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***see later replies for info on new headers***
The emails speak for themselves. The last couple of issues of camaro performers they've been doing a buildup on a 99+ v6 camaro. im not sure of the exact year.
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here is my email to him:
From: Larry Leuchtmann <loochy88@gmail.com>
Subject: the 3.8 project in camaroperformers
Date: Sat, 6 May 2006 01:36:41 -0500
hey, not sure who to direct this to. forward it to the correct party
if i got the wrong person please :) ive been following your 3.8
camaro article in the camaro performers magazine. last time you guys
made it sound like you were looking for headres. pacesetter
(lmperformance.com) and rksport (rksport.com) both have a set of
headers for the 3.8 fbody. this time it seemed like you had some
headers in mind though. as far as tuning goes, hptuners has a
programmer for the year you're working on i believe (hptuners.com).
also, texas speed performance has a mail order tune you may want to
let your readers know about, as does pcm for less. As for the
nitrous, the NOS brand 5175 kit (i believe thats the number) is great,
unless youre looking for a wet kit, though on this application i'd
recommend dry. Ive been running it for a while. remove that
throttlebody screen if you havnt yet, its a good idea on the straight
tb's especially if youre spraing through the maf with a dry kit.
Have a look at my v6 if you'd like. www.cardomain.com/id/loochy88
for a ton more info, check out http://forum.camarov6.com/index.php
-larry
ps: its awesome to see some v6 articles, keep it up!
------------------
------------------
And his email to me:
Hi Larry-
My name is Hib Halverson. I'm the guy who's writing the series in Camaro
Performers about the V6 F-car. I'm also the guy who does a lot of the
shop work on the car and directs the project.
Thanks for writing the magazine. I looked at that web site and checked
out your car. Looks pretty nice. Your email shows you've got a pretty
good mod program going.
Now, as to the points made in your letter.
Both the RKSport nor the Pacesetter header fit early 3.8s but not the
later engines. The problem is the EGR connection on the #1 primary on
both those headers is not compatible with the late-style EGR pipe. To use
either of them requires fabrication of a connection compatible with the
late-style EGR. Our choices were either to get the RKSport or the
Pacesetter and modify them to fit or just have a set of headers built to
our specifications. We decided the latter. Also, with the RKSport
headers, early in the project we actually considered getting them then
fabricating the EGR to fit but when RKSport said they were going to
discontinue that part once the supply sold-out, we decided it would be
unacceptable to endorse a product in the magazine series that consumers
would not be able to buy.
HPTuners for the 3.8 is a reasonably good program, but there is a pretty
steep learning curve with the amount of calibration change we required
because of our camshaft and cylinder head changes. We decided we'd be
better off and more efficient if we had a professional calibration
engineer do the work for us rather than waste a lot of time experimenting
while learning the program. Also, there are some things HPTuners cannot
do that our calibration engineer can. A mail order tune would not have
worked for our application.
Although I've used NOS in the past, I'm not nuts about their products
since the company was sold to Holley. We're going to use a system from
Nitrous Supply, a company which, interestingly, was formed by two people
who once worked for NOS and temporarily retired after selling the company
to Holley. I'm not sure yet whether we're going to use a wet or dry
system but I will consider your suggestion of dry but I'm interested to
know more about why you feel a dry system is the better choice.
As for the honey screen in the TB, our intake ducts make an S-turn
because they adapt the offset V6 air intake to the V8 style air box which
has the connection at the center of the top. When you do that you MUST
have the screen in there as a flow straightener. If you don't the MAF
generates incorrect flow data and the engine won't run right at idle or
low speed.
I'm glad you're enjoying the series. We have Pt5 in production and a
final Pt 6 is being considered. If you want to see it, write the magazine
again and tell them!
------------
So... the tb screen point seems to make sense to me. Im suprised to hear that rk is discontinuing their headers. has anyone else heard this. also, can anyone else confirm these claims of the egr problems with pacesetters. I didnt think it was that big of a deal.
discuss :)
The emails speak for themselves. The last couple of issues of camaro performers they've been doing a buildup on a 99+ v6 camaro. im not sure of the exact year.
