Quote:
Originally Posted by Matt.A
The truth is that if you are racing these engines, eventually they will fail, or need to be freshened up with new rings, and bearings, etc. That is just the nature of the beast. When you push things really hard very frequently and for extended amounts of time, the odds of breaking something go up. However, there is a difference between racing, and driving a car hard on the street and taking it to the occasional Good Guys Autocross. I don't think even the most reliable factory LS3 would be able to hold up to 100K miles of what I would do to it.
I'm not saying that the engine you're looking at is unreliable. In fact, I have an aluminum block 454 LS7 based engine in my Camaro, and I probably did 30+ track events with it last year. I had a cam go bad at the end of last year, but other than that, no issues. It burns oil, but I think almost all LS engines do.
If you plan to attend an autocross once or twice a year with the rest of your driving being on the street, I don't think there is anything wrong with the GM 454 LSX crate engine. seems like a good price considering the parts.
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Matt, if the engine has the right hone finish, the right ring package, and is vented correctly it won't use oil. I'm sure I use mine just as hard as you do and mine uses no oil to speak of. A lot of engine builders use low tension rings to squeeze out every last bit of power which is fine for drag racing but not good for what we do, GM uses them for fuel economy.