i hear all the time its good to get some sort of stall when you upgrade the cam, what happens if you dont? what exactly does the stall do, in easy to understand terms. thanks

 

"Stall" is the rpm the engine gets to with Wide Open Throttle (WOT) and the car not moving or just barely launching with an automatic. Stock "stall" is around 1700 rpm or so. A higher "stall" torque converter might "stall" at 2400 or 2800 rpm. The disadvantage is quite a bit more slipping during normal driving.

Many aftermarket cams sacrifice low end (1500-2500) torque to get more mid-range and high rpm torque (and therefore horsepower), so they don't like a 1700 "stall". The 2400 or 2800 "stall" allows the engine to get into the area where it runs smoother and makes more torque.

All is not lost. Cams are available that can use a stock stall and also make more low-mid torque and stilll increase top end power. Look at this thread:

http://web.camaross.com/forums/showthread.php?t=506142

 

for a hotcam, i would recomend a 2500 stall give or take a couple hundred rpm. on stock heads and gears, this should be right in the range you want it. it should be a blast. a stock converter does flash stall at about 1700 like oldstroker said. that will do okay, but more rpm is better. moreso than the launch, the stall speed is important for keeping the rpm up between shifts. the big problem with stock stall speed is that when you shift into another gear, it takes you down to an rpm that is not as powerful, therefor slowing your acceleration rate down. on a stock converter, i used to lose a full car every shift to the car i was racing...otherwise our cars were even.

 

I did a mild ZZ4 cam which is 208/221 .474/.510 112 before doing a stall or even headers. In hindsight the order I did things in was a big mistake. That season I went a best of 14.9 on 93 octane tuning, the next year I had 87 octane tuning, 2800 stall and still stock gears and no headers and went 14.1, massive gain considering it was a stall and swapping back to lower octane tuning, gave it 3.42s(from stock 2.93s) and went 13.9, then slicks and headers netted a 13.2.
Granted my car is a big heavy Caprice but the general idea still applies, the stall and headers resulted in massive non-typical gains because the car needed them even more with that very mild cam than it had with the stock cam.
I do not doubt you could get some gains with a stock stall and the right c am, BUT you woiuld get more gains from a good stall and a stock cam.

Torque converter technology has come a ways and a 2800 stall from a reputable company can offer an amazing balance of drivability and performance.
Just a few years ago I was afraid of stall too but once I got some experiance that fear went away, Caprice is only maybe a 10K mile a year car now and I am very happy with the current 3400 stall.

 

+1
I did the same thing with the HOT cam. I'm in the process of putting in a 2800 stall converter this weekend. DO the stall converter 1st as it will be a decent gain even on a stock motor.

 

I totally agree. And any decent small cam should have at least a 2800 stall. Like Nova stated, even a stock motor would wake up with a nice stall.