Hiboost

iTrader: (9)

So after getting a baseline of the car in stock tune I verified it could do a 13.6 @ 101 giving me the go ahead to start bolting on parts this weekend. I'm still waiting on my exhaust and front mount intercooler with piping but I was able to get a bunch of other things finished.

AMS Poly Front Motor Mount: Impressions when I started it up... wow did the Exhaust crack open when I jacked the car up? I can now use my car as a paper sorter, if you don't like lots of vibration especially at low engine speed then you will want to skip this one. While my change rattles when the idle gets low, the car isn't that much worse at speed. The handling seems to be ever so slightly more crisp and now if I shift while going around a bend I've noticed there are no more issues getting it into the gear, it used to be that the 2-3 shift was especially hard to pull off if the car was transferring weight. This should also help a bit with wheel hop at the dragstrip when making more power. Overall I like it and it makes the car feel like a race evo! haha

AMS Underhood Shifter Bushings: This was a huge change for the way the shifting feels. I also cut down my stock shifter by about a 1/2" and removed some plastic threads inside the knob to clear the metal lip. Between these two small changes the car has a much more positive shifting feel when going through the gears. Gone is the vague rubbery feeling I had when aggressively shifting at the drag strip Friday night and I'll be able to avoid any 2-> 3 lockouts like I experienced a few times in the past.

AMS Stainless Steel Brake Lines: I did a few high speed sprints followed by antilock inducing slowdowns to 10 MPH to bed my pads in and get those gasses out of the pads. The brakes feel firmer already the following day and slightly more positive feedback in spirited driving. It's not a huge change but it helped on my last Evo 8 and it seems to have helped on this car too.

Dejon Dual Boost Controller: I moved this over from my Evo8 and loved the fact it was a simple manual boost controller design with the capability to switch between two boost settings. I can actually set it up to switch between stock and high boost where it would use the original boost lines or leave it like it is now and bypass the stock lines completely. Right now I've got a T leading to the stock boost solenoids and then have their outputs leading to each other... I call it the boost recirculator mod but it keeps them happy since they are seeing boost, LOL. I've got a spike to 25 PSI and it settles to 23 PSI fading to 20 PSI or so as it goes from 6k -7k. I may play with the preload on the WG actuator as the boost was still fading towards Redline but that may be all this poor turbo can muster. Likely I'll fine tune it once I get the exhaust, FMIC, and piping installed.

AMS Turbo Intake with MAF housing and Filter: Seems to be a real boon for a car without a tune since you can counter some of that factory rich AF that comes with the stock ECU and get some nice HP for the $$. The MAF housing is about 72mm inside diameter compared to the stock at 67mm although the stocker is larger at the filter end and is hard to measure at the center where the sensor comes down. It seems there really is a BOV and turbo on this car now since I can hear the air entering the engine like it was meant to sound. The stock turbo sure does spool up fast at low RPM's! I know that it won't always give me all that power once I get the other parts and an ECU tune but my plans to make a cold air box should complete the setup quite nicely.

I have to admit the car was feeling a bit sluggish when I first got it, but after the rev 2 reflash and a few tweaks it all seems to be transforming into the car I really want to drive. I'll post my impressions of future upgrades as they make their way onto the car. Hopefully everything will get done before the drive down to the 08 Shootout!

Mightygnu

iTrader: (4)

Thanks for the review.

joowick

iTrader: (7)

Thanks alot. I've been thinking about getting the motor mounts and shifter brushings but just wasn't sure if it was that big of a change.

Hiboost

iTrader: (9)

Considering how stiff that front motor mount was it's just insane how much vibration it transfers to the frame now. It's growing on me but if someone came out with an insert that is 50-75% as stiff it would be much more suitable for a daily driver. Right now I can guarantee you the first thing that my girlfriend will ask when I start up the car is "why is my entire body vibrating?"

It's crazy how much better the car feels already with just a few tweaks so far. The AMS intake pipe and filter feels like a solid 30 crank HP mainly due to the leaned out A/F ratios and the 20 PSI boost to redline seemed to add in another 20 HP. Powerwise this is how the car should have come from the factory since it now hauls like an Evo should. Even if it was at around 350 HP at the crank right now it still is a bit heavier than my Evo 8 so maybe low 13's high 12's car @ 106 MPH if I had to guess. If I get a chance to hit the strip on Wed night I may just take her down for a few passes, especially since my shifting feels much more precise.

I'll report back on power after I get the FMIC with pipes and Exhaust installed which should definitely prompt me to test the car at the strip before the shootout. I'll also try and get the Eibach Lowering springs put in and aligned this week. Likely I'm going with -2.0* camber/zero toe front (or slight toe out 1/32" to 1/16") and -1.5* camber/zero toe in the rear. Likely the stock adjustment won't get me that much camber but I'll have them put a half a degree more in the front compared to the rear.