i am looking at getting a screamin' demon coil pack with live wire plug wires. a catback exhaust, a high flow intake, a new header and throttle body. not sure if all that will provide more HP. any info or suggestions would be appreciated. oh yeah, i have a 2000 ZX3, everything is stock right now. hoping to change that soon.
The catback, headers, & intake will all help. I'd also suggest an under-drive pulley. Get the 1 pc., and shop by price. There's really no diff between brands.
The throttle body will give better response, but performance gains are doubtful.
This is just my , bit I'd forget about the Screamin Demon. There are no proven performance gains, (at least I've never heard of any from reliable sources). Lots of folks who have installed them, have removed them & are now trying to sell them. If it were me, I'd just opt for a good set of plug wires. They may not give you any performance gains, but they do smooth the engine out nicely.
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screaming demon( focus frenzy magazine did a article and got up to 2whp gain throughout the range, never any losses) it might help a bit, i have it and would say its not a big HP booster, but can help overall efficiency
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Why don't people change the cams first since they are almost ALWAYS the limiting factor on stock engines? How many cars out there are using the full potential of stock intakes, exhausts and ignition systems. I'm not a big fan of loud exhausts unless they are absolutely necessary to make the power.
Captain J wrote: Why don't people change the cams first since they are almost ALWAYS the limiting factor on stock engines? How many cars out there are using the full potential of stock intakes, exhausts and ignition systems. I'm not a big fan of loud exhausts unless they are absolutely necessary to make the power.
I agree, at least to a point. If/when you're racing, or are spending a lot of time in the upper rpm range, cams will really help a lot. Everything is a trade-off though, and high-performance cams will hurt your lower end performance. Every car I've ever installed a cam is has done noticably worse at low rpms, e.g., getting off the line, driving in relatively slow moving city traffic, etc.
I also don't like my cars to be too loud. That being said, a more open exhaust will help your power.
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The farther away the exhaust gets from the engine, the smaller the pipe needs to be. The higher the velocity of the exhaust, the better job your exhaust will do of scavenging each cylinder, especially at low rpm, when it has more time before the valve closes. The exhaust cools off and becomes denser as it moves down the exhaust pipe, so putting a larger cat back on it than is needed will slow the exhaust gas velocity and therefore do a lesser scavenging job of the cylinders at low rpm, leaving less room for the intake charge.
What i think is the most reasonable order to go for a moderate street car (without taking the head off) is: change the air filter, tune the EFI, change cams, tune the efi and adjust timing, change the entire exhaust and move the cat farther downstream, tune the efi, change the intake manifold and adjust efi and timing. I'd only change the ignition if necessary.
What i'd like to do for my exhaust if i ever get around to tuning my focus is make a ferrari style variable resonance dual exhaust deal with a valve opening up the second exhaust at a set rpm.
if you have the cash go out and grab a crower stroker kit. i'm sure they make them for the zetec as they make them for most any popular applications.
remember, there is no replacement for displacement, or something like that i think it goes.
Last edited on Sun Feb 27th, 2005 04:27 am by docinsano
a longer stroke would definately kick your torque in the pants but so will the 4000$ price tag.
I'd get some nice street cams plus the usual I/H/E.
If you think now that you'd like to have a turbo or supercharger in the future than stop right now and buy nothing for your car. invest all money in the FI and you will be alot happier.
cams can't help without room to breathe. The biggest limit the zetec has from the factory is restriction. The factory intake tract is horrible, and the exhaust is even worse. Number one mod on any zetec should be some sort of intake, get the air in there and it can start to come to life. After that, a catback should be the first step to a new exhaust, it should always be first as it can work with the stock other parts, where buying a header to feed a stock exhaust is getting nowhere fast. Then a header and flexpipe and you have a good starting point for starting on the engine. An intake alone cannot get you more than a couple hp, but with a header and exhaust, the intake can more effectively do its job.