----------------------
here is my email to him:
From: Larry Leuchtmann <loochy88@gmail.com>
Subject: the 3.8 project in camaroperformers
Date: Sat, 6 May 2006 01:36:41 -0500
hey, not sure who to direct this to. forward it to the correct party
if i got the wrong person please :) ive been following your 3.8
camaro article in the camaro performers magazine. last time you guys
made it sound like you were looking for headres. pacesetter
(lmperformance.com) and rksport (rksport.com) both have a set of
headers for the 3.8 fbody. this time it seemed like you had some
headers in mind though. as far as tuning goes, hptuners has a
programmer for the year you're working on i believe (hptuners.com).
also, texas speed performance has a mail order tune you may want to
let your readers know about, as does pcm for less. As for the
nitrous, the NOS brand 5175 kit (i believe thats the number) is great,
unless youre looking for a wet kit, though on this application i'd
recommend dry. Ive been running it for a while. remove that
throttlebody screen if you havnt yet, its a good idea on the straight
tb's especially if youre spraing through the maf with a dry kit.
Have a look at my v6 if you'd like. www.cardomain.com/id/loochy88
for a ton more info, check out http://forum.camarov6.com/index.php
-larry
ps: its awesome to see some v6 articles, keep it up!
------------------
------------------
And his email to me:
Hi Larry-
My name is Hib Halverson. I'm the guy who's writing the series in Camaro
Performers about the V6 F-car. I'm also the guy who does a lot of the
shop work on the car and directs the project.
Thanks for writing the magazine. I looked at that web site and checked
out your car. Looks pretty nice. Your email shows you've got a pretty
good mod program going.
Now, as to the points made in your letter.
Both the RKSport nor the Pacesetter header fit early 3.8s but not the
later engines. The problem is the EGR connection on the #1 primary on
both those headers is not compatible with the late-style EGR pipe. To use
either of them requires fabrication of a connection compatible with the
late-style EGR. Our choices were either to get the RKSport or the
Pacesetter and modify them to fit or just have a set of headers built to
our specifications. We decided the latter. Also, with the RKSport
headers, early in the project we actually considered getting them then
fabricating the EGR to fit but when RKSport said they were going to
discontinue that part once the supply sold-out, we decided it would be
unacceptable to endorse a product in the magazine series that consumers
would not be able to buy.
HPTuners for the 3.8 is a reasonably good program, but there is a pretty
steep learning curve with the amount of calibration change we required
because of our camshaft and cylinder head changes. We decided we'd be
better off and more efficient if we had a professional calibration
engineer do the work for us rather than waste a lot of time experimenting
while learning the program. Also, there are some things HPTuners cannot
do that our calibration engineer can. A mail order tune would not have
worked for our application.
Although I've used NOS in the past, I'm not nuts about their products
since the company was sold to Holley. We're going to use a system from
Nitrous Supply, a company which, interestingly, was formed by two people
who once worked for NOS and temporarily retired after selling the company
to Holley. I'm not sure yet whether we're going to use a wet or dry
system but I will consider your suggestion of dry but I'm interested to
know more about why you feel a dry system is the better choice.
As for the honey screen in the TB, our intake ducts make an S-turn
because they adapt the offset V6 air intake to the V8 style air box which
has the connection at the center of the top. When you do that you MUST
have the screen in there as a flow straightener. If you don't the MAF
generates incorrect flow data and the engine won't run right at idle or
low speed.
I'm glad you're enjoying the series. We have Pt5 in production and a
final Pt 6 is being considered. If you want to see it, write the magazine
again and tell them!
------------
So... the tb screen point seems to make sense to me. Im suprised to hear that rk is discontinuing their headers. has anyone else heard this. also, can anyone else confirm these claims of the egr problems with pacesetters. I didnt think it was that big of a deal.
discuss :)
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