I've been itching to do something to my car ever since I finished paying off the loan last year. Unfortunately, the plan was repeatedly pushed back because of conflicting priorities and it was mostly left stock, save for some grounding works, better rubbers + rims and some uprated work on the brakes and shocks. The engine was still pretty much a virgin.

Time to deflower it.

But I have been paying Speedworks several visits over the past few months to get some quotations and deciding what I could do with this aging hunk of metal. I ended up deciding to play around with the 'breathing' aspect of my car. Teong of Speedworks was pretty helpful in answering my questions.

I told him what I wanted, and he finally had everything ready in shop today. But honestly, when he started working on my car, I was kinda taken aback by the working attitude there.

Yes, I understand that he is a busy man. But with his phone ringing every 5 minutes, it really started grating on my nerves when I only see 3 bolts removed after 20 minutes. And damn, the workshop ethics really suck. As my car was systematically gutted, parts were strewn all over the place (seriously) and I got a little worried if they could piece everything back together later.

But they proved me wrong, so my worries could be just my obssesive compulsiveness rearing it's ugly head. 

Anyways, this is basically what was done. Mostly light mods.

First of all, junk the stock extractor. The standard cast iron unit is kinda restrictive, making the engine kinda sluggish, so this was on the top of my list to replace.

This was also the hardest part to remove due to the close proximity of the powersteering pump assembly, and I even had to help pitch in to get the damn thing out.

Finally, the extractor gave in and could be removed and yanked out.

Here's the new chrome Hotbits unit which is mandrel bent and should give better the engine an easier time to expel the exhaust gasses.

Next thing on my list was to remove the catalytic converter. Hey... I'm no environmentalist... I don't give a crap about greenhouse gasses and all that waramashit. I'm just interested in squeezing an extra few horses out of my car.

The entire mid section was replaced by a Hotbits unit which came with two bullet resonators. Which theorethically should be much more easy flowing without the restrictive cat.

And for the finishing touch, a Hotbits muffler.

This mufler is a double barrel shotgun design and pretty much straightflow type. Teong wanted to recommend me a bazooka type but I insisted on something a little less attention grabbing.

Once everything is installed and in place, Teong let me fire up the engine, and the first thing I realize was how freakin loud the damn exhaust was. It isn't as loud as the exhaust senget boys type, but still pretty darn loud. But the tradeoff was how much free-revving the engine is now. I told Teong, I wanted to drive around and see if I can live with the new decibles.

As I drove around, it was fun with all the new aural experience and extra horses. I was dumbfucked by how quickly the revs build up considering the 4G18 is a pretty sluggish engine due to the heavy flywheel. But I guess it got kinda tiring after 15 minutes. The boomy exhaust sound was way too intrusive in the cabin. I couldn't even enjoy my music without the exhaust drowning out everything everytime I gently prod the accelerator.

In the end, I drove back to the workshop and told Teong to replace the Hotbits muffler back with my stock unit.

Farking hate making this crappy decision.

Bleh.

No doubt I will lose a little of the new-found free-revving characteristics, but I can live with that. I can't imagive living with a car which sounds like a broken washing machine day in day out. I'm sorry, but I simply can't bring myself to beng-ify myself to that extent.

To compensate, I asked Teong to install a drop-in K&N free flow air filter and add a front Hotbits strut-bar just to alleviate some of the dissapointment of having to let go of the muffler.

The end result is a car with stock sound levels, but with slightly better throttle response. Expecting a huge difference would be lying to yourself. But at least the extractor and mid section did make their presence felt... ^_^

Overall, it's a little to early too tell if the changes are worth it. Kinda hard to justify the amount of money dumped in for the returns. But it's a really nice beginner's lesson on car tuning.