The Biggest Bang for the Buck

[olsonpg]

Originally Posted by Braces

Emergency fund in savings account.

Pshhh get that responsible financial advice out of here. :p

[olsonpg]

Originally Posted by malubawla

oft w/header $1015 +$40 for gaskets
drop in filter $50
spc front camber bolts $30
lowering springs (prokit, rce yellow) used $130-180
alignment $80-120 (-1.5F, probably will settle at -1.0R)

Thats my pick and what I did

100% this.

Torque dip gone, some extra get-up in the engine, OFT is a lot of fun to tinker with, lowered will make your car feel like its on rails, and alignment cause duh. All that for 1400 is a steal.

[PureShield]

It totally depends on what your use of your car will be and what kind of build your going for, street, track, drift? Most guys go for a CAI or drop-in filter and header and tune for your biggest bang for your buck.

[VTEC]

Originally Posted by strat61caster

My first ~$1300 went to camber bolts, brake pads/fluid, tires, alignment and then camber plates after that (so a touch under $2k). IMO the camber was more valuable than the tires for HPDE and AutoX (and the brake pads were a must), don't chuck your OEM tires prematurely, use them up, you already paid for them.



But it is on the gas lid: "Premium Unleaded Only"

91 is still considered premium. I was saying I wish they put the recommended 93 octane on the fuel cap because the torque dip really sucks on the 91

[VTEC]

Originally Posted by go_a_way1

LOL Bad car owner

Haha yup. So much unnecessary engine knock cuz I didnt RTFM. Thank god for this site cuz I saw the topic come up about 91 vs 93 octane and that's when I started to search the manual

The recommended 93 octane should be part of the "I want more power FAQ" sticky for other bad car owners like me lol

[strat61caster]

Originally Posted by VTEC

91 is still considered premium. I was saying I wish they put the recommended 93 octane on the fuel cap because the torque dip really sucks on the 91

It's location based, yes 91 is marked premium in California but in other places 93 is marked premium.







I guess he could live where all the pumps look like this, but there's only so much coddling you can reasonably request imo, at least it says it in the manual.

[m.box.design]

Originally Posted by strat61caster

My first ~$1300 went to camber bolts, brake pads/fluid, tires, alignment and then camber plates after that (so a touch under $2k). IMO the camber was more valuable than the tires for HPDE and AutoX (and the brake pads were a must), don't chuck your OEM tires prematurely, use them up, you already paid for them.

Which camber plates did you go with?

[Kestrel]

Lol @ $4 premium! Ouch.

[weederr33]

Buy a used supercharger by lowballing someone.

[LenA]

I bought 2015 BRZ a couple months ago. I plan on mostly DD, hopefully a couple of track days or autox, but only occasionally.

What i have done so far is
Motul 300 trans/diff $75
Adjusted clutch pedal $0
Apexi drop in filter $50
Mishimoti intake tube $130
Moddiction Anvil 2 shift knob $70

Plan for alignment and camber bolts next to get good baseline numbers and whatever negative camber I can get up front. $150 ish

That will put me right around $500 total. Will replace tires and brake pads when they wear out.

Car shifts better with clutch pedal, Motul and new shift knob.

Intake tube and drop in might give a bit more power, but mostly did it to get rid of sound generator and clean up engine bay. It sounds a bit different than stock.

It is really easy to get caught up in mods, but realistically, this will be perfect for my real use of the car.

[Muaddib]

Tires + SS brake lines.

[strat61caster]

Originally Posted by indesign

Which camber plates did you go with?

Raceseng due to their modularity, definitely on the expensive end but I bought them for OE suspension with no idea what coilovers I was going to end up with. My changeover should only run me about $130, more for different setup changes.

Arguably it would be cheaper to buy a different set and then sell and buy new camber plates that match my chosen coilover (which I'm not positive I'd beat my $130 cost to change above, even if I could find what I wanted as my setup will be on the rare side) but I liked how Raceseng offers diagrams of how it goes together (some vendors barely show pictures from two angles, let alone the whole stackup) which parts fit which kits and I can visualize what I need and anticipate future changes.

I'm happy with them, contrary to consensus I didn't notice an increase in NVH that usually seem to go with changing the rubber top hats to solid chunks of metal, they're as well mannered as the rest of the car for DD imo aside from a few quirky noises after a year of daily use that I think can be remedied. I wouldn't try to dissuade anyone from buying from a different manufacturer (could easily save $100-$400) and a bunch of coilover kits come with plates anyway, all depends on what you want. Cheaper kits may have compromised adjustability, adaptability, and may not be as good when it comes to NVH but I can't speak to that.

Had to alter my post after I realized that the first ~$1.2k went to tires (~$600), brake pads/fluid (~$500) and camber bolts/alignment ($150-$250), then I spent >$600 on the cascams...

[adamg]

CNT headers $350
OFT (used) $400ish
intake (used) $150ish
coilovers (used) $700ish

[Mim]

Aluminium drive shaft ($450) - http://www.driveshaftshop.com/2012-s...ece-driveshaft

Final drive gear upgrade ($250~$385) - http://www.weirperformance.com/finaldrivegears.html

Drop in air filter element ($50?)

Labour to install it all (shop round, but should only be a few hundred from a transition shop).

I put Cusco 4.556 gears in and an aluminium drive shaft in mine. Still going through initial break in, but to be honest it now feels like a higher capacity engine ie like a 2.2L. More power everywhere as it made every gear 11% faster. Throttle response has been improved. The only draw back is each gear sits about 300rpm higher at the same given road speed so it may mildly impact fuel economy, but I experienced the reverse with it improving my own simply down to the speed zones I usually drive in and the mod making 4th more usable more of the time.

Our cars use the ABS sensors in the front to measure speed so I didn't even need to touch the ECU to have the speedo adjusted. Its also a stealth sort of a mod. Though a really solid mod you would only really do this one if its a long term keeper.

You do also have the choice of going to more aggressive gears, at greater degree's of trade offs ie even higher rpms per gear and needing to upgrade to another LSD etc.

Here's a nice read - http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=27647

Figured FD gears have not been mentioned by anyone yet so thought I'd bring an interesting mod to the table for you that fits within your budget.