Gomez
11-29-2004, 05:11 PM
The day I purchased my new Elantra GT Sedan.
My first new car that I financed for 5 years with a very reasonable monthly payment and low insurance. I loved it. It was the first car I'd had with rims, a spoiler, leather, cd player, ac, cruise control and fog lights.
It also had the most decent amount of horsepower of any car I'd driven, my previous vehicles were a '87 Sentra (12 valve with a nice oil leak) and a '93 Saturn L Sedan SOHC with a/t (100 horsepower!). Both of those cars were base model, but not this time, my Elantra was loaded and it was the ****.
It had all of the above and got excellent gas mileage compared to other vehicles, in its class, on the market.
It is a great car. I drove it back and forth to Canada about 10 times (720 miles round trip) and it never showed any signs that it wasn't capable of doing that trip every day of the week.
I don't know what my motivation was, but one day during this past spring I started looking at the elantra forums online. "I can change these parts and it'll make my car faster?," I asked myself. That sounds great. It's not that expensive and it's a lot of fun to work on your car. It only makes you feel safer and more secure in your car because you know what your car is doing, why it's doing it and so on.
I started, where most do, with a Cold Air Intake. It definitely made the car faster, but I hate the noises. The hissing, the starts, the cough when you turn the engine off. I knew what the noises were and they just faded away after a while because you have the power now!
"I think the Tib Sway bar is a good next step." It is. Get it. It's worth it on every level. "Maybe a short shifter will help my acceleration." It does. Get it. It's easy to change, inexpensive and more fun to drive with.
"I'm just going to do horsepower mods," I told myself at the beginning. "I just want to add some horsepower, 20 or so, that's all." I said it and I've seen a lot say it since. It's not so easy, you learn this very fast on the forums. Headers cost over $300, exhaust around $300 and with that you take a chance at voiding warranties (A CHANCE! A dealer could **** you). And these are not easy parts to change for a novice and it's dumb to spend money on the parts and then spend more to have a shop put it in. Some want to do that but when I started I told myself that I wasn't going to buy any part that I couldn't do myself. THAT IS ONLY MY OPINION.
As I'm on the sites I see other members' cars and the rims and tires and ground effects start to look better and better. All those things make your car handle better (not the ground effects) and look nicer, and let's face it, nice things make life nice. So you consider rims and tires, that could be anywhere from $700-$1400. Ground Effects are easily $1000 and you have to have them painted. I was envious of all of you. That's the exterior. It looks great.
Back to Speed. Headers, Exhaust and Intake aren't doing it for you? There are a few other things you could do N/A but they won't yield anything. Get a turbo or supercharger. The idea of tbing or scing a car that doesn't come with one from the factory is AWESOME. Being able to say "Yeah, I did this," is cool and I continue to salivate at pictures of turboed Elantras. It was always a goal. But how much does that cost and do you have the know-how? If you don't, are you gonna double your costs and pay someone to do it for you? Cost: between $2000-$3000. Most won't go that route.
To all those turboed and supercharged, you are a better man than me, keep it up.
State of the Union after changing Headers, Exhaust and Intake: Gained 20 or 30 horsepower after spending just under a grand, car is loud as hell because there are no cats and a stage 3 clutch would be a good idea because the stock one cannot take that power and you want to be able to launch and shift hard to reap the benefits of your hp gains. Clutch could be $300 and you have to have a shop do it.
I took my CAI off this past weekend because I was bored and I wanted to see how it was doing. I put the stock one back on, without the black box and snorkel. I've been driving it since and certainly notice the loss of power, but it's an easy trade for the loss of hissing and noise. I still have my Evo Fusion exhaust on and that may be coming off soon. I was going to get rims and tires for Christmas and the TCSpoiler but I don't really want that stuff if I don't have the horsepower. "If you're gonna do it, do it all the way." That's me, to an extent.
One thing I see members always telling newbies is "Decide what you want from your Elantra and add mods it to achieve that. Don't just add parts if they're not going to provide the results you want." The horsepower that I want from a car, the Elantra can not give me. I can accept that so I'd rather have no mods than a few whose (TO ME) negatives outway their positives.
It's like the girlfriend, friend, wife, mom, dad, etc. always says, "If you wanted a fast car, why didn't you buy one." Because it's fun as hell to mod your car, you dumb ***. And that's what I'm going to do, but with a car that can give me the results I want.
That's about it. Just my flame. For the record: I have a catback exhaust and had an intake, never had headers but I was seriously considering them. A turbo was always the dream. So many times I looked at my credit card with a $6000 limit and thought about what I could do, but that's irresponsible and I don't make enough to mod that much out-of-pocket.
DISCLAIMER: Everyone who is doing what they're doing should keep it up. I'd love to keep modding but my brain says "no." It's not a waste of money and time if you enjoyed yourself and enjoy your results. Don't be offended or upset, I'm not putting anyone down, this is just what I'm saying.
