i would save up for A and B

 

i'd do B and E

and no you can't eliminate your flex pipe. why would you even want to? the flex pipe is just a peice of hollow pipe that is flexible so that your exhaust doesn't break in half when the engine moves in the engine bay. it doesn't hurt your performance at all.

you can get bigger (in diameter) flex pipe's when it comes to exhausts i'd recommend talking to Ray at McNews ( http://www.mcnewsautomotive.com/ ) those guys know what thier doing.

as for the exterior personally i wouldn't spend money making my car look like something else thats out there, i'd get a differant body kit, but if thats what you want, go for it.

sadly enough your working with an SPI which can get kinda hard to do from what i understand. why not talk to tin_maddog about a turbo? he built one for his SPI and it runs great!

 

^^^ yeh i didnt know what the flex pipe did, I want to keep it street legal, since MA is kinda strict.

I just noticed the roush focus fanatics group buy discount so i may be getting the roush front bumper instead. if I go that route. unless the guy who offered me the svt front bumper pulls through with a beter price.

If/when I do exhaust I will talk to them about the flex pipe.

The turbo would be a luxury for me, I know I have an SPI, my goal is to get up to a stock zetec engine and have better MPG. so the Turbo would def put me well over the zetec. I really don't want to ruin my enigne so I was thinking of using a saab or volvo stock turbo and keeping the boost really low probly only adding 50hp???? although i know absolutely nothing about turbos, all I know is my buddy knows how to install one and he would help me out.

 

well just because you can install one doesn't mean you know what your doing. unless he has built and installed a turbo on an SPI before.

the flexpipe isn't needed to keep your car legal, the catylitic converter is.

 

well if you want to stay legal then do E and F

 

you could always buy a zetec for like $800..

i don't think us cincinnati guys have any problems with staying street legal. we could damn near drive an indy car down the highway around here, as long as we weren't speeding we'd have no problems..


HURRAY NO EMISSIONS!

 

why would he want to buy a zetec $800. its just a 20hp difference which can easly be made up by a few mods. seriously, lets keep engine swaps out of this for they are not what he is considering.

what I think you should do is get a lentech valve body and go for a bit of boost (5psi roughly). it would be the cheapest way to make good and reliable power. look on jeffescortlx's cardomain site and read up on his dsm scort (turbokit for about $400 and made 140hp atw). an auto tranny can handle that with the lentech valvebody. so about $800 and you'll have similar numbers.

personally i'd stay away from cams,lifters, etc. due getting more expensive than an HMT kit in the long run and i'd also not do any audio upgrades. a nice svt appearance conversion would be an excellent descision after you've added a bit of power to the engine.

so i'd say: 1) boost, 2) svt appearance 3) exhaust. no audio, escortfocus parts, or manual swap.

 

how well do the torque converters do under boost, stock ones? and a lentech vb would be sweet!

 

I'd go with A and B. Those have some potential for LARGE power gains with a re-flash.

 

You have to do audio first. For me anyway, that's a MUST. Afterward, an exhaust or underdrive pulley seem to be your best bets. I just got the FC Underdrive Pulley off NewEdgePerformance, and an exhaust is in my very near (6 months) future. I decided on an MBRP cat-back, as no one makes a flex pipe for our engine (Zetec Only). Also, styling is important, but only if you can 'walk the walk' should you 'talk the talk.' Catch my drift?

 

f00t why are you against the engine internals??? i know nothing about that stuff i don't know much about anything, i am still learning.

its significantly cheaper than a turbo plus i think it would be safer. i'm still on the wall foreveything i know i can get way more HP from a turbo but i don't want to blow my engine either and a turbo with an ATX needs to be really percise i believe.

right now i'm leaning towards the escort focus line up then heading towards exhuast.

again this is a daily driver looking for a little extra kick.

although in the back of my mind i keep telling myself SAVE FOR THE MTX!!!

so i'm realy lost still

actually take audio off the list i just remebered i have to keep my car in hartford for most of the year and thats like car jack city.

 

You could just find a junked out Focus with the Zetec, and swap out the engine, MTX, and ECU and there you go. I was thinking about doing this, but I'm holding out for the 2.3 Duratec! d00t! [woot]

 

firstly, i am not trying to stirr up crap or take a dump on you ideas. I am just a very diy guy and love doing/ learning things myself. therefore the following comments:

i have nothing against internal engine mods (believe me, if i'd have the cash i'd love to build a sweet NA motor). i just think that doing all of the mods that you have mentioned in "A" will be significantly more expensive than building and installing your own turbo setup.

think about it cam: $330, spring/retainers/seal: $200, cam gear: $120 (i dont even think they make them anymore), lifters: $100, bigger injectors: $100 (you didnt think that you would be able to keep the stock injectors with all those mods did you?), udp:$110 (but i dont think anyone make them anymore/ i have been wrong before though). thats $960 just in NA parts for your car. then you will have to pay someone to install them for you because you will most likely not know how to do it yourself because you only ordered/ bought them and didnt get any hands on experience, another wadfull of cash.

