Anybody on here modify their car?

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I'm referring to the go-fast type of mods. I'm running megasquirt on my turbocharged ride. Anyone here do the same? It is a wonderful piece of kit that allows you to fiddle with almost every single element concerning your car's engine from fuel mixture, to spark advance, to how long the capacitors hold a charge within your coil packs.

Soo.. Anyone modify cars here?

No, but I've been interested in it.

Tim

Yes, but not the in the same way, I'm more interested in efficiency and cost for the time being.

To a certain degree I am as well. My primary project is turbocharged and uses the megasquirt to make power, but along with those, you tend to pick up fuel economy as well. A freer flowing exhaust usually adds 1-2mpg, as well as an aero kit, larger, lower resistance rolling tires and other mods. If you get into modding turbocharged vehicles, when out of boost, you can generally keep the motor running fairly lean, and run more timing than stock, thus giving a fair bit of efficiency. We've gotten up to 28mpg out of this setup, which is a far cry over the 21mpg the car comes with stock. These are numbers recorded out of boost, cruising at 70mph. In boost its another story, but who records economy numbers when you are doing 100+ anyway?

Once, I had a 1978 Ford F250

400 V8

4-speed with a granny gear

I modified it all right!

I kicked in the grill, both doors, and caused a bit of other damage with my fits of anger years ago.

I say it was stolen from the parking lot at work (it really was)... my mom says it ran away!

I admire people a lot who have automotive knowledge and can modify their vehicles.

I am fascinated by cars (especially the classic muscle cars) and I would like to fix one up in the future, but at the same time I do not like to drive. Weird combo, I know...

There's no reason ya can't do better. Like, say, ~40mpg@150mph. Given what's available today, there's also no reason imo why fast and fuel efficient can't coexist, w/ some compromises elsewhere of course. I'd love to screw around with something twin engined when I finally work up a decent budget (~$5-10k) to use. I think 100mpg/10s quarter mile would be nifty, and well within reach.

possibly, but not within my budget. The next car I'm doing is a turbo diesel light pickup truck for around town runs. I'd like to perk it up, but it will be nowhere near the performance of the car I'm running now. However, it will be a damn sight more economical. Otto-cycle engines definatley aren't that fuel efficient, but for the price to power ratio, it is hard to beat one!

A hybird in the future would be something fun to try, but the price of batteries, in-hub electric motors and speed controllers will have to come waaaay down first. As for now, I'll work on continuing to port the cyl heads, looking for more efficient turbo chargers and adding small things like hydrogen boost and tight squish motors with combustion chamber grooves to extract all the power and efficiency I can from this little 4 banger.

Sure they are, so long as they aren't throttled. But, there's something to be said for really cheap/free fuel.