454 Build questions-options

[trevmountain]

Hello everyone,
I Finally decided to pull my motor and throw some money into a quality rebuild/upgrade. Would love some help with this process. I have an engine builder who will be doing the work and I just need to come up with some configurations. So here is the lowdown...

Rig is an 84 GMC One ton long bed 4x4, 454, Turbo 400, 205 case with gearvendor.
373 Gears, bout a 7 inch lift with 37's

The motor is already pretty well built up. Bored .030 over with 049 cast heads with some porting/polishing. Can't remember what cam is in it but it's a medium range. GM performace roller rockers and hydraulic lifters. Weiand action plus dual plane intake, Thorley headers and edelbrock carb. MSD 6Al, GM Hei ignition.....

Some questions

Heads...Iron vs Aluminum? I have heard mixed reviews on this for years. This is a big heavy truck so weight loss is the least of my concerns. Performance and quality being top of my list. I am open to any and all options with the heads. I would rather put more money into it now.
What about going with hydraulic roller cam set up?

Just hoping for some experience with different combinations that have worked well in builds that any of you have done. Things can look good on paper but having actually done the work and ran with it for a reasonable amount of time is another.
Looking for as much power and torque that I can reasonably get with out sacrificing daily driving and reasonable idle characteristics.

Engine hopes summed up in three words. (Durability Quality Performance)

Also I am hoping to go with the Fast EZ EFI kit if I can stretch the funds that far. If not now I plan to go with this type of injection in the future.

Thanks and I appreciate all responses

 

[kevin400ex]

you've already got one of the best flowing oval port heads made in the 049's. if they dont have the bigger valves in em thats one area you can do some work on. a roller cam would be anice addition, and some balancing and blueprinting would help longevity as well. id maybe switch the intake to an edelbrock performer rpm air gap manifold. another option is to stroke it for more power. you can add a 4.250 stroke crank and with a 4.130 bore youd have a 496, a very popular combo that makes some great power.

 

[trevmountain]

Thanks for the tips kevin. Couple questions, I found some build info from previous owner. The only description for the valves is swirl polished undercut one piece SS valves. The cam specs that I found read 218 degree duration at 50 thousanths valve lift total of 520 lift.

What size valves do think would be good. I do want to go with a roller cam. What do you think of the cam size that's in it.

You mentioned the edelbrock performer intake. Was wondering what you thought of those Edelbrock Aluminum Performer RPM Heads. They seem reasonably priced and my engine builder said he has had good success with them. Your thoughts. How would the 049's I have compare.

 

[kevin400ex]

a set of 049's with the 2.19 and 1,88 valves installed WITH bowl blending and pocket work will outflow the oval port edelbrocks. if you went even bigger with the valves to a 2.25 1.94 and maxed out the porting you can do to them they will outflow the edelbrock rec ports. im guessing your current heads are at least as good flow wise as a outa the box set of edelbrock ovals. if you want aluminum heads though they would be a good choice with some port work done to them. you current cam is probalby the biggest you can go without a higher stall converter. a comp cams xr270hr cam sounds interesting, split duration 218 in 224 ex at .050 .510 lift on both with a centerline of 110. should be good for about 540hp and 590ftlbs @ 4500-5000rpm

all in all it boils down to how much you want to spend on the project and intended use will be. if you tow much you will want to build the engine to have low end torque, a daily driver low to mid (i prefer a really powerful midrange myself for daily drving), lots of variables.

also bigger isnt always better specially when it comes to cams. in my motorhome i swapped out on rv cam for another with slightly more lift and duration and it didnt have nearly as much power as the smaller cam did. same thing in my 79 k5, i swapped out a comp 262 hyd for a 272 hyd the powerloss was signifigant, but the bigger ccam sounded cool lol

 

[trevmountain]

Sounds like I may just stick with the 049's and just follow your machining advise. Should save me some bucks too.

Ya my goal for the truck is to build up the low end torque. Truck is set up now with 373 gears and a gear vendor. Haven't actually run the gear vendor yet, It will be getting installed while the motor is being worked on. As it was without the gear vendor it did pretty good at cruising speed but lacked in the off the line power. It would take a sec or so to get it wound up. I would like to stick with the 373's because I really like having the cruising ability and lower rpm's for when I'm driving on the highway. But if gearing it down would make more sense I'm not against it. What's your thoughts on gearing/camsize for my situation and goals?

Is the Comp Cams xr270hr just something you've been looking at or have you run it? Ya certainly don't wanna lose any power by going with a larger cam. But I guess that's not always the case. Lots of variables at play here.

Really appreciate the tips and keep em comin

 

[kevin400ex]

i havent used that cam before. i used a program called cam quest to play with numbers and see what it comes up with. with the size tire you are running you really need to regear to at least 4.10's.