Greetings all,

Just joined the club a month ago, got a pristine little '97 CL 2.2 nugget with only 39K miles on it. Looks unused, love it. The only thing is, it's a bit slow in the 0-70 mph range. I suspect it's partly the automatic... but I was willing to bite that bullet 'cause Phoenix rush hour traffic sucks with a stickshift.

What I can do to make it a bit snappier? I don't want to go turbo, nitrous or anything like that, I need this thing to last a good while. I'm thinking intakes, filters, plugs, wires, ignition control modules, that sort of thing. Can someone recommend certain parts, plus where they got them?

Thanks,
Max

 

Use the "Search" function. It will answer all your questions.

 

The first thing you should do in my opinion is to get a new air intake. Most people on this board will tell you to get an AEM Cold Air Intake, but if you don't want to spend that much money get a generic short ram off eBay(that's what I did) and be sure to remove the stock airbox and silencer. I got mine for $39 shipped and installed it myself -I believe this is the best "bang for your buck" without going for nitrous.

 

Welcome!

Yeah, put in a CAI, a tranny cooler (to save that auto tranny), look into an aftermarket exhaust, and a set of headers.

There's not much we can do to our cars, that will dramatically improve performance (besides an engine swap, N2O, or a turbo).

You'll have much better luck moding for looks!

 

Thanks for the suggestions!

I'm gonna start with the tranny cooler. Dustbuster4, I saw in an earlier post that you were planning to put one in, a Hayden #1677? If you already have, how did it go? What made you choose that one over others?

I'm sure other '97 2.2 owners here have installed one. It would be great to hear from them, like which coolers they chose and if they had problems installing them.

 

Manual trannies rule:P

 

I'm going try install it on Thursday (unless it rains--sucks not having a garage).

I have a better idea of how to do it!

My decision to purchase this particular cooler came from a suggestion of another a-cl.com member!

 

Hey, it's Thursday - get a chance to install it? Let us know how it goes.