RS2 vs Cams

[Aydon182]

Calls for a good discussion,

If you were to buy one which would you go and why?

From what I've heard cams will give you a better bhp peak but the RS2 offers a good torque increase throughout the whole rev range?

Yes I know there is a big RS2 thread going on but that's irrelevant this is Cams vs RS2 there roughly the same sort of price but as for others like me who are thinking About one or the other soon this should bring up some good information.

So Cams or RS2 Manifold,
What would you choose and why?

Cheers,
Aydon.

 

[MonkeyKnifeFight]

Rs2 as you can sell it and get alot of the money back when you decide to move on.

 

[Chip-mk1]

What do you use your car for?

Where in the rev range are gains most important to you?

 

[Sir_Dave]

Rs2 as you can sell it and get alot of the money back when you decide to move on.

Yup, u can also DIY it easily.

But if your cambelt needs doing anyway, then cams become quite a cheap option...

 

[Aydon182]

What do you use your car for?

Where in the rev range are gains most important to you?

What would YOU choose and why?

 

[-J-]

I went for RS2.

Reason being, it's bolt on / bolt off and my belts were done already and I didn't want to spend the money having them done again.

It's a daily driver with the odd track day, motorway over taking is a pleasure with the RS2 fitted.

Quite happy -

 

[Chip-mk1]

What would YOU choose and why?

We went for an RS2 for our 172.

Reasons:
Easy to fit, and also easy to remove later on to sell on if we get rid of the car
It gives a fantastic gain in torque at the sort of rpm that we're at for motorway driving which we use it for a lot
Its good at the top of the rev range, the standard inlet strangles the motor at 7K+ and we do a lot of trackdays so its nice to have that bit of extra rev range as the gears arent very close on the 172
My mrs is quite into detailing and it looks nice

Downsides:
I actually quite miss the "nothing-nothing-lots" delivery of the standard inlet where it feels like you have a lot of torque at 5500rpm or so, partly cause it makes good power ther, and partly because there is so little before it (a bit like the way bad turbo lag makes a car feel quicker when it spools!) cams are very much "like standard but more so"


So it kind of depends what you are after, cammed cars undoubtably feel quicker as they have that big midrange surge that the RS2 does, so by contrast they feel more aggressive where as the RS2 is kind of deceptively quick because its so smooth.


I know that I wont be fitting throttle bodies at a later date too for example, as I already have other cars for more serious tuning, so if you think you might fit bodies then an RS2 is a bad idea really as you'll have to remove it to fit them where as cams you wont, and in fact they complement bodies well.

So it really is a personal choice, and each has their merits.

 

[Cub.]

Chips post above sums it up quite nicely really. I knew I was getting ITB's, and I needed the belts done so Cams it was for me. If not, I'd have RS2'd. The sell on part didn't register for me either as I'm likely to keep the car as a trackday toy for some time.

 

[Aydon182]

Thanks Guys some good contributions there, sounds like RS2 would probably be my preferred choice, nice to hear your experiences with the RS2 Chip, any more experiences with either! Maybe someones had both before and they can comment on what it was like varying from one to the other.

 

[Chip-mk1]

There is always the option of doing both of course.



Simple way to get to 200bhp whilist still maintaining the aircon and cruise control etc.

You'd be looking at spending the money out twice then of course, but at least its in two chunks not all at once, so you could do rs2 first, then when your belt next needs changing anyway just budget a grand for it rather than about half that like normal and get cams at the same time as the belts, although you will then need a remap after the cams too, so its slightly dearer for that reason than doing it all at once.

That would see you at 185-190 to begin with, and 200bhp or so once you are on the cams too, assuming you have a pretty decent engine to start with.

Like I say, it really does depends on things like if you want to keep the car for long etc and what you use it for.

 

[Andyman]

What cams were running with the RS2 in the above graph Chip?

 

[Nick172Cup]

Columbo and Biriani (spelling) camshafts chap, very peaky cams iirc.

