2003cobra#2's 3.4 Whipple Build

olympic

Well-Known Member
Established Member
Joined
Dec 28, 2014
Messages
3,511
Location
Canada
^^Good advice on the passenger side secondary tensioner. It helps maintain timing accuracy while the engine is running. Also, you can get better accuracy with an 18" degree wheel. https://www.summitracing.com/int/parts/mor-62191 although I don't know how feasible that is with the engine in the car.

The cams you listed have a lot of duration. The idle will sound awesome but be prepeared for driveability issues below 2000 RPM (bucking, stumbling, stalling) and high IAT2 temps when driving in city traffic. They say a good tuner can mitigate some of those issues. I recently swapped from Crower Stage 4 cams (236/244 duration) down to stage 2 (222/222 duration) because I was tired of the issues and didn't have access to a local tuner to help deal with it. Now it drives perfect with the help of an tune by Kevin Dunn! :cool:
 

03cobra#2

Hobbyist Of Many Hobbies
Established Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2007
Messages
1,518
Location
Cleveland, Ohio
^^Good advice on the passenger side secondary tensioner. It helps maintain timing accuracy while the engine is running. Also, you can get better accuracy with an 18" degree wheel. https://www.summitracing.com/int/parts/mor-62191 although I don't know how feasible that is with the engine in the car.

The cams you listed have a lot of duration. The idle will sound awesome but be prepeared for driveability issues below 2000 RPM (bucking, stumbling, stalling) and high IAT2 temps when driving in city traffic. They say a good tuner can mitigate some of those issues. I recently swapped from Crower Stage 4 cams (236/244 duration) down to stage 2 (222/222 duration) because I was tired of the issues and didn't have access to a local tuner to help deal with it. Now it drives perfect with the help of an tune by Kevin Dunn! :cool:
Thank you for the input. I did talk to my tuner and he said comp stage 3's won't be a problem so I'm taking his word for it. A few years ago I did comp stage 3 cams on my 2v and with a tune it drove good. Now I just need to decide if I'm going to need a low pressure bypass valve for the Whipple or just stick with the stock one. My tuner is very good.
 

olympic

Well-Known Member
Established Member
Joined
Dec 28, 2014
Messages
3,511
Location
Canada
Sounds good! When I bought my 2.9 in 2017 I was told that that the low vacuum bypass valve was now standard on all Whipples, so you likely already have it. Probably have to call Whipple or test it yourself to confirm.
 

94slowbra1

Well-Known Member
Established Member
Joined
Feb 19, 2007
Messages
2,779
Location
new orleans
I just tested my bypass, for different reasons, and I remember by 5lbs mine was open. Not fully open but enough to be effective. Hopefully that's the case for you
 

03cobra#2

Hobbyist Of Many Hobbies
Established Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2007
Messages
1,518
Location
Cleveland, Ohio
I just tested my bypass, for different reasons, and I remember by 5lbs mine was open. Not fully open but enough to be effective. Hopefully that's the case for you
That's good to hear. Thanks for chiming in. I'll have more updates this weekend. I'm ordering the cobra engineering tensioner this morning.
 

03cobra#2

Hobbyist Of Many Hobbies
Established Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2007
Messages
1,518
Location
Cleveland, Ohio
Spent some time installing the cams and secondary gears. I was able to line up the copper links on the secondary gears and line up the cams no problem. The L&M adjustable secondarys are nice pieces.

One thing I did notice is when I look at the main chains I only see one copper link. How do I make sure the main gears / chains are spot on with only 1 colored link on the chain?