Once you build up your engine you will definetly want to maximize its power and buy a header (need custom one cause no one manufacturs spi headers anymore) and intake (I think a quality one will run you $200+)

Now your stock atx tranny is rated for 270 tq (tq kills your tranny not hp). so divide that by two and you have 135tq (shaft tq) or all your stock tranny can handle. those lifters, cam, etc. that you will have just installed (or had installed) will raise the tq numbers of your engine significantly to the point where you can easily blow your tranny. Meaning that you will have to at least get a lentech valvebody for your tranny to keep up with your motor.

Lets now look at going Fi with a HMT (home made turbo) kit. you build the turbo kit yourself, collect all the needed parts, do a ton of reading (you will have to anyways), and try to take in as much info as you can. I hate people saying that you can only go FI if you spend several thousand dollars on a prebuilt kit, which seems to be the majority concensus in this forum.

Have you looked at Jeffescortlx's cardomain page like I mentioned? do it and read everything there. after that, look and read all about his DAILY DRIVEN escort. the turbokit that he built for it was only less than $400. and made 140hp and 188tq unintercooled at 7psi. (i think he mentioned that you can achieve 170hp and 185tq with an intercooler at 7psi).

Alright, now look at it this way: if you choose to do an good HMT kit you will learn tons of information, know your car inside-out and what its limitations are, and be able to easily increase power by just upping boost a few psi (if you ever choose to in the future). If you decide to build a big NA motor, in my opinion, you will not learn much due to having someone else do all the installation (you just dont strike me a a person who is very "wants to get into the nitty gritty of it" from your posts); which will, in turn, take away from your overall experience of the focus.

With the lentech valvebody, I believe, that an atx transmission can handle 5-7psi on a GOOD tune (i think that's what wb said). at my estimation i think thats roughly 160tq to 180tq at the wheels.

you will also need tuning no matter performance route you go. most people are hinting towards the sct flash/ tune and i think that would be good for a normal NA car. but for your escort focus route i think you'll need more extensive tuning than just an ecu flash (I may be wrong though) to maximize your gains. (look into megasquirt <-- just a suggestion). you can just as easily blow your motor/ tranny even if you just throw in a cam. it all depends on how good your tune is no matter if its NA, FI, or nos.

finally, lets compare prices of some of the items discuuse above:

NA setup: $960
valvebody: $400
sct Xcal2+ 6 mont subscription: $445
thats: $1805 for NA and Xcal 2

NA setup: $960
valvebody: $400
megasquit: $250
thats: $1655 for Na and megasquirt

FI setup (well use jeff's): $400
valvebody: $400
sct Xcal2+ 6 mont subscription: $445
thats: $1245 (still cheaper than NA)

FI setup (well use jeff's): $400
valvebody: $400
megasquirt: $250
thats $1050 (alot cheaper than NA)

I'm not trying to force you to go FI, its just what I think would be the most reasonable descision.


Since you said that you only want "a little extra kick" while driving your daily driver i think that you should do something simillar to the following:

buy a good exhaust, have a header+flexpipe made (if you want i can send you some ideas i've been drawing up and show you how to mod an escort header/ i think steeda is now producing shorty headers for the spi), an udp, performance spar plugs, screaming demon livewire+ coil, black diamond throttlebody, custom tune by wayne.

that way you will have plenty of kick and a very nice exhaust system for a daily driver. and can get to work on your other plans

 

I have to strongly agree with f00t's final paragraphs, for a daily driver why go to all this trouble with internal components, that only truly benefit show-type or race-bred cars? I would say the exhaust etc setup is a great idea, and the UDP (by the way f00t) is available at escortfocus and new edge performance.

 

I only spent $260 to turbo my SPI

With some real tuning (like SCT) and a intercooler, my same set up could support 200whp.

 

mine custom was 3k and 450 for the tuning

 

damn jeff, with prices like that your really making me consider a dsm mani+turbo instead of fabbing another manifold of my own. too bad the only dsm clubs anywhere near me are "rice the hell out of 'em" dsm clubs (seriously I saw a late model talon the other day with a HUGE rap aound wing that almost touched doors, a 4" fart can, and a great big "talon" sticker that covered 1/2 the windshield. not to mention bling-bling rims)

 

hey f00t i PMed you about the gt headers.

 

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