4 Misconceptions About Car Mods I'm Tired of Hearing...

4 Misconceptions About Car Mods I'm Tired of Hearing...These aren't Fake Performance Mods just because they don't give 50HP instantly. From Cold Air Intake, Exhaust, Headers, Intake Manifold, and tune. If you want to race, then add some Carbon Fiber, buy some Coil Overs and get yourself some Tires. I never want to hear from someone that "because it adds too small of HP to notice, it's a stupid fake performance mod". Those "Small HP" gains begin to add up...that's literally how math works. Your first mod for your car won't send it flying to the moon. Heck, even if you did a Turbocharger as your first mod, that's still true...since your car would fly for a few miles, then blow up due to lack of Forged Internals or blow it's Manifolds or Head Gaskets. Supporting mods like better Air Cleaners, stronger intake manifolds, and efficient headers will make more of a noticeable gain in the long run. BE PATIENT WHEN MODDING A CAR!!

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[SteveOnlin]

Number 5: blinker fluid is just a prank, this is very important for your car you must do it. You need to change blinker fluid

[scarface]

As a technician I appreciate this video to know I’m not crazy for the first two points

[HirokaAkita]

I'd add another thing about ECU tuning.

Yeah. They maybe add some 10-15 hp in a worst case scenario. But here's the BIG elephant in the room:

*It's not about the amount of power delivered at the redline. **_It's about how power does get delivered all over the revs._** There's no case in having 800 hp at 8500 rpm, if the car its completely undriveable from 1000 to 7000, and gets crashed after leaving the house's driveway.*

[EmilyRose]

The first mod you should make, imo, is tires. They let you accelerate, brake, and steer better. It's actually a better upgrade than just coilovers. Maybe add some rims to fit bigger stickier tires, but for your money, it's the best bang for your buck.

[heeltoeautomotive]

A “huge improvement” also really depends on what you’re doing. When it comes to road cars it’s usually like 50-100 hp. But in actual racing, especially in sports car racing where we have tight regulations, having an extra 5 hp is a HUGE difference

[BrianJNelson]

Good to see someone out there supporting even the smallest mods. Not everyone is comfortable pulling their car apart (with no idea whether they can reassemble it) and sometimes just having something small and easy might give someone an incentive to do more later down the line.

[wadedalton]

To reinforce the 3rd point, in the Crown Vic community, getting a Marty tune can easily cut your 0-60 time down 1-2 seconds from 9 seconds to 7-8

[Iron-Griffon]

As someone who currently doesn't have a muffler on a 95 horsepower car, it is VERY noticable.

[zellcaraway]

For my car, dual cone intakes were one of the first mods I did because the stock airbox is restrictive af. Also, email tunes are great either way. For a lot of email tuners available for my car, you get free revisions, and they will actually have you do a pull, take a log, and send it to them so that they can adjust the tune to your specific car.

[artij]

I totally agree with you. People seem to forget that any mod is just a part of something bigger. Of course any of these mods alone are hardly even giving any real profit... but all of them (and many others) combined give some serious gain. I love that you included shelf tunes. Even on an almost stock car with some minor upgrades it's good to have some safe tune.
Fun fact - I was noting my thoughts about each of the mod you mentioned just before you explained that and I had very simillar conclusions. I'll provide my notes in the reply to this comment 😁
About the powerboxes. There are some chip-boxes that are designed specifically for particular engine models that by-pass ecu and actually really increase power. I wouldn't recommend them though as these are just faking input data in order to enrich fuel-air ratio.

[boargarage]

I always tell everyone to get an intake not for power but for the sound. Worth it, especially if you have a quiet, small engine

[reidhulshof]

And even if basic cold air intakes and exhausts didn’t matter, they’re still a good way to comfortably get your feet wet when wanting to start modding. Those are the first two mods I did on my car and just a simple couple hours undoing a few bolts or clamps helped me break through the initial intimidation of messing around in my engine bay or getting around underneath my car. They’re fantastic beginner mods for the jumping off point they provide

[someweeb]

IMO a cold air intake is only worth it if you're going all out and giving it real cold, fresh air. Get a headlight intake or put it out the hood or do whatever, just give it lots of air intake.

[ralphharrison]

13 years ago, i upgraded my exhaust system on my 99 subbie sus, and the difference was def noticed. not only did it give a small increase in hp, the dirty growl was worth it.

[BrandonrsGaming]

Somewhat disagree with approaching email/remote tunes as a "start" or cheaper option and worse than a dyno tune. I think it really depends on your platform and tuner. Ex. I have a Fiesta ST, and I guarantee if I went to a local dyno shop (which would definitely not specialize in anything like my car) that they would not do nearly as well of a job as my tune from a (remote) company who has already worked on 30+ cars with almost the same list of modifications. I think the only time dyno tunes dominate is when you find someone of the same knowledge/skill level as a remote one, but the advantage to remote is you can choose specifically who you believe to be the "best"/most knowledgeable one for your car. Also, I'm not sure if this isn't true for other platforms, but I got a few revisions of my tune based on my datalogs from the previous revision so that it IS entirely custom to my car. It's not an "off the shelf" tune for my parts list.

[yippeeclawyay]

Man sounds like a disappointed dad, I didn’t need 2

[bbracing]

In my area, loud exhausts save lives! Every vehicle I have ever owned has had a modified exhaust system. I've also never hit a deer or even came relatively very close to hitting one. On the flipside my mother has taken out practically a whole herd of deer over the years with her multiple (very quiet) vehicles. At this point I am convinced it is more than a coincidence. 🤷🤓

[bewareofmountainlions]

A lot of people also forget that there is more than just power to some of these mods. Intakes, aftermarket TBs, and tunes usually also help throttle response making your car more reactive the inputs of your pedal. Makes your car's power delivery feel more instant. So while you didn't increase power much your car feels more peppy than it was before.

[briffy]

a few years ago there was a youtube video with a v8 engine running as a test crate, they tested all the different intakes, if i remember correctly, the one with best performance was a salad bowl, modified to be used as an intake

[darkstrm]

This is a great video. I got a $500 piggy back and a dyno tune which netted me almost 140whp, so now my stock car is 490whp. Still an $800 upgrade with dyno, but 140whp is totally worth the cost on a car with no other mods