How to increase automobile performance

April 1, 2:27 AMTampa Sports Car ExaminerMichael Berenis

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Making a car faster is somewhat of an easy task with the right tools. How can I make my car faster? There are a couple of things you need to focus on when attempting to make your car faster. Intake, exhaust, and tuning are the three areas worth putting effort towards to make your car faster in a straight line. To make your car go faster around corners, you'll need to upgrade suspension, reduce weight, and upgrade tires & wheels.

Typical upgrades include the following:

Intake

• Performance air filter element
• Cold air intake
• Short ram intake
• Modified stock intake
• Throttle body spacers
• Port and polish throttle body, over sized bore
• Intake manifold
• Emissions removal (free mods)
• Heads
• Cam, valves, lifters
• Forced induction (turbo, supercharge, procharge)

Exhaust

• Headers
• Up pipe, down pipe, turbo manifold
• Mid pipes and cat backs
• Emissions removal (free mods)
• Muffler
• Tips
• Heat wrap, silicon coating
• Ceramic and powder coating

Suspension

• Coil over kits
• Shocks
• Strut assembly
• Tower braces
• H-braces
• Torsion bars
• Sway bars
• End links
• Lateral links
• Tie rods
• A arms
• Springs

Weight reduction

• Stage 1 weight reduction (20-35 lbs.)is removal of non invasive weight products. Simple items like carpets, plastics, sound deadening material, extra assembly brackets, and other various items are what you need to remove. Spare tires and jacks may be removed but should be left behind if not on a track. Take things out that don't matter, and things you don't see every day. (Hidden under carpet, in trunk, hood, etc)
• Stage 2 weight reduction (36-150 lbs.) is removal of all items unnecessary. This includes all of stage 1 plus additional items not necessary for the driver. Passenger equipment, door sills, interior plastics, and other. Replacing of plastics with other light material plastics may also take place.
• Stage 3 weight reduction (151+ lbs) involves stripping the entire vehicle down to chassis and replacing everything with lighter weight, more efficient items. Complete dash rebuilds, steering wheel, and more. Lighter weight brakes, wheels, engine components, drive line items, everything is reduced. As much weight as possible is removed from the vehicle.

Upgraded speed requires upgraded brakes. Usually a nice set of ceramic pads with drilled and slotted rotors can enhance the braking performance enough for the typical performance modifications. For modified cars seeking enormous amounts of speed and power, you'll want to consider upgrading brake calipers as well. Multi-piston calipers with over sized rotors can really make the difference.

Tuning is recommended for users that are removing the stock intake box and using performance cold air or short ram intakes. The additional amount of air flow can cause a lean condition and premature engine wear. It is strongly suggested that vehicles using forced induction that change intake systems from oem to cold air or short ram also modify the car's tuning. Tuning can be completed by either a hand held unit, or by taking your car to a professional tuner and performing an ECU flash & dyno tune. Typical cost of ECU flash and dyno tune is anywhere from $300-$500 depending on where you go. Hand held tuners cost the same price but you get a generic map unlike professional tuning that yields exact maps for your vehicle. Check out tuner 3gsucks for more information about tuning.

Cheap and free mods are typically found by eliminating heat sources from the intake. The more cool air you can get to your throttle body in a quick easy fashion, the better. A short ram intake will yield more noise than a cold air intake. Short ram intakes suck in hot air from the engine bay, while cold air intakes suck in cool air from the fender.

Ram air is when you force air through an intake in the grill or hood scoop by air pressure created while driving. If you can rig up a system to catch this air pressure to feed your engine bay or intake with cool air, more gains are to be had. Get creative. There are several ways to make your car faster with out spending money. Removal of catalytic converters for off road use is another great cheap way to get extra flow out of your engine. The more air you can get quickly in and out of your engine the better.

There is also ways to trick to the ECU with out use of expensive programmers or tuning. You can change the intake temperature date by installing a resistor in wire harness where the IAT goes. Each vehicle varies which resistor you'll need, so it's best to buy the intake chip kit from ebay. These are handy for natural aspirated vehicles, and can be deadly for forced induction. They trick your vehicle into running "cold" all the time. This does increase horse power but in the wrong vehicle it can really screw things up. Good vehicles to use this chip method is in domestic v-6 and four cylinder vehicles.

Cheap suspension mod's can be done by using spring compressors to make the ride height lower and stiffer. They consist of a bracket and bolts used to mechanically compress the springs. Similar to leaf spring compressors, they do actually work. Purchasing after market springs cost about $200.00 plus installation, so using the compressors is sometimes a good choice. You can also get cheap tower braces and sway bars from ebay.

If you want "to do it right" make sure you have a service manual for your car like a Haynes book or other digital medium. These handy tools will help you design and chose modifications. Installation in the right order is key. Most people start out by modifying the intake, changing the exhaust, and then performing suspension upgrades to accommodate their new found power. Brakes are typically the last thing to be modified. A smart enthusiast modifies brakes in anticipation of additional power and not as a ramification from illicit use of the extended power range of their vehicle.

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Video content: Cold air intake install

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Read about the author's car at http://subaru-offroad.blogspot.com