454 TBI cam choices?

[dyeager535]

Anyone want to post up some favorites for a 454 TBI cam?

Dad is looking at buying one for his upcoming TBI swap, and I have no experience on the big block setups.

Conditions/Specs:

Stock 454 TBI/injectors (will tune as necessary)
Essentially a 454 rebuilt "stock". (no idea what heads, I can ask. Intake is an Edelbrock performer IIRC)
6000lb K20
465/205/4.11's
Tows a trailer over mountain passes
Cruise @ 70MPH=3000RPM
Never sees over 4000RPM
All freeway/logging roads/around town
Emissions not a concern. Mileage is. (like it's going to ever be "good" )

To be honest I don't know as even the "RV cams" are something he'd need. His trailer is probably 7500lbs or less, and trading any off-idle performance in that heavy of a truck kind of sucks. The cam the rebuilder put in it was the only thing that was performance related, and is way too high of a power band for how he uses it.

As it's driven, it's probably 25% trailer towing, and 75% unloaded.

 

[dave w]

I like the idea of using the old school 4 barrel Edelbrock Performer intake manifold if the 454 is going to use heads that have large oval ports. The Edelbrock TBI Performer is OK for the small oval port TBI heads. I attached some comparison pictures. I did not install the Edelbrock TBI intake on the engine with the large oval port heads.

As for the camshaft, I used the stock camshaft 0.398 / 0.398 lift. The better flowing large oval port heads, and dual exhaust will really "Wake Up" the TBI 454!

dave w

 

[sweetk30]

WOW what a choke down in port size.

ya i would save money and get a 4brl intake and then adaptor plate to tbi.

flows much better also.

have you looked at brians site gor good tbi info ? www.tbichips.com

 

[Thunder]

If it is a truck engine he is rebuilding it most likely has peanut port heads (small oval).
Best cam I can recomend other than stock is an Edelbrock 2162 cam to match with the performer intake. It is mild low end torque 0 to 5000 rpm cam. It will work good with the peanut ports. It should run ok on the stock chip with an adjustable FPR and a little higher fuel pressure. but.
I do recomend a custom chip.

 

[dyeager535]

He actually has car heads on it. Motor is simply being converted from carb to TBI while sitting in the truck.

Good bad or other he has decided to run the intake it came with (Edelbrock with mismatched ports as pictured above ) and PERHAPS the stock EFI cam. Probably not an issue on port mismatch since there is no step, however I can see where it would kill port velocity at that point. Since he is going for low end power, it can't be any worse than if the ports were large all the way through.

Noticing a HUGE disparity in lobe separation between the aftermarket "computer" cams, and what GM used, even in the "larger" cams.

 

[Thunder]

A lot of the "Car head were peanut ports. Post up the head #s

 

[dyeager535]

I'll have to get those from him.

Looked up the cams last night in my GM parts manual. While I don't believe it, they list the SAME cam for all BBC 1985-1988, which is also the same cam as the 300HP 396 had. Specs on it are pretty wimpy for a 300HP cam IMO.