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Old 03-11-2004, 07:48 PM   #1
travsstuff
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enhance car performance

Is there a way that I could enhance my cars performance without spending a lot of money? Exe. (ram air, whatever) Just cheap mods that would make my car accelerate, or whatever. I'm 15 and I'm really bored.
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Old 03-11-2004, 10:09 PM   #2
Nexagen
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The cheapest and free way would be to remove as much weight off your car.

Here are some suggestions:

1)Remove Spare Tire and Jack
2)Remove Floor Mats
3)Remove AC System
4)Remove Stereo System and Speakers
5)Remove Excess Junk from your car

Less weight = Improved acceleration.

Now if you want to spend some money...

The cheapest and probably most inexpensive suggestions I have next is this...

1)Performance Sparkplugs (About $5 bucks each). I use NGK Iridium IX.
2)Performance Sparkplug Wires (You can get em on ebay for less than $30)
3)Royal Purple Synthethic Motor Oil (Better than Mobil One, Pennzoil and pretty much any oil on the market.) By reducing the viscosity in your engine you will run smoother and lost HP will be freed up. Usually you only gain about 2-5 HP by adding this oil. It's amazing stuff but is hard to find. Check http://www.royalpurple.com to see where a dealer near you lives.

Now this is the next list of upgrades in the $100+ range:
1)AEM or Injen Cold Air Intake
2)Muffler

If you got about $300+ layin around you could also add these:
1)Full Cat-Back Exhaust
2)High Flow Headers
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Old 03-12-2004, 08:46 AM   #3
KC Ron Carter
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best performane options for the money

Gear ratio is the best way to get performance.

Torque wins races and HP sells cars.

Getting the car to provide the higher torque at a lower RPM is a prime issue.

By using a lower ratio, smaller tires in diameter, or different transmission, you can make a street car preform like a raging race car.

The best example is the power a car has in lower gears is extended to the higher gears.

The trade off is it will be noisey like a bubble bee and you will lose the same percentage in economy that you gain in performance.

Most manufactures supply a lower gear ratio to the automatic cars in the same production as the standard shift so any bone yard can advise you on getting a lower ratio.

Later,
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Old 03-12-2004, 10:07 AM   #4
SaabJohan
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Re: enhance car performance

Provide a higher torque at lower rpm? Tprque wins races and HP sells car? What could be more wrong I say!

Horsepower is what accelerate the car and it's whats makes the cars top speed. Higher torque on low revs is only good for one thing; driveability.

Power = torque*rpm, this means that with a different gearing we can only change if we are going to convert the engine power into rpm (needed for high speeds) or high torque (needed for a fast acceleration) at the wheels. Using a lower gearing allows for a fast acceleration but we can't go that fast, a higher gearing will then allow us to go gast but the accelerration will be slower.
On a racing cars the gears are also very narrow which means that the engine can operate close to its peak power (only performance fools or people that want fuel economy uses the rpm around torque peak).

Buying expensive spark plugs or spark plugs wires is just a waste of money, stick with the originals since the are chosen to work with the engine. If you increase performance of the engine you can switch to a little cooler plug rate than the oems but otherwise you don't have to do anything with the ignition system unless you have problems with misfires then you might need a better ignition coil from example MSD.

All oil-companies claim that they have the best oils. Personally I think the synthetic Mobil 1 oil is one of the better ones. Mobil 1 does't contain any viscousity improvers and has a low friction. In a test on a 300 hp engine the Mobil 1 0W-40 showed the highest power, 311.2 hp compared to 308.7 for Royal Purple. But this are only small gains.
However, if I were to use any oil in a high power engine where cost isn't a issue I would have chosen Motuls ester based synthetics.

If you're going to get any power increase to talk about replace the exhaust system and exhaust manifold with an extractor type manifold and free flow exhaust system. Replace the cam and increse compression and preferbly also ignition advance (requires higher octane). Fit the intake with a free flow filter which takes air from a cold and high density place.

There are also several aerodynamic improvements that can be done cheap, like put thin aluminum plates under the car so its floor will be smooth. Add a splitter in the front and make a small diffusor on the rear. Cover the top part of the grill, seal all holes around the grill and lights with duct-tape and so on.
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Old 07-30-2009, 10:44 PM   #5
z31Alan
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Re: enhance car performance

"Horsepower sells cars, but torque wins races" Carroll Shelby
Yes HP means power, but remember your not just going fast.
Your going fast, faster than the other car. Hence wins races.
Id just like to tell you that you were just shot down by a 17 year old..
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Old 07-31-2009, 08:12 PM   #6
HeWhoKillz
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Re: enhance car performance

[quote=Nexagen;1627725]The cheapest and free way would be to remove as much weight off your car.

Here are some suggestions:

1)Remove Spare Tire and Jack
2)Remove Floor Mats
3)Remove AC System
4)Remove Stereo System and Speakers
5)Remove Excess Junk from your car


this all together would not even take 50 pounds from your car. The spare tire would be the heaviest. The jack and floor mats along wiht your radio and speakers wouldn't weigh enough to sink a paper boat. Excess junk...ok...prephaps this one does make sense. All the extra trash such as receipts, mcdonalds big macs, stolen goods, and dead bodies. Prehaps that would remove the most weight. Too sum it all up, this will make no difference in your cars preformance except leave you without a spare tire when you have a flat, mud on your carpet from your shoes rather than on the mats, no AC for the summer, no speakers or radio to listen to, and no more mcdonlds big macs for you!
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