More power for my ,99 k1500

[drenolov]

I just had my stock 5.7 vortex stroked with a cam it's not the big hitter I thought I would get out of a 383 so I'm wondering how I can more out of my girl thinking about force air it's all stock other than the stroker

[kstruckcountry]

Know how much hp it's making? A 6.0 out of a newer pickup can put down closer to 400...

[Chris]

With keeping your current engine and staying NA, better heads, bigger cam, headers.

[drenolov]

I don't know what it's putting out I had it stroked first time I've ever had a engine rebuilt and I don't really feel that the shop really informed me of everything I should know

[drenolov]

It got a bigger cam when it got rebuilt

[ifixedit]

It really depends on how much you want to spend and what the computer will tolerate before it goes bonkers. Generally the next steps would be a exhaust that flows more freely, headers, dual exhaust, low restriction mufflers and cats, then I'd be looking at the intake to see who offers what, I'd check with Summit or Jegs, probably something from Edelbrock.

 

The Vortec heads on your 99 are actually quite good and are great bang for the buck performance heads, in fact are the best stock cast iron heads Chevrolet has ever offered including besting the performance of "performance" small block heads from the 60's. Even though the Vortes have smaller valves (which can be changed to larger ones for even more power), because of their fast burn design and 64 cc combustion chambers, out of the box they are generally worth a good 20-40 HP over any other stock performance small block heads GM has ever offered including the famed "Camel Hump" heads. A word of caution: Stock Vortec heads are a bit limited in how much lift the cam can have (about .480") unless some machining is performed and new springs and screw in studs are installed. I would assume whoever did the rebuild stayed in the safe zone on the cam lift, otherwise you would be having problems unless they did the above mentioned work already.

 

I'd also quizz the place that did the rebuild and get the cam specs they used and what they figure you ended up with for compression ratio, then I'd contact someone like Comp Cams and see how your cam stacks up against what they would recommend. Compression ratio, gear ratio, stock converter or one with a stall are all big difference makers in what would be recommended. Although it may sound good now, the wrong cam for the application could really hurt the performance.