General Motors' 15-Year Legacy of Performance Dominance Continues

While the driver provides the soul of a car, the engine is its heart. The performance car market has been dominated the last 15 years by a series of V8 engines made by General Motors. Beginning with the LT1, which debuted in the 1992 Chevrolet Corvette, followed by the LS1 in 1997 and now the LS3, GM has been on a streak of successful performance V8 engines that is unmatched. The 5.7 liter LT1 engine is closely related to the original Small Block Chevy V8 (dating back to 1955), but with several key improvements. It is best known as the powerplant for the 1992-1996 Corvette and the Chevrolet Camaro and Pontiac Firebird from 1993-1997, but also made its way into the Impala SS and even Caprice police package cars. The LT1 in Corvette form made 300 horsepower, which was an amazing number in the early 90s. Several technological improvements made this possible, such as a new set of high-flow alimunum cylincer heads and a short runner intake manifold. A highlight of LT1 engine is that it employs reverse flow cooling, sending coolant to the cylinder heads first, which enables the LT1 to run more ignition advance and a high-for-its-time 10.4:1 compression ratio for greater horsepower. However, LT1 engines did not remain in service for long. The entire LT family of engines (LT1, the High-Output LT4 and the L99 "baby LT1") had to make way for the next generation LS1.

The 5.7 liter LS1 engine debuted in the 1997 Corvette and went on to be listed on Ward's 10 Best Engines the same year. The LS1 represents a clean-sheet approach-it shares nothing in common with the original Small Block V8 or LT1. Over the LS1's lifespan, it made its way into thousands of Corvettes, Camaros, Trans Ams, and the 2004 Pontiac GTO. It also formed the basis for the Vortec line of GM truck engines. The 350 horsepower LS1 featured all-aluminum construction, with a composite plastic intake manifold, single bore throttle body, and high-flow cylinder heads that re-wrote the book on aftermarket performance in the late 1990s.

The LS1 inspired a new generation of performance enthusiasts. Using the power of internet to share ideas and technical knowledge, this new generation has helped create a second golden-age of the muscle car. The LS1 drove a whole new era of aftermarket modification, and the superb design of the motor meant it was easy and cheap to make more and more horsepower. The successor to the LS1 is the LS2, a relatively short lived engine that used a slightly larger displacement and upgraded heads to produce 400 horsepower. The 6.0 Liter LS2 was used in the Corvette from 2005-2007, the 2005 and 2006 GTO, and the Trailblazer SS.The LS3 engine is the latest engine on its way to power the Corvette in 2008. Although based on the LS1, it produces an amazing 430 horse power. It is an updated version of the LS2 engine with a larger bore of 4.06 inches resulting in a displacement of 6.2 liters, 0.2 litres higher than the LS2 engine. The LS3 uses a set of cylinder heads based on those found on the 7.0 liter, 505-hp Corvette LS7. There is much speculation that the LS3 will find its way into the 2009 Camaro as well.The success of the LT1 and LS1 series of engines has forced other auto makers to come up with new engine packages to compete. Chrysler introduced an all new Hemi V8 in 2003 which borrows extensively from the LS1 design. Ford has resorted to superchargers on its line of "modular" V8s to compete with the power output of the LS series GM eninges.

Chris R

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Why You Need Keyword Elite

Are you a struggling Affiliate Marketer trying to make enough money to quit your day job?If what you are doing online has not led to success chances are you are not doing something right.  That something could be one thing or it could be a combination of things.  If you could nail down those problem areas and find a resolution you might actually make some money online.

One of the hardest areas to master in affiliate marketing is keyword research.  This seems to be where most people trying to become a full-time affiliate marketer fail.  And the reason for their failure is not because they have trouble building a huge list of keywords.  They fail because they have not done the proper keyword research.  Finding keywords that sell is much different than finding keywords that drive traffic.

Keywords that drive traffic can be almost any keyword that falls into your particular niche and I don't care who you are, with the right tools, anyone can drive traffic to a website. If all you want is traffic, that is easy.  Find high search volume keywords and bid on them.  Bid on enough of them and you'll get a ton of traffic...but you'll also get a rather large invoice from Google at the end of the month for all those clicks.  It's important here to remember one thing...Thousands of keywords may drive traffic to your site but they do not guarantee conversions.

Your goal when selecting keywords should be conversions, not volume.  I would rather have 20 highly targeted keywords driving 100 converting customers to my site than 1000 niche related keywords driving 10,000 non-converting customers to my site.

It seems really simple to understand but most people get it wrong over and over again. They mistakenly think that more keywords means more traffic and more traffic means more sales.  In some cases that is right but in most cases it doesn't work.

Your keyword research for your site should include highly target keywords with medium to high search volumes.  Then once you have identified these keywords - turn them into buyer keywords by adding relevant buyer pre-fixes for each.  Watch for my article on turning relevant keywords into buyer keywords.

If you are serious about your keyword research and not sure where to start you might consider a program called Keyword Elite.It is one of the best selling keyword research tools on the market and can work directly with your adword account to provide you with large lists of highly relevent keywords in a matter of minutes.

About The Author:  Dale Martin is a full-time Internet marketer maintaining multiple sites on a wide range of Internet Marketing topics.  Visit his keyword software site at YourKeywordshere.com.  

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