Hey guys. I'll be ordering cams really soon for my IX head swap. And these are the three cams that I've been thinking about a lot. I've tried PMing Mike@awd and JohnBradley for info but I think they're not getting back to me because they'd rather not comment on what is better or worse. And there are a lot of dyno threads on the S2 but only one on the tomei and literally none on ER's custom grind gsc "S2R" cams.

The S2s give impressive results as we all know. The tomei from that one awdmotorsports thread also seems pretty impressive and with 11.5mm of lift I'd think is capable of more power. And the S2R supposedly is a S2 with 12.0mm of lift intake/exhaust.

I'd like to know about the driveability of these cams (especially low speed), the idle (as stock as possible, I'd rather not have cam lope), power potential, and what part of the rev range the cams are optimized for. This is all known for the S2 but theres almost no information for the other 2 cams. And this will be combined with a 2.2 or 2.3L 4G63 shortblock and really well ported IX head, along with a gtx3076r/hta3076r/BBK-C turbo. I'll probably never rev past 8.5k.

I've literally been thinking and searching on info about this since last August and haven't come up with much. Now its decision time and any information at all is very much appreciated!

 

They are probably not getting back to you yet because the "s2r" isn't a production cam as of yet. I would suggest calling and talking to Greg@GSC

 

There are people that do have it though. ER had it custom made by GSC. I almost bought one a few months ago. I guess now they're making the S2R an official product.

 

I think your best bet would be the Tomei procams. They don't have much of any lope to them which is one thing you want. And they are pretty close in power gains to S2's but no official comparison has been done. The S2's are 274 intake/ 272exhaust I believe with 11.2 lift. The procams have slightly less duration at 270 int/exh. So the extra lift makes up for it.

 

The "s2r" has very little in common with the s2. It also is fairly big and not suitable for a stock head.

 

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That "S2R" grind is only available through English and has more in common with an S3 than anything else.

 

Solid advice. Thanks guys. I just assumed the duration of the S2R was the same as the s2 (274/272) with more lift.

So far it looks like my pick will be the tomei. Its going on a CNC ported head that looks like this:



So its definitely going to take advantage of anything cams have to offer. I basically want to extract maximum power across the rev range while maintaining very civilized idle and driveability (ie. not struggling to maintain vaccuum). Thats why I ruled out 280s like the S3. My ideal powerband is 4000 to 8000 and power of 500+.