Rewind:
My engine is a 8500mile crate LT1 engine. It was replaced July.
Had everything short of the intake, fuel injectors, fuel pump, and a few other things replaced.
3rd Oil change - Found a piece of plastic in the oil. Very tiny, about as large as jumper off a piece of computer hardware. It appeared to be burned. Brought it to the dealer who had installed the engine and I was assured it was a piece of a valve seal and not much to worry about.
Two Weeks Ago - Faulty AIR pump replaced under recall.

Present:
I look out the window of my apartment at 3:00 or so, and notice my roommates car is being towed. I run to wake him up, we jump in my car, and tear off after the bastard. We catch up with him about 10 minutes later. I had to fly all over University and Dean rd to catch him. Well, we deal with his crap. On the way back, I noticed my car was idling reallly rough. At first I'm thinking "Oh god not bearings again" (very reminiscent of my spun bearings) and then I notice the guages are fine, no SES light, no other symptoms of any kind. Oil pressure is unchanging and the car had most of its power (intermittent) so I rule out bearings. Then, I notice as I accelerate under low throttle input, it seems to run smooth. Anything around 1000rpm and above is smooth. 50% throttle is fine. WOT is surging and stumbling all over the place. It seems like its the fuel pump. Not panicking yet. I get home, pop the hood, and I take a good look and listen. Tried to look for any apparent arcing, didn't see any. I notice the driver's side of my engine is ticking. I go look on the passenger side: quiet. I never noticed this sort of thing before. Well, it brought back memories of the little piece of plastic. Now I'm thinking I floated a valve, or bent a valve or god knows what. I don't know what to do and I can't afford a diagnostic at this point. I am just looking for anyone's input on this.

My bird is sick again.

So I am not sure how to test any of my ideas. I don't have a fuel pressure guage or a known good torque wrench that I could start investigating the fuel pump or taking off the valvecover. Does anyone know what else I could do??
Now if I've bent a valve I am supposedly warrantied by GM 50,000 miles on the engine itself. So now I just need to figure out where to go with this.

 

Check for DTC Codes for additional clues. Pop the valve covers and look for a broken spring, or dropped valve. If you dropped a valve, it may not be bent (I've experienced both over the years). Until you investigated further, you won't really know what's wrong.

 

If the engine is warrantied by GM and they installed it, I'm thinking you should take it to them and let them figure it out. Just my .02

 

Not common for a stock LT1 to bend a valve. You would feel it at all rpms. Something is going on, but may not be that serious.

 

Everything is 100% consistent with what I would expect with a dying fuel pump except for that tick under the hood. I am not sure whether or not that is something or not.

The car idles like crap. At WOT the power cuts in and out randomly, with the common denominator that in the upper RPMs it has no power at all.

 

From my experience a FP is either good or dead, not much inbetween. If you keep running it at high RPM's if you have a serious valve train problem, you might make it worse. It is possible to drop but not bend a valve. Pull the covers and rule out a valve train problem