Triumph Repair: tuning, high performance engines, 500cc bike

Question
How do you develop a camshaft profile to meet a performance engines subtleties?

Answer
Hi Mordy,
Over the years and from when I use to race motorcycles on flat tracks in the AMA I learned a little about cam design. (just enough to get myself into trouble) I started when I was about 16 or 17 years old when I read a book that covered cam profiles. My first attempt was humorous, (read about it in my web site)
http://mg-tri-jag.net/techtips.htm
Later I tried a cam profile in a Triumph that had a wider duration on both intake and exhaust cams but no higher lift and not much change in overlap. I found it developed a good more horse power but ONLY at very high RPM. I raced that bike on several TT tracks and found it to be lacking mid range torque so when I raced a smaller 500cc bike on flat track I had a cam grinder pick a profile that would give me high torque from mid range up. I raced a 250cc bike at a United States M/C event at Daytona with a much higher RPM cam and I was able to time trial 4th fastest of about 150 bikes that were entered. I went into sports cars later and built many high performance engines for a wide range of sports cars.

My point is that I found that first you must decide what you are going to use the car for. Auto Cross, SCCA, drag racing or a street rod. Then you need to decide how big a pile of money are you going to dump into this engine. And what and how far are you going to modify that engine. Then you should approach a cam grinder /manufacture and ask them what profile they have to match what you want to do. For example a road race (SCCA or such) cam may be useless in an Auto Cross or dirt track.
That is all I can tell you of what I learned about cam profiles. The ONLY useful advice you will get from anyone will be from someone with the exact same engine you have and doing the exact same use as you are and someone who won't lie to you and is successful with theirs.
Howard