My main cam gears and the cobra engineering secondary tensioner arrive today.
c9e5b7cbfe131cb9b06b90c1687f9d37.jpg
f6fffbfeb8ffabd24917b9433700bb2d.jpg
4185254403334e4c82beb2f13fa32bb4.jpg
2bf8758bcf2f779b76a96397f5b0b589.jpg
 

Attachments

  • b56f458c901d9799e65ff020dae03a5b.jpg
    b56f458c901d9799e65ff020dae03a5b.jpg
    661.2 KB · Views: 166
  • 38f6f88b2cf36b045e93b988dc295ff9.jpg
    38f6f88b2cf36b045e93b988dc295ff9.jpg
    689.7 KB · Views: 143
  • 2b59aa2cb0e9f65e8e648a1e13540d99.jpg
    2b59aa2cb0e9f65e8e648a1e13540d99.jpg
    661.2 KB · Views: 151
  • 5d29e33a8f3697de711d4469b5f7bf63.jpg
    5d29e33a8f3697de711d4469b5f7bf63.jpg
    574.6 KB · Views: 121

03cobra#2

Hobbyist Of Many Hobbies
Established Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2007
Messages
1,518
Location
Cleveland, Ohio
So I have the cams in, and drivers side gears, and main chain on. Setting up my degree wheel, lash adjuster and follower installed on piston #6. The piston stop that came with my tfs degree kit won't thread into the sparkplug hole. So I ended up making one out of a old spark plug. Next I'll install that into piston #1 find TDC and set up the degree wheel. So far so good.

One thing I'm gonna have a problem with is setting up the dial indicator for the exaust cam. Not much room to work. I'm hoping if I move the brake resivoir / booster completely out of the way and jack the engine up it will give me the room to set up the dial indicator. Fingers crossed.
 

03cobra#2

Hobbyist Of Many Hobbies
Established Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2007
Messages
1,518
Location
Cleveland, Ohio
There's not many pics out there floating around people degreeing cams in their car so here's a picture of how I have everything set up in my engine bay
5e70bb81da95516c8238a62a8dcc7265.jpg
9d9f9658f2dbeab2d040ef77b2eccbb1.jpg
 

MalcolmV8

Well-Known Member
Established Member
Joined
Mar 27, 2003
Messages
7,353
Location
Tampa, FL
You can definitely do it in the engine bay. It's just a PITA. I always prefer to do it on the engine stand when possible but when I was working out some annoying issues with various cam degrees I re-did mine in the car every few days till I figured out what I needed to and had them running properly. You have to tear off a bunch of stuff but after doing it a few times this is a one day job.

I think it's a hard process to learn in the engine bay if its your first time doing it but it can be done. Look for consistency. If you pull the chains off and put them back and re-check they should still be degreed spot on. If not you have some error somewhere in your process.

IMG_8900.jpg

AF1QipOpxGaCZ9U24hLEL6dDhw1T_4GOF6t1VjYMHRDf
 

03cobra#2

Hobbyist Of Many Hobbies
Established Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2007
Messages
1,518
Location
Cleveland, Ohio
You can definitely do it in the engine bay. It's just a PITA. I always prefer to do it on the engine stand when possible but when I was working out some annoying issues with various cam degrees I re-did mine in the car every few days till I figured out what I needed to and had them running properly. You have to tear off a bunch of stuff but after doing it a few times this is a one day job.

I think it's a hard process to learn in the engine bay if its your first time doing it but it can be done. Look for consistency. If you pull the chains off and put them back and re-check they should still be degreed spot on. If not you have some error somewhere in your process.

View attachment 1621712
AF1QipOpxGaCZ9U24hLEL6dDhw1T_4GOF6t1VjYMHRDf
This exact picture is what I used to set up everything. They key is it shows enough room to get the dial indicator. Thanks! I'm all set up and ready to start rotating the engine and get some numbers.

As I do this.... I will do it over and over again until I get repeatable results. Starting from finding TDC. I have the time available as this is only a weekend car.
 

