No, your not OK without a CASE. Depending on whether your car has a postive or negative variation you could at best get less performance and at worse cause damage by asking for too much timing. We do not recommend anyone going over 1/2 throttle without a proper CASE being performend after changing a cam, PCM, or cam/crank sensor.

i just want to do a couple little things to it, like a new pulley, spark plugs, intake, and a new pcm, and exhaust. So i should prob go with a 3.4 or 3.5"?

Doing intake and exhaust..I think a 3.4 would do nicely

If I was in your shoes, I'd go with a 3.4". With it, I'd run 92-93 octane on the road and get your PCM programmed with a couple extra degrees of timing to deal with KR issues.

3.5" will still get you plenty of gains, but if you're power hungry like me, get the 3.4".

For what he'* planning on doing he should go with a 3.5. And you don't add timing to deal with KR issues Or go with a MPS and a 3.5, then when he'* to a point where he can step down to a 3.4, he can do so. Or keep the 3.4 for when he puts in some racegas and goes to the track....

I believe you do add degrees of timing to deal with knock retard. At least, that was what I was advised on this forum to do awhile back...and when I got my INTENSE PCM with +3 degrees timing, it cleared up all my KR problems. The proof is in my car, I didn't just make it up.

You do not add timing to get rid of KR, you reduce it. The reason your INTENSE PCM helped with your KR issues is it adds 3% fueling as well as reduces torque management.

That is why the PCM retards timing (Knock Retard) when you have knock.

Like Rogue said above, you definately DO NOT add timing to reduce knock. You reduce timing to get rid of knock. That is why KR pulls timing in your PCM not advances it.

As I said earlier, I would recommend a 3.5 pulley for your setup. I wouldn't recommend a 3.4 until you have either some sort of valvetrain mod (like 1.9 rockers or a cam), or you have ported manifolds or headers in addition to the mods you listed above. Unless you scan the car with a 3.5 and find that it has no KR, then I would drop to a 3.4 and if it scans with no KR as well then you run that pulley. But to be safe run a 3.5. A few less hp is worth the money you save by not having to put a new engine in.

Shawn

Is this another one of those Bonneville specific things, if so I have ALOT to learn about the Bonne.

I have done 20+ motor (another 30+ tranny swaps)swaps without a case learn done for thousands of miles, and running mid-low 13s at the track. And per the scanner (A-tap, LS1m, PT, HPT) none have jumped up in their timing. DHP or IPCM have BOTH topped out at 18* advanced timing. With and w/o case learns. Thoose are all GP motor/PCM combo'* as far as I know.

At worst case w/o case learn I have seen the car have random multiple missfires. No other noticable issues. After a CL MOST of the cars did idle better, but no gains to be seen. Thats my 1st hand experience, and if it was that big of a problem I think GM would've wrote that in their engine swap process (2001). But as said ,I dont know if the process if different for a Bonne, but would assume it shouldnt be. But we all know what assuming does.

Um..You will never know if the timing is off because the PCM will always report what it thinks it is asking for. GM doesnt mandate this for the hell of it. The PCM can not know the variation between the crank sensors unless it learns it. If it asks for 15 degrees and there is a -5 variation your only getting 10 however the PCM will still report 15 because it doesnt know any better. If it asks for 15 and there is a +5 variation your getting 20 even though the PCM will still show 15. When people wonder why they are getting a ton of KR with such low timing it is very often because they did not get a CASE learn done.