Advice Needed on Next Mod from Experienced Owners
 

2014 Sports pack Z and not sure on next step. Currently have Motordyne Art Pipes and MD CB exhaust. Heard from a tuner that cold air I take is useless due to the turbulence and had my eyes on the Motordyne LTH. Curious on what you guys suggest next. Headers, cold air intake, tune, pulleys, or just calm down and be happy? Thanks fellas

Sway bars. And your tuner is wrong on the intake.

It's a pretty well respected tuner in the Z community. Says the turbulence that the MAF have to deal with eliminates any benefit. Not saying your wrong though as I thought tuners just loop the MAF readings artificially. Why do you say sway bar? Front, rear, both? I like tail happy.

For HP, a cold air intake and a tune.

Otherwise, the Z definitely benefits from a stiffer front end via an aftermarket front sway bar, and a front underbrace. Swift springs are also nice.

Additionally, Z1 sells collar inserts for the rear differential and an all aluminum transmission mount to "tighten things up."

Okay, I'm happy I asked.

Your best gains are from cold air intakes, test pipes, and catback. After that you follow a path of diminishing returns - ported manifold and headers will net you something, but it's relatively costly for limited performance improvement.

I did Z1 Intakes with velocity stack upgrades, 63 mm ported throttle bodies, z1 ported upper mani, fast intentions long tube headers, fast intentions exhaust, dynoed at 334 whp, 278 wtq (and my torque band starts early thanks to the headers).

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing

I keep a lot of dyno data and results in a shared Google Drive file, you may enjoy looking over it.

So Admin intake and uprev tune or Z1 intake with ecutek? Stock throttle bodies. I Really can't find anything that shows why Admin is worth the money but could be wrong. So many threads of back and fourth.
Also love that spreadsheet. Very interesting to see the different setups. Appreciate it

What he said regarding intake.

So far this thread is just talking about horsepower gains, but what about the clutch/drivetrain? There are some upgrades you can do here that will vastly improve your driving experience.

Didn't mention it as I already have that squared away

I'd say calm down and be happy. Change whatever you think needs modification. Thousands in breather mods may net you like 20 or 30hp which is a joke. Other modern turbo cars gain that with a cheap intake.

Personally, I think suspension is the most enjoyable mod on any car.

What's your goals? Street car? Track?

clutch slave cylinder replacement before it breaks
lightweight flywheel and clutch

it'll change your driving experience since the OEM flywheel hates revving

Respected ay. Avoid this tuner like STD. Statements without facts are just opinions. This tuner made an assumption. There are two commonly used CAIs that perform well for the Z. Do your research. I've done pretty much every N/A mod. I would do breather, cooling, and suspension mods before anything else.

Yeah that tuner is off the list to say the least hahaha. That's why I asked

Buy some used GTR injectors ($120), install them yourself.

Then spend $800 on a EcuTek tune on E85.

Then hang on!

I wouldn’t necessarily say that your tuner is wrong with respect to maf readings. It is true that under SOME conditions the air will be more turbulent with an aftermarket air intake than with the factory intake. The factory goes through great lengths to ensure the airflow has as little turbulence as possible and the result can be observed in the relatively smooth maf signals present in most stock applications.

With that said, an intake that produces more flow will in fact produce more power since the air mass consumed is larger and a larger amount of fuel will need to be added to hit the desired fuel targets. A good measurement without a dyno can be approximated by logging g/s of air consumed by the engine under identical conditions for comparison.

Ultimately a lower turbulence maf signal will produce a more accurate load calculation and that will produce a smoother ignition timing curve and the car will drive smoother than a high turbulence system. Each implementation has its drawbacks/benefits.

I'd say coilovers unless you want hp gains then get a 3" intake and a tune. Most 3" intakes require a tune for the car to actually run well.

Stillen Gen 3 Intake
 

I am selling my Stillen Gen 3 intake if you are interested. Only has about 200 miles on it.

Fast Intentions Turbo kit

IMO:
1. Zspeed CSC Elimination Kit
2A. Intake Either a CAI or K&N Drop ins; Our stock intake is pretty good at getting cold air but the tubing isn't the greatest. 2B. ECUtek Tune
3. Wavetec or Quaif Differential
4. Front Sway Bar
5. Tires and brake pads and oil cooler
6. Done or Take a dive down the rabbit hole of $$$

Install a Z Speed Performance CMAK before it’s too late and install a oil cooler kit for starters.

You drinking the coolaid? For the Z, the gains from CAI from Stillen and Takeda are documented.