Redback081
30-11-2007, 09:50 PM
Hey fella's
Well the VE demon's finally got the better of me a few weeks back so
we sold the VY SS and now I'm the owner of a brand spankin new
VE SS, my first ever new car, and I gota say its faaaaaarking awesome :)
Not long after I had my appendix removed (great fun) and with countless
hours at home with nothing to do but scratching my balls and surfing
the net (ls1.com) I started researching mods to crank up the LS2.
I thought I'd return the favour to everyone that posted their VE
results by posting my own results. What mods I chose, why I chose
them, how much they cost me and most importantly how much
power they made. Hopefully I can make someone else's decision
easier in the future.
Anyway here's a few pics
http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee97/Redback081/PB250031ver2.jpg
http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee97/Redback081/PB250028ver2.jpg
To start with I had the car dyno'd at the shop doing the tune,
it churned out an almighty 216rwkw at the wheels, a touch low I think
but the car had only done 600k's at that stage so it may just have
needed a bit more of a flogging to loosen up. That was the easy part :burnout:
First step was the exhaust. Bloody hell - how hard was it to sift
through all the info on here and make a decision? Bloody hard.
Not easy for someone that's relatively new to LS1's/LS2's.
Anyhow after countless hours of research and visits to exhaust
shops I decided to go with the 4 into 1 non ceramic coated
pacemakers. Mainly because of their good rep, but also because
I had pacies on the VY SS which had to be one of the sweetest
sounding exhaust's I ever heard.
I decided to go with the 4 into 1 pacemakers instead of the
shorter pacies that fitted up to the original cats mainly on the
exhaust shops advise, while I was there he was fitting a new
system to a VE so had the old stock VE exhaust manifold and
cats on the ground and explained how the airflow was restricted
with a shorter header setup... anyway it made sense to me.
The pacemakers set me back $1040 fitted which I thought was reasonable. :)
I guess the majority of forum members would already know this,
but for those of you that don't these headers didn't allow me
to keep the original cats because of their length (I think that's
right, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong). So aftermarket cats
were also on the menu. I went with magnaflow cats because
that's what my exhaust shop were supplying and the price was
reasonable, $250 each.
With the replacement of the cats came the O2 sensor issue,
I wasn't too worried about it because the car was getting a
tune the following week so would have the problem edited out,
that's if it ever arose. I'm told that on some VE's the 02 sensor
will trip immediately after the new exhaust is installed, on others
in can take weeks or even months, again feel free to correct me
if I'm mistaken. Anyway after a week of driving the engine light
didnt make an appearance.
I chose an Xforce 2.5" mild steel catback next for a few reasons,
I contacted a few forum members with a similar setup who replied
with good results (thanks Curtis & SS Enforcer). I also did some
research on old posts and found Xforce to be a popular choice,
that ontop of everyone saying how sweet the sound was.
There also bloody good value, I picked up mine for $700 from
ebay, couldnt go wrong with that!. Except that there was a
bloody chip out of one of the exhaust tips which I only noticed
when I got home. I decided not to go with the stainless steel
purely because of price, I was on an extremely strict budget,
women just don't understand the importance of performance..
need I say more.
And I can also confirm on the drone issue that they are %95
drone free, only a slight noise at around 1600-1700rpm while cruising.
After the exhaust was fitted we did another dyno run for 238rwkw,
an improvement of 22rwkw from stock.
Next was the cold air intake, my tuner was supplying this for
$320 which consisted of your basic pvc pipe and pod filter setup.
I chose not to go with the alluminium pipe incase any heat build
up in the aluminium pipe took away from its performance.
This CAI was chosen again based on price, it's a basic setup
that still yields results and as mentioned earlier, I had a budget
to adhere to.
Last but not least the tune, set me back $880, I left it with the
bloke for a whole day and had it dyno'd the final time for 255rwkw.
I must admit I was hoping for around 260rwkw but the car was
down on kw to start with, possibly due to it being so new, I also
have to take into consideration that every dyno is different.
Whats 255kw on his Dyno could be 265 at another shop down
the road, all in all I was impressed with the performance of the car.
It pulls like buggery.
Most importantly my brother-in-laws XR6T is 254rwkw so I'm
ahead by 1rwkw :flipoff:
I chose this tuner after asking around and a few shops, checking
out there website and speaking with the bloke, all seemed well
and he delivered. Even loaned me his work ute to get to and from
home while he had the SS at the shop!
All in all these were my results.
Stock 216rwkw
Exhaust 238rwkw
CAI & Tune 255rwkw
Total price
Exhaust $2300
CAI $320
Tune $880
$3500 for a gain of 39 rwkw
89 dollars a kw :smilesandbanana:
Overall the SS is a beast and I'd recommend these mods to
anyone. If I could do things over I would have fitted a 3 inch
cat back because I reckon the 2.5" xforce cat back is too quiet
for my liking. I would also have waited for an OTRCAI to be
released instead of my pod filter before I had it tuned, just food
for thought for anyone looking at VE mods, from what I know an
OTRCAI should be available from Marrano's in Sydney towards
the end of December. Depending on price I will look at ordering one.