03cobra#2

Hobbyist Of Many Hobbies
Established Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2007
Messages
1,518
Location
Cleveland, Ohio
Started to get my feet wet degreeing last night. The piston stop that came in my TFS degree kit would not thread down into the spark plug hole. So I ended up making one out of a spark plug. After setting things up and checking things I went through the process of checking the drivers side exaust cam first. I came up with a centerline of 118. Which is exactly what the cam card calls for. Very excited about that. Did it a couple times and came up with the same reading. I moved to the drivers side intake cam and came up with a reading of 117 and the cam card calls for 114, so I have a bit of work to do there. I didn't really understand how the adjustable secondary cam sprocket works so I attempted an adjustment and it read totally wrong. Now that I understand how to advance / retard using these gears, I will get back to it tonight. With any luck at all I may be able to have the drivers side done tonight / tomorrow. This is going to be time consuming but I'm having fun doing it. Here is a pic of the piston stop I'm using, and I'll have more pics soon.

Edit, still on the lookout for a crusher inlet for the 3.4
66198f0f6dc5d10bb24e7b6980715fb7.jpg
 

03cobra#2

Hobbyist Of Many Hobbies
Established Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2007
Messages
1,518
Location
Cleveland, Ohio

cj428mach

Well-Known Member
Established Member
Joined
Sep 21, 2012
Messages
7,609
Location
Kansas
Na-svt Facebook page is dedicated to cam degreeing. I think you 'll be way happier doing research degreeing for less overlap. Obviously Malcolm has a lot of experience in this, he buys, assembles, and tunes his own car. He also tunes others cars so he can probably give you some tips.
 

03cobra#2

Hobbyist Of Many Hobbies
Established Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2007
Messages
1,518
Location
Cleveland, Ohio
Update: I am done degreeing the cams. Wow what a event that was. It ended up taking me about a total of 12-14 hours. The initial reading had all the cams off by about 3-4 degrees. After I was done I was spot on mostly....a couple of the cams were .5 or so off the mark, but you know what, I am fine with that...I'm not building a dedicated race car. I ended up following the spec that came with the Comp Cams cards. 114 center line on the intakes, and 118 center line on the exhaust. Here is a few thoughts for anyone thinking of doing it themselves as I have never degreed cams before.

1. It is not that bad once you move stuff out of the way. I had to move the brake booster / reservoir, the fan for the radiator, and use zip ties to hold the wires out of the way. I ended up keeping the sway bar in place but I did move the coolant tank and hose out of the way as well. Good news is there is plenty of room to set up the dial indicator and degree wheel.
2. Using the L&M Engines adjustable secondary cam sprockets, and Comp Cams Adjustable gears made things pretty easy to adjust. Just take your readings, pull the chains, tensioners, sprockets off, make your adjustment put back on and re-record your readings.
3. I tried just clamping the chains to get tension but I just could not get consistent readings. So I decided to install the tensioners. Once I did that my readings became consistent right away. It is a bit of a pain to pull the chains / tensioners off to make your adjustments but you get pretty good at it and can do it quickly.
4. The setup took almost as much time as the actual degreeing. Such as finding TDC using a piston stop, mounting and adjusting the degreeing wheel and pointer, installing the solid lash adjuster, and setting up the dial indicator. I bought the TFS degreeing kit and ford supplemental kit. Those 2 kits combined come with everything you need, however I did end up picking up a digital dial indicator from Harbor freight as I was more comfortable using a digital....I just felt I could be more accurate with a digital rather then analog.
5. I worked on it a little here and there...this is not something you can rush if you never done it before. I had to read up on it for about 2 weeks to understand. There are a couple good Facebook groups and threads out there that really helped.

All in all, I'm glad I did the degreeing process for piece of mind, but my goodness it was a huge event that took up a lot of brain power lol.

Next up is to bleed down the lash adjusters, and pop the followers in...then start on reinstalling the timing chain cover / valve covers. So far so good.
23bac9c2803f525c25a544dfd8dcc2c3.jpg
9c47a805f5432ebe5412b461f51bc612.jpg
16468c8e0ae822a4db8557df0b7b392d.jpg
5a120e06b3df5d3742c81b9939c16f62.jpg
 
Last edited:

Users who are viewing this thread



Top