My first new car that I financed for 5 years with a very reasonable monthly payment and low insurance. I loved it. It was the first car I'd had with rims, a spoiler, leather, cd player, ac, cruise control and fog lights.
It also had the most decent amount of horsepower of any car I'd driven, my previous vehicles were a '87 Sentra (12 valve with a nice oil leak) and a '93 Saturn L Sedan SOHC with a/t (100 horsepower!). Both of those cars were base model, but not this time, my Elantra was loaded and it was the ****.
It had all of the above and got excellent gas mileage compared to other vehicles, in its class, on the market.
It is a great car. I drove it back and forth to Canada about 10 times (720 miles round trip) and it never showed any signs that it wasn't capable of doing that trip every day of the week.
I don't know what my motivation was, but one day during this past spring I started looking at the elantra forums online. "I can change these parts and it'll make my car faster?," I asked myself. That sounds great. It's not that expensive and it's a lot of fun to work on your car. It only makes you feel safer and more secure in your car because you know what your car is doing, why it's doing it and so on.
I started, where most do, with a Cold Air Intake. It definitely made the car faster, but I hate the noises. The hissing, the starts, the cough when you turn the engine off. I knew what the noises were and they just faded away after a while because you have the power now!
"I think the Tib Sway bar is a good next step." It is. Get it. It's worth it on every level. "Maybe a short shifter will help my acceleration." It does. Get it. It's easy to change, inexpensive and more fun to drive with.
"I'm just going to do horsepower mods," I told myself at the beginning. "I just want to add some horsepower, 20 or so, that's all." I said it and I've seen a lot say it since. It's not so easy, you learn this very fast on the forums. Headers cost over $300, exhaust around $300 and with that you take a chance at voiding warranties (A CHANCE! A dealer could **** you). And these are not easy parts to change for a novice and it's dumb to spend money on the parts and then spend more to have a shop put it in. Some want to do that but when I started I told myself that I wasn't going to buy any part that I couldn't do myself. THAT IS ONLY MY OPINION.
As I'm on the sites I see other members' cars and the rims and tires and ground effects start to look better and better. All those things make your car handle better (not the ground effects) and look nicer, and let's face it, nice things make life nice. So you consider rims and tires, that could be anywhere from $700-$1400. Ground Effects are easily $1000 and you have to have them painted. I was envious of all of you. That's the exterior. It looks great.
Back to Speed. Headers, Exhaust and Intake aren't doing it for you? There are a few other things you could do N/A but they won't yield anything. Get a turbo or supercharger. The idea of tbing or scing a car that doesn't come with one from the factory is AWESOME. Being able to say "Yeah, I did this," is cool and I continue to salivate at pictures of turboed Elantras. It was always a goal. But how much does that cost and do you have the know-how? If you don't, are you gonna double your costs and pay someone to do it for you? Cost: between $2000-$3000. Most won't go that route.
To all those turboed and supercharged, you are a better man than me, keep it up.
State of the Union after changing Headers, Exhaust and Intake: Gained 20 or 30 horsepower after spending just under a grand, car is loud as hell because there are no cats and a stage 3 clutch would be a good idea because the stock one cannot take that power and you want to be able to launch and shift hard to reap the benefits of your hp gains. Clutch could be $300 and you have to have a shop do it.
I took my CAI off this past weekend because I was bored and I wanted to see how it was doing. I put the stock one back on, without the black box and snorkel. I've been driving it since and certainly notice the loss of power, but it's an easy trade for the loss of hissing and noise. I still have my Evo Fusion exhaust on and that may be coming off soon. I was going to get rims and tires for Christmas and the TCSpoiler but I don't really want that stuff if I don't have the horsepower. "If you're gonna do it, do it all the way." That's me, to an extent.
One thing I see members always telling newbies is "Decide what you want from your Elantra and add mods it to achieve that. Don't just add parts if they're not going to provide the results you want." The horsepower that I want from a car, the Elantra can not give me. I can accept that so I'd rather have no mods than a few whose (TO ME) negatives outway their positives.
It's like the girlfriend, friend, wife, mom, dad, etc. always says, "If you wanted a fast car, why didn't you buy one." Because it's fun as hell to mod your car, you dumb ***. And that's what I'm going to do, but with a car that can give me the results I want.
That's about it. Just my flame. For the record: I have a catback exhaust and had an intake, never had headers but I was seriously considering them. A turbo was always the dream. So many times I looked at my credit card with a $6000 limit and thought about what I could do, but that's irresponsible and I don't make enough to mod that much out-of-pocket.
DISCLAIMER: Everyone who is doing what they're doing should keep it up. I'd love to keep modding but my brain says "no." It's not a waste of money and time if you enjoyed yourself and enjoy your results. Don't be offended or upset, I'm not putting anyone down, this is just what I'm saying.