i have a 07 SS 5.3L and I want to know what kind of mods i can do with a $2900 budget? im looking for mainly bolt-ons?

 

Cold Air Intake kit, but personally I would stick with a KN drop in filter. You'll never need another filter for the car and they breath better than stock which will give some power and won't be as costly as the CAI.

 

well before i read this post, i read your other post in the u bend section you made.

the best way to spend your moeny is to leave this section and head over to the engine & internal or (since you say you want bolt on), the turbocharger, supercharger, and nitrous section. k&n drop in filter may help you out a bit.

but as i posted over there, i've learned the hardway that tampering with exhaust doesn't help you're times with any major noticable difference.

 

Ok, lets go a bit further now.

First a exhaust system does not create any new power, it will only give back what the system layout problems took.
The average car like ours is losing 35 H.P. due to poorly designed exhausts we must have for a variety of reasons.
Poor velocity and poor scavenging is the reasons and restrictions are just a minor nuisance in this equation.
Breaking down the exhaust 15 H.P. is lost cat forward.
10 H.P. is lost midsection
And 10 H.p. is lost in the rear section.

Cat Forward:

Just having to run a Catalytic converter you will lose roughly 8 H.P.
A cat is not a restriction as some have you believe, its a flow destroyer because of its design.
The internal makeup of the cat has more area than either the inlet or outlet sections of pipe, so this in itself cannot restrict flow.
We all know exhaust gases are hot and hot gases if allowed, will expand rapidly. The internal makeup of the cat has allready as said before, more area than either the inlet or outlet which allows the gases to rapidly expand. This expansion and now the fact the expansion needs to be compressed again to exit creates poor scavenging and slower exhaust flow. If a cat actually is made to work to eliminate foul gases the gases must hit a large surface area of these plates that remove them. Your not going to find another cat that can do the same thing and flow more than 10% better. There is no new magical material that could allow this to happen so all you have and can get is a cat that allows more pollution to pass and to be at least 49 state legal, well thats my 10%. 10% of 8 H.P. is .8 H.P. and do you want to pay that much for so little?

Headers which I have covered before will give make 7 H.P. more just by the fact it increases velocity by correcting scavenging.

Mid Section:

Where power is lost here is all in pipe turns and now a new added feature we did not deal with in the past called a Resonator.
Turns only lose you 1/2-1 1/2 H.P. max depending on the severity of them. You got a few turns which cannot be eliminated, but partially corrected by using a larger pipe (1/4" larger) and madrel bends. Count your bends, give them 1 H.P. lose as is, 1/2 H.. lost if larger and mandrel bent and you can see the gains available.

The resonator creates the same exact properties the cat does. Depending on the diameter and length of it you lose 4-7 H.P. for that being in place. It only begins to cancel some sounds that mufflers by design cannot. It is not a Drone remover as some lead you to believe. Length of overall exhaust and muffler makeup is what leads to Drone. Flowmasters are widely know to be a Drone muffler and why we won't get into.


Back Section:
Well see above.
Mufflers, have the again same problem as a cat.
And you got the pipe problems with turns etc.

Muffler makeup is critical.
The smaller the OD and ID of the muffler, the better it will flow. Why, lower room for expansion and inlet/outlet sizes are a minor if at all problem.
The ability to flow straight through is better than one that has turns. ( Thats why flowmasters suck performance wise)



Air Intake:

Does you stock air system lead to either the inner fender section or the radiator core support area and have free access to it.
And is it tight against these areas because if it has either and meets these properities, it is a cold air intake.

If the section between the air box and throttle body 2-3 times bigger and short in distance because if it is no problem exists for supplying more air than the motor can use.

Then the only restricting device left would be the filter which is a highly debated arena. It is possibly the only correction left to be made.

The only way to make the rest better and I would highly debate you on this, but theories say it can happen is to place the filter into the hood top and leave it open to the outside. I would debate you on cost only because it would lesson vacuum resistance, but so small I don't think anyone could prove its gains.


Well, that covers air in and air out of the simplest arena.


Next we won't bother to cover and just leave you searching yourself.
Rocker ratio's will yeild more power.
Cams will yeild up to 20% increase with stock setups.
Head porting
Compression ratio's
Forced air

But beyond the Rockers, nothing else is a simple to medium sized task for most.

Programming will not yeild measureable results on a cost effective measure unless you've radically changed the motors breathability like with cam changes or aftermarket forced induction.


But you still have another arena that will make you measurably faster, but does not create power.
First is auto tranny shifting softness. Stock is shifts like ****, slow. Faster, firmer shifts will yeild up to 3 tenths.
Gear ratios is another area, but I leave you to find whats available for your car.

 

The bad thing about gear ratios is you have to pull the trans and tear it apart. IMO unless you're modded enough to need upgraded tranny hard parts- I wouldn't even bother for the small gain- especially since the only commonly available ratios are 2.93 3.29 and 3.69.


IMO, if you have that kind of cash, I'd pick a major mod- and do it. For that kind of money, you should either be able to do heads/cam or a turbo- if not, you should be awfully close.

The bad thing is, you could easily dink $3k away on useless bolt ons (say $1k for exhaust, $500 for rockers, $300 intake, etc etc)- and still not make much more power than stock- whereas if you did something major, you could get a much more substantial increase in that one shot. The LSx engines like bolt ons, but you could really make that thing a beast with a good h/c or boost setup for the same money.

 

try headers.. letting your engine breathe out easier produces alot more horses.. start with air intake tho.. either cold or get a whole system.. then just follow it back to headers then cat then exhaust.. free up as much clean space as you can by spittin out as much exhaust so that your car breathes and runs clean..