Quote Originally Posted by diesan04 View Post
Ok- here is my first post, I have done alot of individual reasearch but am looking to 'put the plan together'

Working on an '04 GTP CompG (not many of those around or am I way wrong?) that is stock and have a few things "in mind" but looking for some decsion assitance. In short- what 'order' is best to do mods? Cosmetics (debadge) and other cosmetics are easy enough to decide, so I am really talking about mechanical.

Here is what I have in mind- please let me know if I am way off base or have a good start. Also, my intent is to build out to a faster ride that is visibly different but wont scare off the Stangs and STIs or any of the sewing machine rides.


Before anything- need new brakes. Ideas are most welcome here as I am all over the place on thoughts.

Now, as far as mods-

1) CAI (Thrasher, K&N or Wiz- prlly gonna go Wiz from my 'research')- with a question on the oil from the filters potentially casuing an issue. Unless the "new one" I see here in forums is 'good'.

2) Smaller pulley, PCM, cooler plugs, and "the other stuff" needed to keep the motor clean running

3) new struts and lower it a bit (reccomendations on height and suggs for solution here?)

4) Headers and exhaust

5) New cam

As an aside, I have been looking at the "performance packages" from 3800performance.com. If anyone has gone this route, what are your results?

Yeah, alot here- but I have not modded a car since my last sleeper which was a '76 Grand Prix with a 455 HD. (anyone even remember boring an engine or Holly double pumpers? )

Thanks to all- I will say I have looked at a number of posts on each of these ideas but cannot really get a good clean handle on 'order'. I also udnerstand that there is a great deal of personal preference, so I will keep that in mind too.
.5)Brakes - I would recommend you to look into the F-Body brakes. ZZP, WBodystore, etc sell kits. There are also some good writeups on how to piece them together yourself. A lot of 97-03 guys do this. Not sure about the 04+ guys. But I would imagine it would work just as well.

1)CAI - Personally, I made myself a cheap DIY CAI using ABS pipe. Others have used PVC pipe. These seem to work very well for the money spent on them (about $50). You can spend a lot more money, and only get a little more performance. I always tend to go the cheap, but effective.

2)For a pulley, I would get an MPS. A little more money, but you will thank me later. Don't drop much in pulley size until you get all your mods straighten out. Then start to drop pulley sizes. Dropping pulley sizes prematurely will only complicate things.

Plugs all depend on the level of mods you are going. But from the sounds of things Autolite 104s will work very well. Other things include a tuneup which is always recommended. Wires, fuel filter, trans fluid & filter, shift kit, etc.

As for a PCM, personally I would suggest getting a tuner. And make that your first mod. Learn the tuner. Learn how to use it. A PCM will cost you about $100-$200 depending on how good you want it tuned. But that is only good for your current level of mods. Change something, and your tune is thrown off, so you are stuck with a bad tune which sucks, or pay $100-$200 again to have it retuned. If you spend $500-$600, you can tune your car the way you want it. If you don't like something, you have the power to change it. You can have 100 different tunes for daily driving, street racing, track days, economy, etc, etc, etc. Not to mention any mods you do, you can simply retune it yourself. By far the best mod I ever bought and should have been the first.

3) Not much recommendation from me. Don't know much about suspension, especially 04+ stuff.

4)Headers - All depends on how much you are looking to spend and how good of quality. You can get stainless headers off ebay, which work fine, but quality sucks, for $300. Or, you can get stainless headers from ZZP for $800, and have excellent quality. Personally, if I went with headers, I again would go towards the cheap end. But I am also cheap.

For the rest of the exhaust, I personally went all custom. I bought Borla Pro XS mufflers, a high flow cat, and had a local shop weld up my SS exhaust. If you are looking for a good aftermarket bolt in exhaust, I would look at ZZP, Borla, or Magnaflow. Listen to some sound clips and find what you like. Personally, I like my Borla exhaust. But that is all subjective.

5) Cam - I don't have much experience with cams. I will let someone chime in here.

As for the performance packages, I personally wouldn't go with them. I would get a tuner first. Learn to use it. Then piece by piece mod the car. And after every mod, retune. This will teach you what each mod does and how it affects how your car drives. Then, when something goes wrong down the road, you have a better understanding of how everything works and what might possibly be wrong. If you just buy a bunch of parts, install them, or have them installed, you don't learn much, and don't know what is wrong when something breaks. I find it much more fun to learn as I go.

Hope this has helped.