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Benefits of Increased Area Under the Curve and Stiffer Valvetrain

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Lake Speed's Ford C3 NASCAR Engine: NEW Comp Cam! 20+ Year Old Camshaft Specs vs Current Technology

What happens here

The new camshaft designs are able to achieve a significantly larger 'area under the curve' compared to older designs, which means they can move much more air into the engine. This increased airflow is not just due to greater lift, but also due to advancements in valvetrain components. Modern engines use much stiffer rocker arms (e.g., 7/16-inch pushrods instead of 3/8-inch) and stronger valve springs, allowing for higher valve acceleration rates without causing valvetrain instability. This system provides a more stable and efficient way to open and close valves, resulting in improved performance.

Goal: Identify how modern cam designs increase airflow and the role of improved valvetrain components.

Tools and materials

  • Camshaft Specification Graph N/A — Illustrating the 'area under the curve' concept
  • Pen — Highlighting areas on the graph
  • 7/16-inch Pushrods — Stiffer pushrods for modern valvetrains
  • Stiffer Rocker Arms — Improved valvetrain stability

What they say

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this region you know Peak piston velocity occurs here at about 70 degrees after top dead center so here's where the Piston is going fast as it can now this peak piston velocity doesn't mean that you have Peak Port velocity because the port has all the air mass in this port has momentum you know that has mass has to build up momentum so as you start the Piston starts dropping away the valves chasing it the Piston starts out running it all this volume is increasing then you really start to move in the air and so where this new camshaft really beats the old camshaft is it actually closes the valve earlier so we're probably closing the valve about 10 to 15 degrees earlier but if you look down here in this region from about 30 degrees before to 30 degrees after bomb dead center you can see in this region we have almost 200 thousands more lift at 30 before bottom dead center and still more than 50 thousandths more lifted 30 degrees after about seven so I'll if you've ever turned an engine over by hand when you turn over a stand and you'll see the Piston comes down real quick and it gets down to the bottom and because of the rod and everything it just looks like it camps out around bottom dead center while the Piston's camping in there air is how RPM the air is just pouring into the engine so if we can keep the door open in that region then we can get more airing but what we can't do while we're keeping the door open and here we can't make this closing later because if we move this closing out that way to get more air here what happens is it Tunes at a higher and higher RPM so the new design we have to

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