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A cam or IPD VX cam? Auto DD

comanche250

comanche250

Member
Joined
Jul 12, 2024
Location
Okanagan, Canada
So I can't find a straight answer over the years. I have an auto Regina wagon that I want the best cam I can get for it. No I'm not turboing a Regina car right now, I already put a T cam in but I was struggling to do 100 km/h up the coquihalla in BC and was slowing down to 80 floored in 3rd.

The easiest cam I can seem to find is the IPD VX street cam. I can get it with the adjustable cam gear right now on sale but some of you guys say it's not worth it in an auto, and some people say it is. Some people say get an A cam, some people say it'll clog my cat. Not to mention it's hard for me to find one.

So what's the consensus? Is the VX cam really not worth it? I'd love to buy a new cam but that seems to be the only one I can find easily.
 
The VX cam is decent. My experience was with it in an '84 245 with the lower compression B23F and a M46, though. Wound up switching to a B cam from a B21F, which didn't seem much different. A little less grunt in the higher rpm range, but felt decent in the lower-mid rpm range. The B cam is slightly hotter than the A cam, but does have more overlap. Might be another option to look into. The only issue with the A and B cams sold in North America is that they don't have the distributor drive at the rear end. So, if your wagon has a head mounted distributor, you may be stuck going the VX route anyway.
 
There's a dyno graph some swedes did that shows the VX3 makes less power than a T cam below 4k rpms. I'd be curious how a map based system handles a higher overlap cam. For an off the shelf cam the IPD Turbo is nearly a V, just with pointer lobes at the peak for en extra .5mm of lift. Despite the turbo name it's a good NA cam.

If you can't get up hills with a T there's probably other issues, I towed a large trailer across the USA with a T cam. Can you double check the timing? Does your Regina car have the block mounted distributor?
 

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i know people dislike the vx but stuck with the untunable speed density EFI, it has the most similar profile to an M to keep the stock fuel/timing curve as optimal as reasonably possible. I have never personally ran one though
 
I had a B cam in my '93 Regina car (most of which seem to have been block mount distributors) and liked it. It definitely felt like something compared to M cam Regina cars I've owned and driven. It never clogged the cat that I know of and it went to the scrapyard with 340k miles on it.

The issue I had on hills was converter lockup; it seemed reluctant to unlock for some reason though I see you are having trouble even in 3rd.
 
OVERDRIVE said:
There's a dyno graph some swedes did that shows the VX3 makes less power than a T cam below 4k rpms. I'd be curious how a map based system handles a higher overlap cam. For an off the shelf cam the IPD Turbo is nearly a V, just with pointer lobes at the peak for en extra .5mm of lift. Despite the turbo name it's a good NA cam.

If you can't get up hills with a T there's probably other issues, I towed a large trailer across the USA with a T cam. Can you double check the timing? Does your Regina car have the block mounted distributor?
Click to expand...
The Regina has a head mounted distributor and controls the timing electronically. The distributor does have some adjustment though so I wonder if I would still have to set base timing. I'll look into it. The turbo cam is priced similarly I could probably get that too.
I have been noticing poor fuel mileage along with a weird little hesitation just off idle. I was gonna go to pick and pull and grab a bunch of GM MAP sensors to try out (free).
John242Ti said:
The VX cam is decent. My experience was with it in an '84 245 with the lower compression B23F and a M46, though. Wound up switching to a B cam from a B21F, which didn't seem much different. A little less grunt in the higher rpm range, but felt decent in the lower-mid rpm range. The B cam is slightly hotter than the A cam, but does have more overlap. Might be another option to look into. The only issue with the A and B cams sold in North America is that they don't have the distributor drive at the rear end. So, if your wagon has a head mounted distributor, you may be stuck going the VX route anyway.
Click to expand...
That's not a problem for me I can get a grove cut at the machine shop down the road, they can just match it to my original M cam I have lying around.
 
A is better than B for automatics. VX would probably be the easiest to just drop in though.
What about a rear gear change instead?
 
OVERDRIVE said:
There's a dyno graph some swedes did that shows the VX3 makes less power than a T cam below 4k rpms. I'd be curious how a map based system handles a higher overlap cam. For an off the shelf cam the IPD Turbo is nearly a V, just with pointer lobes at the peak for en extra .5mm of lift. Despite the turbo name it's a good NA cam.

If you can't get up hills with a T there's probably other issues, I towed a large trailer across the USA with a T cam. Can you double check the timing? Does your Regina car have the block mounted distributor?
Click to expand...
Whether he has a block mount or head mount distributor makes no difference, other than the need for a drive slot in the end of the cam. In other words, you can not adjust the ignition timing with either type of distributor. It is crank triggered and fixed. The only way to adjust the base timing is to move the location of the crank position sensor. RSI produced a vernier type of CPS bracket in order to do that.
 
Take a closer look at the graph. IMO, you are wasting your money. As said above the T cam out performs or matches the torque curve of the VX all the way up to 3800 RPM. Unless you plan on pulling these grades at 4500-5000 RPM you won't gain anything by switching to the VX. My experience with the VX is that it was absolutely underwhelming. It was in a 1993 240 with auto transmission and only 175K miles on the engine. It had a rougher idle than stock and made more noise as it struggled to reach 60 MPH. It felt no better than an M cam under normal driving conditions. IOW, no more usable torque where you want it for a daily driver. Spend you money on shaving the head to bump up the compression and get a more free flowing exhaust system. Those are both "Free" hp.
 
2manyturbos said:
Take a closer look at the graph. IMO, you are wasting your money. As said above the T cam out performs or matches the torque curve of the VX all the way up to 3800 RPM. Unless you plan on pulling these grades at 4500-5000 RPM you won't gain anything by switching to the VX. My experience with the VX is that it was absolutely underwhelming. It was in a 1993 240 with auto transmission and only 175K miles on the engine. It had a rougher idle than stock and made more noise as it struggled to reach 60 MPH. It felt no better than an M cam under normal driving conditions. IOW, no more usable torque where you want it for a daily driver. Spend you money on shaving the head to bump up the compression and get a more free flowing exhaust system. Those are both "Free" hp.
Click to expand...
That is what we conversed about in the low mileage thread he had in non performance.
 
2manyturbos said:
It must not have sunk in. It might take the ministerial 3 to get the point across. Tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them, tell them what you told them. Or, hit them in the head with a 2X4 first to get their attention, then, tell them.
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So you guys are telling me a stock T cam with 218/215 duration and 10/10 lift is gonna be the exact same as a vx cam with 245/236 duration and 11.3/10/6 lift??? Well f*** me why aren't we all running T cams in our cars then for the best performance. f*** off with that shit.

What point are you even trying to get across right now? I'm all ears.

Should I not get an A or a VX cam then? Because I'm not spending several more hundred dollars to pull the head, shave it down, and spend a bunch of money on a bigger exhaust. Not to mention all the down time.
 
The best street cam to get is something like an Enem V15 n/a version. Your most affordable path for a small higher rpm improvement would be the A cam. You should also consider the V cam mentioned above. Don't know if you can find a slotted one though. Between the VX, and A, B, and V cam I would chose the V. Then if I wanted about 150hp improve the exhaust and raise the compression as mentioned.
 
comanche250 said:
Well IPD seems to be the only option for a new camshaft
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You have a swedish car. Then you know where they make the widest range of aftermarket cams. IPD is the only US choice. But if you shop overseas and/or get in on a group buy or even run the group buy. You can get good swedish cams. For a daily fun driver I used a V15 n/a for over a hunder k miles of driving. Gave me good high rpm power without changing anything. It's 400$ to get a cam like that.
 
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