Inside the Camaro's LS3

[TheNewGuy]

If you are an engine nut like I am then you are going to love this post. The new Camaro’s LS3 is one of the most advanced LS engines to date. But if you are wondering why that is then indulge yourself in the text and pictures below.



camarohomepage.com has a very complete article detailing the LS3. I’ll give you a few excerpts from it but be sure to check out the full story here to get all the details.



World-class engines start with stout blocks or "cylinder cases" as GM Powertrain engineers say. The LS3 case shares basics all aluminum Gen 3s and 4s have had since they debuted in 1997: deep-skirted, 319-T7 aluminum block with siamesed, cast-in-place, gray iron liners which are centrifugally-cast to increase density and allow thinner walls; long, 11-mm head bolts threading deep into its main bearing webs and six-bolt, sintered steel main bearing caps. All this makes a lightweight, rigid, block structure offering good durability and reduced friction.



During the Gen 4 development, the water jacket design was improved to get good heat rejection without water between the bores. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), one of GM Powertrain's computer analysis tools, allowed the Small-Block Team to model coolant flow in the water jackets and project the quality of bore cooling if the design was altered. CFD can examine water flow profiles, movement of particles in the water and where eddies or divergent flows occur. Engineers can see coolant flow on a computer display and that enables them to more easily predict the effect of water jacket improvements. Once a particular change demonstrates effectiveness in the virtual world, it can be quickly applied to actual hardware.



The oil pan used on the Camaro LS3 is quite a bit different than the one used on LS1s in the 4 Gen cars and it's different from the one used by the LS3 when it was introduced on the Corvette for 2008. The Camaro pan is a bit bigger inside holding a additional two quarts of oil compared to the Vette LS3. Otherwise, the pan is similar in concept to other Gen 3/4 oil pans in that, besides holding all the oil, it acts as a sound insulator and add some rigidity to the bottom of the block. In addition, the Camaro LS3 has an engine oil cooler because, according to ACE Ron Meegan, "...of the (vehicle) weight and the (reduced) air flow around the engine in this package, some of the more aggressive driving modes required us to use a cooler to meet our oil temperature requirements." The Camaro oil cooler is the same type of oil-to-coolant heat exchanger used by the supercharged LSA in the Cadillac CTS-V and it is mounted in a similar location, on the left side of the oil pan.