 

[yeecup]

Cams. IMO

 

[aucky]

Something else to note- The RS2 is perfectly behaved at idle/pulling away. Cams can cause problems I believe?

 

[.Stevo.C.]

Something else to note- The RS2 is perfectly behaved at idle/pulling away. Cams can cause problems I believe?

From what I've read 438's and the Gt cams Fred sells are fine. I can imagine other more aggressive cams could cause problems like you say though.

 

[yeecup]

Cams are all about the mapping

 

[Aydon182]

Cams are all about the mapping

So is the RS2 iirc

 

[Nick172Cup]

I'm all for the RS-2, however my new 182 needs a dephaser so I'll be going with a set of cams as its financially beneficial for me to do so over getting a cambelt done and then buying an RS-2.

 

[Aydon182]

There is always the option of doing both of course.

View attachment 71681

Simple way to get to 200bhp whilist still maintaining the aircon and cruise control etc.

You'd be looking at spending the money out twice then of course, but at least its in two chunks not all at once, so you could do rs2 first, then when your belt next needs changing anyway just budget a grand for it rather than about half that like normal and get cams at the same time as the belts, although you will then need a remap after the cams too, so its slightly dearer for that reason than doing it all at once.

That would see you at 185-190 to begin with, and 200bhp or so once you are on the cams too, assuming you have a pretty decent engine to start with.

Like I say, it really does depends on things like if you want to keep the car for long etc and what you use it for.

Chip, I've read many threads implying cams and the RS2 Manifold don't go down very well together, in most cases even losing power?

 

[Sir_Dave]

Chip, I've read many threads implying cams and the RS2 Manifold don't go down very well together, in most cases even losing power?

It was designed to maximise the potential of an internally standard engine, Tom never really got to mess about with cams as well. Bar James' small experiment with the C&Bs.

The theory is that it could work with cams, but the CAD work & other airflow modelling (or whatever he did) was based on a standard 182.

 

[Laine_16v]

Simple way to get to 200bhp whilist still maintaining the aircon and cruise control etc.

Is it? I think thats the *only* RS2+Cam graph in existance that shows 200bhp

 

[Nick172Cup]

Is it? I think thats the *only* RS2+Cam graph in existance that shows 200bhp

Plus it was poorly mapped and the engine wasn't running 100% either.

 

[Laine_16v]

Plus it was poorly mapped and the engine wasn't running 100% either.

Right.........

 

[yeecup]

Lolz..... Let's not open that can of worms

 

[Laine_16v]

:quiet:

 

[yeecup]

Waits for chip......:boring:

 

[Nick172Cup]

Right.........

Indeed it is, mapped by Henk in holland and the cambelt was done by Danny before 519 was created which he fucked up.

yeecup, got anything clever to say or are you just another gullable cs idiot?

 

[fraz101]

Whats RS2????

 

[Dan519]

Indeed it is, mapped by Henk in holland and the cambelt was done by Danny before 519 was created which he f**ked up.

yeecup, got anything clever to say or are you just another gullable cs idiot?

think you'll find james admitted that was a lie last week.

 

[Jamesstone]

The standard camshafts work best with the Rs2, We're currently in the trailing process with RIKUS Automotives semi group N tool which has broken the 200bhp rs2 with standard camshafts, hopefully we'll be able to confirm this in the coming weeks

 

[Jamesstone]

think you'll find james admitted that was a lie last week.

When?

 

[Laine_16v]

Indeed it is, mapped by Henk in holland and the cambelt was done by Danny before 519 was created which he f**ked up.

yeecup, got anything clever to say or are you just another gullable cs idiot?

So, you think looking at that graph and the powerband it produces is a result of poor cam timing? what planet are you on, it makes the correct torque up top there is clearly nothing wrong with the timing. Not to mention it was agreed between JMS and 519 the timing was fine after they checked it multiple times anyway.

And its mapped poorly because Henk did it? The same Henk that has one of the best reputations for engine calibration on our little renaults just about anywhere??

