I have a stock 04 convertible, what is the best $500 performace upgrade I can do?

 

What are your performance goals?? What type of performance increase do you expect or WANT? 10 HP, 20HP, 50, HP, 100HP ???

Manual or Automatic Transmission?

Differential gearing ratio??

What are you going to be doing with the car? Daily driver, track, HPDE, combo of each????

Are you happy with the cars handling as it is now??

There are too many variables to give you ONE answer.

Fill us in on the above questions. The more info we have the better recommendations that you will get to optimize you spending.

Bill

 

The car is an automatic. It is a weekend cruiser And want to continue to take on weekend trips. Just want to add a little more 20 to 50 hp if possible.

 

Quality tune.

 

Not much to be gained from a tune if no mods are made. Will get some if the "prevent abuse" stuff is removed form an auto trans car but not 50hp.

 

The C5 doesn't give up HP very easily. Sure, a tune will give you 10-15 HP but, it cost a good bit of cash ($150 for a mail order tune) , ($400-500 for an in the shop tune) That's on a stock engine.

Once you own the car for a while, that small increase in power will soon no longer thrill you will develop into a quest for MORE POWER. The cycle never ends. Trust me

My recommendation:
You really need more than that 10-15 HP increase to really feel a proper gain. Save your cash for the speed parts that make a difference (headers, proper cold air intake, ported TB and install all that at the same time and THEN, get a tune. That will usually net you a true. You have an automatic. I requested the differential gear ratio. TRUST US, I make a serious difference in the way the car performs. Do you have the stock the 2.73's OR the optional 3.15's.

The 2:73 is a dog out of the hole. The 3:15s are better. Most swap to a 3;90 for a big acceleration gain and love it.

All depends on what you desire.

Bill

 

Headers, cold air intake and a good in the shop tune will net you an easy 30-35 HP.

BC

 

This is exactly it! You may be well into the $1000-$1500 range, depending on header style/quality and tune type. A mail order will run about $150.00 (a shop dyno will move up the cost rapidly), and a CAI can be had for as little as $200. The zip tie mod is very popular and can be done for under $25.00 in lieu of an all out CAI kit.

 

I was simply saying within his $500 budget the tune was about it.

 

I would agree budget is too low for anything noticeable.

 

I was going to suggest a drivers school as the only thing I could think of at that price point, but as I read further down , you were asking about adding horse power at $500, not speed. Never mind.

As others have said, this kind of thing needs goals to spend the money effectively.

One of the items often skipped among the posted considerations when performance planning , is, if you want to sell the car in the future. To me, any used car with headers means I might be looking at a Ricky racer, and there are too many other cars not modified out of the factory stock design to make a car like that worth investigating. people with higher skills or different goals will shop differently, but there are less of those buyers around, and your goals with the car might not match what they are looking for.

My car was set up for auto crossing in a class that required a lot of stock parts being retained, the only performance modification allowed was an axle back exhaust system.

Works out great because I live in an area with some of the worst air quality in the nation, little kids getting permanent lung damage, stuff like that, so smog checks are a reality, and needed. I am not a perfect citizen all the time, but I can respect and follow the smog laws, being a big fan of breathing, since I do it so much.