5sfe Cams Options

[GuYun14]

Sup people,

This is probable a noob question but are the cams from the 5sfe the same for all the years of each car model like the Camry, Celica, MR2s and whatnot? Might be looking for an extra set to get upgraded since an enigne swap is out of the question for my daily with emissions and stuff.

[slavie]

Usually you can re-arrange the shims around and many will work from the same head (the clearance spread is 2 thou), but you're almost guaranteed to need a handful in sizes you won't have and will need to be ordered. Even a local dealer is unlikely to have the sizes you need in stock, as these are older engines. So, if you were thinking of putting new cams and re-shimming them in a weekend, probably not gonna happen unless you have a few dozen spare shims around.
Even though I do have a few dozen spare shims around, the whole process of shimming and measuring takes very long. I did buy the tool for these heads that sort of allows you to replace shims without taking the cam off, but I found that tool doesn't work very well for some of the shims. If I had to change more than 2-3 shims, it was easier to pull the whole cam out rather than fiddle with the tool.