You fail at deffending the RS2

 

[Jonny1*2]

Is the rs2 vs cams not being slightly over debated at the moment :S

 

[Nick172Cup]

So, you think looking at that graph and the powerband it produces is a result of poor cam timing? what planet are you on, it makes the correct torque up top there is clearly nothing wrong with the timing. Not to mention it was agreed between JMS and 519 the timing was fine after they checked it multiple times anyway.

And its mapped poorly because Henk did it? The same Henk that has one of the best reputations for engine calibration on our little renaults just about anywhere??

You fail at deffending the RS2

Did I say that Danny messed the timing up which affected the power? Well he did in way but it's the consequence of poor timing, not just the timing being out.

Also have you been to holland to have your car mapped by Henk? Granted he's done quite a few calibrations for the RS range but they are far too compromised to cater for the wide range of RS's on the market as a generic map.

Have you read my previous post? I've already said that I'll be purchasing a set of camshafts for mine whilst I'm doing the cambelt, if I was so against them wouldn't I just get the cambelt done and then fit an RS-2? lol

 

[Laine_16v]

Did I say that Danny messed the timing up which affected the power? Well he did in way but it's the consequence of poor timing, not just the timing being out.

Has anyone really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like? WUT

Also have you been to holland to have your car mapped by Henk? Granted he's done quite a few calibrations for the RS range but they are far too compromised to cater for the wide range of RS's on the market as a generic map.

No i have not been to holland to have my car mapped, why is that relevant? From what i can make out you are saying Henk poorly mapped the RS2 car because he used a compromised generic map for it? *so much facepalm*. It's clear JMS and Henk would have worked close to perfect a custom calibration for the RS2. Again none of what you have said tells us why the it was mapped poorly by him?

Have you read my previous post? I've already said that I'll be purchasing a set of camshafts for mine whilst I'm doing the cambelt, if I was so against them wouldn't I just get the cambelt done and then fit an RS-2? lol

Can't knock you for that choice

 

[Chip-mk1]

Chip, I've read many threads implying cams and the RS2 Manifold don't go down very well together, in most cases even losing power?

TBH my personal opinion is that James from Stone automotive (aka JMS previously) was massively over critical of the results he had on that engine when he says that the cams "dont work" with the RS2.

Sure a totally flat curve like the ones he is used to on the RS2 is very desirable, but actually many other people are perfectly happy with the "twin peaks" type output you tend to get on hotter cams on a lot of engines with similar induction setups.

So where he calls it a failure because there is a hole in the torque at 4500 I dont think its quite that clear cut, I look at that graph and think that 3-4K where I sit in normal driving looks great, and 5-7.5K where I use a car on track looks great too, the hole at 4500 although obviously not what you would ever choose is actually in a place that wouldnt bother me particuarly as its not a bit of the rev range im at a lot in all honestly anyway, and even there its still only 130lbft that it drops to, its not like its down at 90 or something.

Next time the belt needs doing on ours (just been done so not for a while TBH!) I will almost certainly fit cams at the same time as I am doing it, and if the results i get resemble that graph, I'll be quite happy.

Its 200bhp, perfectly driveable, perfect cold starts, and all on a standard engine, to me thats good results, the dip at 4.5K is a slightly issue, but it doesnt render it something I wouldnt want just over that.

 

[Chip-mk1]

PS

Whoever did the cam timing on James's engine didnt so in the context of developing the correct timing for those cams on that inlet, as they werent commissioned to do.
So at best it would have been on standard marks which are quite possibly not ideal anyway, what JMS should have done is what James is doing now, trying different cam timings and see how they work, James is doing that initially on the standard cams but personally I think if he has the development budget for it he should then move onto doing the same thing with aftermarket cams as well.

 

[yeecup]

Indeed it is, mapped by Henk in holland and the cambelt was done by Danny before 519 was created which he fucked up.

yeecup, got anything clever to say or are you just another gullable cs idiot?

Pipe down