Hopefully some new VE owners find will this info usefull, see you on the road! :driving:
Cheers
RB
Well the VE demon's finally got the better of me a few weeks back so
we sold the VY SS and now I'm the owner of a brand spankin new
VE SS, my first ever new car, and I gota say its faaaaaarking awesome :)
Not long after I had my appendix removed (great fun) and with countless
hours at home with nothing to do but scratching my balls and surfing
the net (ls1.com) I started researching mods to crank up the LS2.
I thought I'd return the favour to everyone that posted their VE
results by posting my own results. What mods I chose, why I chose
them, how much they cost me and most importantly how much
power they made. Hopefully I can make someone else's decision
easier in the future.
Anyway here's a few pics
http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee97/Redback081/PB250031ver2.jpg
http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee97/Redback081/PB250028ver2.jpg
To start with I had the car dyno'd at the shop doing the tune,
it churned out an almighty 216rwkw at the wheels, a touch low I think
but the car had only done 600k's at that stage so it may just have
needed a bit more of a flogging to loosen up. That was the easy part :burnout:
First step was the exhaust. Bloody hell - how hard was it to sift
through all the info on here and make a decision? Bloody hard.
Not easy for someone that's relatively new to LS1's/LS2's.
Anyhow after countless hours of research and visits to exhaust
shops I decided to go with the 4 into 1 non ceramic coated
pacemakers. Mainly because of their good rep, but also because
I had pacies on the VY SS which had to be one of the sweetest
sounding exhaust's I ever heard.
I decided to go with the 4 into 1 pacemakers instead of the
shorter pacies that fitted up to the original cats mainly on the
exhaust shops advise, while I was there he was fitting a new
system to a VE so had the old stock VE exhaust manifold and
cats on the ground and explained how the airflow was restricted
with a shorter header setup... anyway it made sense to me.
The pacemakers set me back $1040 fitted which I thought was reasonable. :)
I guess the majority of forum members would already know this,
but for those of you that don't these headers didn't allow me
to keep the original cats because of their length (I think that's
right, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong). So aftermarket cats
were also on the menu. I went with magnaflow cats because
that's what my exhaust shop were supplying and the price was
reasonable, $250 each.
With the replacement of the cats came the O2 sensor issue,
I wasn't too worried about it because the car was getting a
tune the following week so would have the problem edited out,
that's if it ever arose. I'm told that on some VE's the 02 sensor
will trip immediately after the new exhaust is installed, on others
in can take weeks or even months, again feel free to correct me
if I'm mistaken. Anyway after a week of driving the engine light
didnt make an appearance.
I chose an Xforce 2.5" mild steel catback next for a few reasons,
I contacted a few forum members with a similar setup who replied
with good results (thanks Curtis & SS Enforcer). I also did some
research on old posts and found Xforce to be a popular choice,
that ontop of everyone saying how sweet the sound was.
There also bloody good value, I picked up mine for $700 from
ebay, couldnt go wrong with that!. Except that there was a
bloody chip out of one of the exhaust tips which I only noticed
when I got home. I decided not to go with the stainless steel
purely because of price, I was on an extremely strict budget,
women just don't understand the importance of performance..
need I say more.
And I can also confirm on the drone issue that they are %95
drone free, only a slight noise at around 1600-1700rpm while cruising.
After the exhaust was fitted we did another dyno run for 238rwkw,
an improvement of 22rwkw from stock.
Next was the cold air intake, my tuner was supplying this for
$320 which consisted of your basic pvc pipe and pod filter setup.
I chose not to go with the alluminium pipe incase any heat build
up in the aluminium pipe took away from its performance.
This CAI was chosen again based on price, it's a basic setup
that still yields results and as mentioned earlier, I had a budget
to adhere to.
Last but not least the tune, set me back $880, I left it with the
bloke for a whole day and had it dyno'd the final time for 255rwkw.
I must admit I was hoping for around 260rwkw but the car was
down on kw to start with, possibly due to it being so new, I also
have to take into consideration that every dyno is different.
Whats 255kw on his Dyno could be 265 at another shop down
the road, all in all I was impressed with the performance of the car.
It pulls like buggery.
Most importantly my brother-in-laws XR6T is 254rwkw so I'm
ahead by 1rwkw :flipoff:
I chose this tuner after asking around and a few shops, checking
out there website and speaking with the bloke, all seemed well
and he delivered. Even loaned me his work ute to get to and from
home while he had the SS at the shop!
All in all these were my results.
Stock 216rwkw
Exhaust 238rwkw
CAI & Tune 255rwkw
Total price
Exhaust $2300
CAI $320
Tune $880
$3500 for a gain of 39 rwkw
89 dollars a kw :smilesandbanana:
Overall the SS is a beast and I'd recommend these mods to
anyone. If I could do things over I would have fitted a 3 inch
cat back because I reckon the 2.5" xforce cat back is too quiet
for my liking. I would also have waited for an OTRCAI to be
released instead of my pod filter before I had it tuned, just food
for thought for anyone looking at VE mods, from what I know an
OTRCAI should be available from Marrano's in Sydney towards
the end of December. Depending on price I will look at ordering one.
Hopefully some new VE owners find will this info usefull, see you on the road! :driving:
Cheers
RB