After owning my car for nearly 5 years and reading about other people’s mods I decided to take the plunge and do a few mods to add a little more fun to the car. I did not want to spend tons of money or change the OEM look of the car.

Evosport underdrive pulleys:
A nice upgrade, Evosport delivered them in 2 days (great service). It took my mechanic 3 hours to do the install (cost $216). The pulleys are much lighter than the OEM parts, are well made and apart from the logo and size differences look like OEM parts. The water pump pulley is the same diameter as the OEM part but is considerably lighter; this is good since I did not want heat problems. The power steering pulley underdrives the power steering by about 11.6% and the alternator underdrives the alternator about 17.2%. I have not had any problems with battery drain using the heated seats so I would not expect any problems unless you have a high powered stereo, the steering feels the same. The pulleys do not produce a night and day difference but their effect is quite noticeable especially when pulling away and overtaking, they seem to give the car a nice get and go feeling, throttle response is better as well. Overall these are a nice upgrade and I would recommend them to anyone considering them.

Eibach Springs & Koni Shocks
I did not want to lower the car much (max 1 inch), the roads around my neighborhood are not “low car” friendly and I was prepared to add thicker pads if needed to raise the ride height if the drop exceeded 1 inch. My car came stock with number 5 pads in front and number 4 in rear so this was not an option. I chose Eibach springs since they had the smallest drop, and Koni shocks because they are adjustable. With this setup the car was lowered about 0.75 inches in the rear and nothing in the front, I will change the spring pads in front next time I take the car in for some work to match the fender gaps (probably #2), that will get me a 0.75 - 1.0 inch drop in the front as well. I set the shocks at the softest setting as recommended. Body roll is dramatically reduced and front end dive is close to nothing under normal driving conditions. The car feels much better connected to the road, is more stable at speed and in the corners. Cornering limits are higher as well. Ride quality is excellent, the car rides firmer but is not bone jarring and the reduction in body roll makes the car much more comfortable/fun on twisty roads. I may try the shocks at a higher setting but since this will require another trip to the mechanic I will wait. I was hesitant about destroying the comfortable ride of the car with this upgrade but for those of you who want to significantly improve the handling of your car without sacrificing ride quality I would say “go for it”. This upgrade has the most dramatic effect on the car and if you only make one mod to your car I would recommend this one. The springs and shocks were ordered from Tire Rack after a quick call to Luke to confirm my reading of the various options. Luke gave excellent advice and Tire Rack delivered the springs and shocks in 2 days with no problems. My mechanic took 4.5 hours to do the suspension swap including a test drive on various roads (cost $324).

Powerchip
Gives more oomph to the car than the pulleys, as reported by other board members it improves the throttle response at lower/mid revs. The combination of the pulleys and the chip add up to quite an improvement, it is quite noticeable when passing on the highway and when you stomp on the gas going uphill. They also took out the speed limiter, I have not tested this but I might be able to verify this one day in the desert. I swapped out the ECU myself using the supplied instructions, they did not match exactly with what I found under the hood but it is very simple to do and required no special tools.

Other things done in the many years of owning this car
Headlight rings, wood shifter with MB star and a permanently wired Escort 8500, all nice additions.

 

That is a very good write up, and I would have to agree with you on the pulley's they are a real nice addition to the engine.

 

Hi Martin,

When you say cost is $324 for Eibach Springs & Koni Shocks, is this for purchase or just for installation?

I am really considering doing this and am just commencing my research on it when I stumpled upon your post.

Thanks for the info.

--bigh

 

hey martin where and how much did you get your powerchip from, im intrested in buying one also. and how much more horse power did ya get?

 

Here are the cost for everything:

Pulleys Purchase $422.73
Pulleys Install $216.00
Springs & Shocks Purchase $699.50
Springs Shocks Install $324.00
Chip (Includes 26.79 to ship to Evosport) $926.79
Total $2,589.02

 

I do not know how much extra wheel HP I got since I did not do any Dyno runs. The pulleys went in first and they produced a nice kick in performance. The chip seemed to do a little more so I suspect a little more out of that.

In rough numbers the chip seems to be worth about 21 HP at the crank so about 17 at the wheels, I would probably guess that is about right since the pulleys reduce load and allow about 11HP extra to the wheels. So these upgrades are probably worth the equivalent of 30HP or so at the crank. Not huge but quite noticeable and reasonably priced at about $52 per HP.

These HP mods were the best bang for the buck I could find, A Kleeman SC will produce 3-4 times the power increase but at about 6 – 7 times the cost! I was not willing to spend that much on this car – to many other things to do.

An added bonus seems to be about 1-2 MPG!

 

Did you really feel a difference with the pulleys? Ive been considering this mod for the past year or 2 but havent been convinced yet.

 

I think im goona go ahead and order the pulleys this friday

 

do a before and after dyno!

 

You will feel it more in the first three gears than in the last two. It really gives you a little more pep off the line.

 

I agree the pulleys give you more go "off the line" when you push it a bit (more gains at higher revs).

Passing is better as well, either shift manually to 3rd or "kick-down" for moderate speed passing feels faster.

Not much in higher gears but that is in line with what you expect.