helped,
Dave

[5.0PiMpin]

thanks for the info dave , you helped alot in clearing up some of the fog in my head!

has anyone else ran an aftermarket cam with stock intake, heads? from all the reading i have done on a cam swap with stock heads and intake, i have come to the understanding that it is suppose to hurt and not help. if it helps will it make a big difference does any body have an opinion on that? thanks--danny

ps : i am looking into the e303 cam from ford , ne other reccomendations?

[drudis]

That might have been the point they were first trying to make. You can _physically_ change cams, but with stock heads/intake/exhaust... there is little gain. Oh sure, you'll feel it "kick in", but you lose a ton of low end, thats why you really notice the top end.
IMOHO, leave the cam alone. You can go pretty fast with the stock one, before it becomes the limiting factor.

[5.0PiMpin]

i dont have stock exhast, if that makes a difference. will the cam make a difference if i change the upper lower intake and throttle body?basically if i change everything else i can bolt onto a different motor when the time comes. just wondering thanks---danny

ps: still looking for any one else who has used an after market cam with stock heads and intake.

[curtis73]

You can certainly add whatever parts you want if you check clearances, etc. The point is that you may notice gaining 30 hp by using a certain cam, but by matching the head flow, intake runner design, and exhaust tuning to the new cam, not only might you net a 90-hp increase, your drivability will most likely not suffer like it would with mismatched parts. Maybe some other users know of some websites with good calculators that may help you match your parts. There are formulas to determine best parameters of intake runner length, header tube length, port flow, exhaust diameter, etc. Some of them you enter displacement, desired hp, and sometimes RPM range, and it spits out some approximate targets for the above parameters.

I'm going to be building two similar engines in the future. One is a 307 Olds (similar outputs and parameters to the 5.0 with a less desirable bore/stroke ratio) and a 302 Ford.

The Olds will be getting ported and milled stock 5A iron heads, 8.7:1 compression for 87 octane, a 210/216-degree at 50 cam with about a 1/2" lift, Edelbrock intake, and a 500 CFM Edelbrock carb. RPM range will be 1200-5500.

The Ford will be getting either Twisted Wedge aluminum heads or Edelbrock aluminum, about 10:1 compression, a 218/226 cam with .512 lift, An Edelbrock intake with (of all things) a Q-jet carb. RPM range will be 1500-6000.

The fun part? The Ford is going in my Cutlass where the 307 used to be.