Hey all, I know this has been answered before but I forgot. I have a ported/milled head (0.040") for 10.6:1 compression. I want to have the smoothest idle possible. I've heard not to adjust the exhaust cam gear due to the cam angle sensor being there. Does that still apply if my head is milled?

Based on experimenting with just the intake cam gear, it seems like retarding that gear 3-4 degrees results in the smoothest idle. But it also seems to result in less power. If I start advancing the intake cam gear, I get much better low-end response/power, but then the idle tends to jump around a bit from 800-900 rpms. I'd appreciate any input you guys have. The ultimate goal is the smoothest idle possible, not power. My car almost sounds like it has cams at idle, even if it holds steady at a certain rpm.

Also, is it normal to hear small popping sounds from the exhaust if I hold the rpm's steady at 3000 rpms in neutral? Thanks.

You close to where Thura and me are milled to, and we both came to about 2 degrees of retard. Because the milled head changes the geometry of the belt teeth on teh sprockets. If you can get her to dead on TDC at the crank. I actually marked the inner portion of my cam gears to like them up.



http://www.exileracing.com
una salus victus
Mods List: http://highlander.dsmpower.com/sig.htm

Originally posted by Michael_97RS
You close to where Thura and me are milled to, and we both came to about 2 degrees of retard. Because the milled head changes the geometry of the belt teeth on teh sprockets. If you can get her to dead on TDC at the crank. I actually marked the inner portion of my cam gears to like them up. http://www.exileracing.com una salus victus Mods List: http://highlander.dsmpower.com/sig.htm

Thanks! Did you also leave your exhaust cam gear set at 0?

Nope, exhaust cam is the main one to get the corrcetion here, because it is responceable for firing the injectors. I set the exhaust cam to what I think is correct for the milled head and only play with the intake cam for tuning.



http://www.exileracing.com
una salus victus
Mods List: http://highlander.dsmpower.com/sig.htm

Originally posted by Michael_97RS
Nope, exhaust cam is the main one to get the corrcetion here, because it is responceable for firing the injectors. I set the exhaust cam to what I think is correct for the milled head and only play with the intake cam for tuning. http://www.exileracing.com una salus victus Mods List: http://highlander.dsmpower.com/sig.htm

Oh ok, so to clarify, you have exhaust cam set to -2 degrees, and then intake set to whatever you find works best?

Originally posted by Michael_97RS
Nope, exhaust cam is the main one to get the corrcetion here, because it is responceable for firing the injectors. I set the exhaust cam to what I think is correct for the milled head and only play with the intake cam for tuning. http://www.exileracing.com una salus victus Mods List: http://highlander.dsmpower.com/sig.htm

Oh ok, so to clarify, you have exhaust set to -2 degrees, and then set intake to whatever works best? I had the opposite - I had exhaust set to 0, and intake set to -2.

-2 degrees on both should line them back up stock if 2 degrees is the magic number for you.

When tuning for power I play with the intake cam.



http://www.exileracing.com
una salus victus
Mods List: http://highlander.dsmpower.com/sig.htm

Originally posted by Michael_97RS
-2 degrees on both should line them back up stock if 2 degrees is the magic number for you. When tuning for power I play with the intake cam. http://www.exileracing.com una salus victus Mods List: http://highlander.dsmpower.com/sig.htm

Thanks! -2 on both seems to run pretty good, but for some reason it seemed like my original setting of -3 intake, 0 exhaust was better at idle (may be just imagination). I'm going to try -1 on both and -3 on both to see if either of those are better.

As I recall your head is also ported with being milled.

In which case opening the intake valves later reduces overlap and will create a bit more vacuum. The ported head reduced idle vacuum, so playing with the cam settings allows the ECU to see closer to what it expects for vacuum and can deal better with idle fuel maps.



http://www.exileracing.com
una salus victus
Mods List: http://highlander.dsmpower.com/sig.htm