Cheap Engine Mods, Pod Intakes??

So... you the rich white boys from the North Shore??... I heard all about you...

Jeb, talk to North Shore Toyota about a foam panel air filter, & a TRD lightweight flywheel/clutch.

Frylai's production of lightweight clutch systems won't be happening as he is going back to Hong Kong, but we all fitted the TRD unit in a group buy. Paid-up members get a 15% discount on parts from North Shore Toycar, or Manukau Toyota down South Auckland. The TRD unit retails for $1700 or so. I'm sure you could get it down to $1400 or so.

The panel filter I'm not so sure about, I paid about $130 for mine.

The exhaust idea sounds a good one, and those are probably the three cheapest mods to help with power.

For handling, fit a stiffer rear roll bar and stiffer shocks. The coil-overs are everybody's dream, but they are not cheap.

Check the tyre wear across the tread and make sure they are wearing evenly. Maybe the cheapest mod will be a wheel alignment, as many of them chew the tyres out very quickly on the inside edges!


Learn to drive it properly and don't get speeding tickets, then mod it!!

haha nice opening sentence... im not rich, i will be paying my car off for thye next few years ($100 per week...and not to mention i have to get my car serviced soon,. rege due,oil change n filter,and lots of other payments JUST for the car...)
anyways about the membership is there any other way to get money to you as i'm not able to transfer money through that way? anyway i can send you a cheque or something? thanks

the NOT so rich north shore boy
nick

Cheers man. Well i guess i am a rich north shore boy. Is the panel or pod filter better. What sort of differences does the lightweight flywheel/ clutch make???
Hey nick have you got any mods ?

Jebbe

haha your dad will be fine with mods, or just do hidden mods like flywheel XD
keep an eye out for cheap 2nd hand stuff. there is a cheap intake on TradeMe, well, should still be there if you're quick :- D

Nick, $60 is pretty cheap, i think i'll get my done soon! have you got yours taken out?

panel fits into the stock air box. and the pod will need heaps new parts and lots of MONEY, as we have many differnent hoses coming off the air box (breathers etc) its not as easy as to jst stick on a pod as you would do with like a lancer or something...

pods generally are better as they have way less ristriction in the air flow, and you also get a throaty induction roar with it as well...

so far my mods are very limited coz im trying to pay off the 18k for my car...lol...

but so far just sub and amp...custom fiberglass box in the making...cats taken out,trd brake pads,trd panel filter (full intake system just paid for and in the mail ) and lightened flywheel...(last owner did it)

but many more to follow however

yeah man done for sure...way better fuel economy now, and slightly more noticible low down tourque (under 2500)

cheerz man

A few ppl here reccomend to remove the cats to increase peformance.. isn't this illegal and isnt there a quite hefty fine?

Does it make any significant improvements by removing them??

i'd only do it if u have some other tuning. on stock setup u will not notice any power, will be tad louder though

Ive just put a HKS pod filter onmy car and god damn you can feel the power increase
Im going to take it on the dyno to see whats its up to.

The induction noise is so loud it competes with the factory exhaust!

You dont hear it till bout 4000rpm or you put your foot down

Need a bigger smoother flowing exhaust now!

...and a cold-air box sealing the pod filter off from the hot engine atmosphere...

The odd photo around of people who have made an aluminium sheet one. Got to be worth an extra few KW!

Be nice to have dyno figures for each little mod up on here, so we can all see the real increase from the BS...

- It depends upon where you live. It is illegal in Australia.

- Define significant?! You will notice a difference, more in throttle response, but also a slight increase in pickup. Improved throttle response makes your car seem faster anyhow, wether or not it actually is.

My (fairly extensive if i don't say so myself) clutch/flywheel review can be found on these very forums, and while it applies to my IS200, the differences i have found will be similar to what you experience. Make sure you look around before asking "What does an exhaust do, what does a flywheel do?" as the answers to many of these very questions are already here on these forums. And you will NEVER get a definive answer on these questions - hook up with some club members who have the mods you are looking at and you will find that a live test is, as Henry Rollins once said, "the only way to know for sure"

If you take out the factory airbox and add a pod filter you're probably going to offset any improved airflow gains by sucking hot air - hence the cold air box theory.

Here's a couple of examples:

Flagrantly risking an all out debate on the topic, i'm going to drop a few coins into this here 'cold air induction' topic:

I have always been of the 'cold air is most important' school of thought, figuring that a stock intake that takes cold air from the front of the car is always going to be ok for a mainly stock car. However, i have always come across decenting opinions and after speaking with some experienced tuners here in Sydney (including our revered Indy So down at IS Motor Racing) i have been asked to consider: volume is more important than temperature. Particularly at normal/high operating temps, any air that passes through your throttle body is going to be heated. It's unavoidable. But the restriction of convoluted and narrow piping of some cold air designs is going to negate the effect that dropping the air temp a few degrees might get you. Your better of focusing on improving intake VOLUME.

*shrugs* exhaust, a good drop-in filter and tuning for RELIABLE power are enough for me anyhow, but it's all food for thought.

We'll leave the debate until we can collect some solid physics based data... I'll just add the points that for pods to help is that the factory intake has to be restricting air flow, and for some vehicles this may not be the case. For a stock engine, there's every likelihood that modifying the intake is ineffective. Perhaps if you increased the displacement or changed the cams you may need more intake area. Secondly, pod filters are always going to make the car feel faster, due the the increased induction noise.

So aside from the PV=nRT temp vs volume aspect there's the assumption that the engine is restricted with the factory system and the 'how smoothly the air flows' area too.

Can-o-worms really... As as I've mentioned all this empirical talk is just speculation until we start crunching some hard numbers...

You're right.

Manufacturers have quite a few different parameters when they design intakes, some of which are irrelevant to us.

They want an intake system that ...just... feeds enough air in, and ...just... filters it sufficiently, and fits in the engine bay easily, and looks sexy, and is very quiet, and is easily serviced, and ...

IT MUST BE AS CHEAP AS POSSIBLE!

Thirty years ago you could feel the difference if you took the air cleaner out of a Datsun 1600. (and measure it on your lap times in a handicap racing system! But how to cheat handicappers, well that's another story...)

The cheapest mod for rallying was to cut the airbox cowling off so the filter was exposed, and stack one filter on top of the other to double the filter area. Even that gave more power.

However, with Toyota pulling magnificent horsepower from the 3SGE, the power increase from non-retrictive intakes will not be as much. (although I'm sure it will be there!)