pabound

Well, I did it. Bought an 04 6MT red/tan leather. IT ROCKS!

Now, aghhhh, what can I do to make it a bit quicker???


He He He.


-John

svtmike

Quite a few things:

1) Drive downhill.
2) Drive with the wind.
3) Remove all unnecessary gadgets and seats.
4) Only fill the tank half-way.

Other than that, there's not much out there right now because the car is so new, but the aftermarket will catch up.

Mike

pabound

SVT Mike eh? I am detecting a little bias to the snake(s)??

Do tell...

svtmike

I don't think I'm biased about car brands; I've owned quite a few different makes. My name comes from the car I had when I joined the forum (SVT Contour, not a Cobra).

The '04 TL is so new that the few go-faster mods out there are really just in development (Cold Air Intake is the only one I've seen discussed), and I haven't seen any hard dyno results to prove that one out.

The aftermarket will come to the '04 TL, but it's not here yet in any kind of force. I won't partake (learned my lesson on that two cars ago), but I'm sure many here will.

Mike

youngmic

svtmike, what was the lesson you learned?

svtmike

Lessons learned about aftermarket mods (specifically on my old 1990 Taurus SHO):

A. Every mod involves a tradeoff. If you love your car before the mod, you might not love it so much afterward because of the tradeoffs made to get the mod's benefit.

- That go-fast exhaust may make the car more powerful, but it may also make it sound like the world's largest weed whacker. Even for an exhaust that multiple people claim is hardly louder than stock. Make sure you value the power more than the peace and quiet of the cabin. The larger diameter pipes may also not fit as well as everyone said they would, and might bang against the car with hard shifts or large road bumps because of the reduced clearance.

- That go-fast intake may make the car slightly more powerful, but from the cabin it may also sound like you put a small jet engine on it.

- That super cool oiled air filter may add 1-2hp on the dyno, but the oil residue that it deposits on your MAF wire and other parts of the intake screws up the way your car runs negates any of those gains. This one other people around me learned.

- Those super duper springs and shocks might make the car handle better, but you might hate the added stiffness that results.

B. Aftermarket mod makers as holistic an approach to their efforts as their engineer counterparts at the auto company. I think that results in many of the tradeoffs.

- Someone might come up with a clutch that will outlast the stock clutch, and clamp harder, but the damn thing catches so suddenly that it's impossible to drive smoothly in day-to-day traffic, even for an experienced driver.

- See many of the tradeoffs above. The negative side effects of mods purpose-built to add power are not generally advertised, nor are they often mitigated by their makers.

C. Aftermarket mod makers generally do not have rigorous testing/reliability programs. Development consists of fitting a prototype to one or two cars, then it's off to production. Variances between cars can become a nasty problem if your car is out of whack compared to the development mule.

Mods that I made in the past that were good things (i.e., lots of benefit with little or no negatives):

- Changed cable shifter to rod shifter linkage.
- Added thicker anti-sway bars.
- Added higher flow Y-pipe to stock exhaust.

Mods that I made to cars and regretted because for me the downsides more than overshadowed the benefits:

- Aftermarket high-flow exhaust.
- Lowering springs and stiffer struts.
- High-flow intake with open conical air filter.
- Ceramic clutch with custom made throwout bearing.

On all of these but the springs/struts, I went and bought new stock components to replace the originals, and sold the mod parts at a loss just to get my car back where I could stand it. Springs/struts were too much labor + $$ to put back.

I swore off performance mods after that experience, and have been true to my word. I have no desire whatsoever to modify my TL (correcting the EL42 defect doesn't count).

In short, caveat emptor.

Mike

svtmike

Another thought as a postscript.

If you want to go faster, improve the nut behind the wheel: invest in a performance driving school such as Skip Barber. What you gain there transfers to every car that you drive.

Mike

youngmic

Very informative! Thanks Mike.