I think youre misunderstanding the stages of the cam and head. remember every manufacturer has theyre own version of stages. I picked up a set of socal stg 1 heads for a good price so I went with them. I just ordered a stg 2 edp alt firing order cam. 2 different companys which have theyre own way of rating things. edp rates that cam to be good up for 900hp and considers it a street/competition cam. which is exactly what itll be used for.
now I will NEVER tow with this truck. it doesn't even have a hitch
when picking out a cam you will have to pick out a stall to match. seeing this cam is more for mid to high rpm range. I have picked out a converter to match. ill be ditching my MLG and going with an MLGK. which has a stall of 2400-2600. so combining that with the cam will actually mate together and should work out well in my build.
850-900hp was in theory my goal
Your build is/was identicle as mine.
I can DD my truck, make 900+rwhp, and went with stock LB7 pistons, cut them, dropped the CR to 16.5 and put new rings in. 6000miles on my build no issues. They are good enough for me to play with nitrous with and run 10.60's at the track. as long as you don't get greedy stock LB7/LLY pistons will get you what you want.
I would have gone forged in my built but im not going to pay 2k+ for pistons, and have to tear it down 30k miles later for new rings. plus stock pistons have been proven reliable.
I wanted to run stock piston but seeing that I need reliefs put in the pistons. it'll just make them weaker.
Id love to run fingers pistons but I can't find them any cheaper than $2100. If I'm spending that much on pistons I'm going forged. I messaged fingers and he told me to get them threw his suppliers.
I'm just going to run a mahle cast with reliefs which will be a 16.5:1 CR. They should get the job done for what I'm after.
So why not keep the stock cam and run stock pistons?
Because I just spent $1200 on a alt firing cam
Do they not make that cam in stock duration/lift?
What's the fun in that. If I'm spending that kind of money. I don't want stock lift and duration.
I've been gathering parts for my build and well pistons are the last thing I need before it heads off to the machine shop.
Goal is for around 850-900hp. Truck is not a daily driver but will see some street time on the weekend and heading to the local track also.
Turbo setup will be an s480 over a 68mm 4094. Stage 1 SoCal heads, EDP stage 2 alt firing cam, Carrillos, main & head studs, dual fuelers & 100% over injectors are the main parts to the build.
So it seems I have a few choices of pistons I've been looking at. Fingers oval bowl, mahle race cast, or just C&C lb7/lly pistons. They'll all need .075" valve reliefs put in them due to the cam. Wanting to be somewhere in the lower 16:1 CR.
i know you can't go wrong with fingers or mahle pistons but if I can get away with a lb7/lly pistons id rather run them. Very rarely will it be on the max effort tune. I'll mainly keep it around 700hp or so which is more than enough for the street.