I have a 2006 Silverado 5.3 4x4 that’s just a daily driver and looking to add some power to this baby. I’m on a budget of about $1000. Looking for some info on what kinda cam to use, what exhaust system to use that sounds pretty mean, and a couple other things. New to building trucks so I need some inspiration and some advice on what I need to lay some power down. Thanks in advance 👍🏼

 

We dont get into mods much here. We heip people who need their Chevy running now. Try a speedshop.

 

I’m not trying to deter you here, I just tend to think on the more practical side of things, so I’m curious - if it’s just a daily driver, why do you need performance mods?

That said, I wouldn’t expect much for your budget in terms of mechanical mods. GM modular engines (at least of this era - not sure if they’re newest stuff has changed) use roller lifters positioned in trays and the only way to remove them is to remove the heads. Just from a practical standpoint, it makes little sense to pull the heads for the sake of installing a performance cam and not have the heads worked to compliment it. Those 2 things alone would easily exceed $500 of your budget.

Additionally, why have the entire top end of the engine stripped off for performance mods and not go the few steps further to pull the engine and work the block as well? Even if that wasn’t a consideration, you don’t know for sure what you’ll find once those heads are off - you might have issues that force further work whether you want to do it or not (scored cylinder walls, for example.

You’ll also want to consider installing a new differential and beefier driveshaft to handle the additional horsepower and torque.

I think your best bet is to use some of the money you have now to find an engine at a salvage yard that you can tear down and rebuild the way you want it. That way you have time to research what you want and don’t have the pressure of your DD being down for too long while you’re getting it figured out.

 

For $1000 a cam and exhaust isn’t really too realistic, a basic cam will run you about $300, some places like texas speed sell complete cam kits for about $600. However you won’t need to remove the heads to change the cam. But with a tune and full exhaust plus the cam kit, even with self installation is well over 1k.

 

Please share your secret on how this is done.