Ok, now that your car is breathing like it can, let's talk about performance parts. A throttlebody is a great upgrade for a zetec focus, it not only helps your engine to get more air, but it offers something you can feel, throttle response. Finally you are doing a mod that by itself makes a difference. Then comes udp's if you like em. We don't use em because they don't produce hp, but they do reduce rotating mass, and again can give you the feeling of throttle response that makes your car feel faster. It is argued that they can reduce the drag of the components like your alternator etc, but it's never a bad idea to let those things work to their full potential imo. I'd recommend the lightweight non-underdrive type if you get em. Some people swear by udp's and i'm not gonna bash them. Everyone builds a different car, that's one of the great things about the focus community, they're all different.
I also recommend anyone/everyone should upgrade at least plug wires. I've never had any problem with the factory spark system, so I have never felt the need to upgrade it, but the oem plug wires are pure shit. Unplug em once and you're more than likely going to develop a problem. I like the ford racing ones. I had a set that went across 4 different team cars and were installed/removed at least 500 times and they were good as new til I sold em for nearly what I paid. haha. Good investment, if not in performance at least in peace of mind knowing it's one less thing to go wrong.
Then I'd recommend cams and cam gears. If you want to get cam gears first and put em on your factory cams and dyno tune, some people have seen 10 whp gains just from that. The factory settings for cams can vary a LOT on the zetec, they kinda throw em in, go down the assembly line some more and get bonked around a bit before the gears go on so they can be 5 degrees or more retarded or advanced right from the factory. Thus the reason some stock zetecs dyno at 95 hp and some dyno at 115. I stand by the statement that upto crower stage II's it is a drop-in procedure. Put em in, dyno tune em and go have fun. Some argue it's "critical" to adjust the buckets and trim to fit, but on a 140 hp engine it's just not that big of a deal imo. Most factory heads come with two size buckets, if you want you can swap em around to get the "best" fit.
On my first zetec i had all the above mods and crower II's and put down 150whp and 145 tq on a stock headed engine. Thats not unreasonable to expect. It doesn't sound like a lot, but its night and day difference from stock.
After that, I recommend upgrading the clutch and while you're at it a flywheel.
The focus is a great handling platform to start with, but along the way upgrading brakes, tires and suspension parts is a great idea. Going fast is great, but ultimately the only important thing is stopping in time.
Hope this gives you some ideas, you can really build it a little at a time and before you know it you have a great little car. Nitrous is fun too, but don't get me started on that. I'm supposed to be a good example on the kids here
If you're getting rid of the cat, get the Focus Central Race header. I have the Focus Sport that I got from a friend but the Focus Central is supposed to give you around 5 more HP.
haha, both the fc and the fs are about the same on hp, but the 4,2,1 gives a tad more tq. 4 to 1 is better for max power, but it's not enough difference to notice. I think the fc one is a little louder. I run kamikaze headers, they're a lot bigger and can hold more big power. Plus they're cheap as dirt in comparison. One thing to keep in mind with the ebay cai's, they do break, all of em. Mostly down where they attach to the radiator. Just cheaper materials. I bungee'd mine up and it worked just as well as an aem, but it wasnt the quality of materials. a pipe is a pipe imo. I did, however go back to the short ram after running some temp tests that showed while moving the short ram temp was pretty close to where the cai was, and since i sucked up water into the engine (disasterous) I won't run another cai.
i did an article on the screamin demon coil and livewires in the zetec performance forum , you might get some helpful hints from it , be sure to gap your plugs to 0.65 thousands instead of 0.51 use autolite double platinum plugs due to the extreme spark, it will give you a cleaner burn w/ better performance and increased mileage. hope this helps.
, bit I'd forget about the Screamin Demon. There are no proven performance gains, (at least I've never heard of any from reliable sources). Lots of folks who have installed them, have removed them & are now trying to sell them. If it were me, I'd just opt for a good set of plug wires. They may not give you any performance gains, but they do smooth the engine out nicely.
What I said with a lot more detail. Good job!
