Best performance mod for the money?
 

Give me your thoughts on the best performance mod for the buck so i know what i should do next to my car (already have a cold air intake and exhaust + header)

what is your car? 12A or 13B?

Dont matter if its 13B or a 12A,The FIRST thing I would do is exhast,header,bigger pipes,no cats if you can,and free flow muffler,Thats your biggest and best noticeable gain before cracking the engine open.

You can always do the mech secondaries, that free and easy!

remove air pump

1.) full exhaust
2) intake
3) remove accessories
4) e-fan (?)
(this is more geared towards the gsl-se, if it's 12a then a CARB would probably be #2 for hp gains)

I keep hearing this but why? Does the air pump rob that much from the engine?

Ok, I have been wondering about this same topic since I purchased my 7. But my I am very hesistant to start removing stuff from my 7 because everything works perfectly and is stock (besides the cat and air filter element- oh and the new urethane suspension bushings)- and that includes all interior switches and lights, and the a/c (including the recirc- brrr cold), and it starts easy and idles smooth at 750rpm. It seems everybody has removed the "rat's nest", but why remove it if everything works perfectly?
Can I upgrade the intake, carb and use a header and still keep everythig else as stock? Can these be done in stages- like upgrading the carb and/or intake seperately?

If its bang for the bucks, lets establish a target say $10 a hp and get some factual evidence.

lol...

Got to start off with a bone stocker.

I would do all the free shit first then,
AIR PUMP,
RATS NEST

ummmmmmmm.? :confused:

Excuse me for being dumb, but exactly what is the "rat's nest", what does it do and what will happen if I take it out?

Thanks!
Ray

if you remove your "rats nest" of wires and vacuum hoses it simplifies teh engine bay, but removes any hope pf pasing emissions :)

Pending where you live,

FL dont have any inspections or emissions.

But simply doing this doesn't make your car any faster, right?

suspension. good brake pads.

nope it makes no power difference

mike

then why do it?:confused: Just need to kill some time on Saturday or something?

removing the rats nest makes it look much better. You don't have all of that emissions crap there to clutter up your engine. It is un-necessary if you have no emissions to deal with. It also makes for fewer things to break.

Removing the air pump will add horse power. Not only is it sucking power by having to be driven by the engine, but it is also sucking air from your intake thereby decreasing the amount of air that can get into the carb.

I'd like to see a dyno sheet with before and after stats on this. ;)

my ass-o-meter told me that it had more power!!!

I don't discount that but what else did you do when you removed the air pump? Did you upgrade to a header, remove the cat? Those are things that are usually done when disabling the pump. I just find it hard to believe that the belt will draw that much power from the engine. A little yes but not a lot. As far as O2 starvation goes, well, the air comes from the air box and quite honestly I don't think it sucks away that much air?

You need to divide this one into two categories. Bolt-on mod or engine intrusive mod. Hands down the biggest HP gain on a STOCK rotary would be a free flow exhaust(and header). Depending on what you purchase you can spend alot of money here but typicaly in the $500 range you can get a really nice setup. There is a mod that will give you more HP on a STOCK rotary and that is porting. Porting however is an engine intrusive mod so the motor needs to be removed from thew car and dissassembled. Technicaly, porting will run you about $400-$500 depending on the shop BUT, I have never seen a port job done without at least freshening up the rotors and using up a new gasket kit. At this point you are about $500 in labour and $1000 in parts but you come out with a fresh and ported motor. As an example, a 12A with street porting will usualy produce in the neighborhood of 140HP. Add the free flow exhaust and you now have a 180HP NA motor. These figures are approximate. The range is about 150-200HP depending on the port job and the exhaust. Done properly you would also change the carb to maximise the power gain.

As a side note, the turbo is definately the single most mod one can do to add HP but I thought the cost would be prohibitive and wasn't in the spirit of the question. Nitrous also falls into this category. Although much cheaper, you need a fresh motor to run the juice or you will be dissappointed with the result.

Toughguy :)

when i disconnected mine, my car felt like it had lost a couple hundred lbs. it had a lot more go at the low-end. i think it's pretty negligible at higher rpm (and thus doesn't affect peak horsepower much), but it sure seems to help lowend.

Wheel alignment.

Admittedly this will only help, if your settings are out to begin with. I got mine done a couple months after getting the car, and it felt completely new. I didn't replace any parts or anything, just tightened up the steering rack and did a full wheel alignment. Definately worth it.

Apart from that, i'd agree with the exhaust thing.