eclipsemf
10+ Year Contributor
- 397
- 4
- Jun 10, 2010
-
Glen,
New_Hampshire
I'm finally going to start my own build thread, I'm not going high hp numbers or fast 1/4 miles times, just building the car to my liking for now and I'll see where it goes from there. First will be some history of me with DSM's and then I'll get in to the car I have been working on for the last year.
On a side note I am in college right now so the updates will not be as past as I would like them so please bare with me!
The car is not driven in the snow, and now is up to 74k miles. I also have all the stock parts so I can go back to stock if I feel like it!
First dsm:
I got my first car when I was 15, it was a 1994 eclipse base model 1.8l with an oil leak and a clutch going down hill and I paid $2500 for it, a bit much but I didn't know any better. It had a body kit, racing spoiler all the f&f stuff which I liked at that point in time.
I slowly worked on it adding CAI and an exhaust tip, and painting the interior. I also started getting into wiring starting with my first sound system, 2 pioneer 12's off a 1600 watt amp. I drove this car till I was about 17 when I found this website called DSMtuners.com....
Though hours of reading the forums I decided I was going to get a 4g63 and just swap it in. I spent about 1k trying to gather all the parts together when I realized that I was no where near as mechanically inclined as I should be to take on a task like this, so I started selling those parts and looking for one that already turbo'd. Here are some pictures of the 1.8 and the motor I had gotten for it but then sold it for my next car.
Second dsm:
After about 2 months of searching for a cheap awd turbo dsm I found a nice 1995 eagle talon tsi awd with a super 20g and the works except a tune for $2500. I went to look at it and it had a bit of frame rot and needed the 1g cas rewired but I didn't think it would be too bad. I came back the next weekend and worked on talking the guy down and got it for $1350! Over the winter I worked on it every weekend trying to track down all the problems that I had not discovered when I had looked at it the first two times. About four months later I put it up for sale because I could not seem to get it fixed and running right. I later traded it to a buddy and that was a whole other story that I wont go in to now. But I can say I never ran when he had it either. I am kind of glad we never had it running because I know it dyno'd at 417HP and after going from my 1.8l to that I probably would have wrecked it very fast not knowing what real power was like. I have just this on picture of it I'll try to find one of the engine bay if I can.
Third dsm:
After not succeeding with that dsm I decided to look for one that was unmodded and running. Over that summer and most of the winter I saved up my money looking for a nice one. At the end of February I finally found a clean one not to far away from me. It was a 1997 eclipse gsx with on 69k on it and COMPLETELY STOCK! I immediately called him up to arrange a time to meet up with him too look at it. Two days later I drove two hours away to look at it after school. When I got up there and saw the car I knew it was the one for me! An older gentleman was the only owner of the car and bought it in 97 with all the features in it that he could. I got to take it for a test drive and the power put a smile on my face instantly. I ran to the bank right then to get the money out and I purchased it right then for $4700, which was a steal considering the condition of the car. It had never seen the winter and had been garaged every year during the winter, and the leather seats showed no wear what so ever.
On the way back I had some trouble getting used to the hydraulic clutch since I had learned on the 1.8 which has the mechanical clutch. The only thing that was wrong with the car is the Fuel Pressure Solenoid though a cel which I know because I brought my scan tool, and the front speakers were blown. I managed to talk him down $100 because of that but that was it. The car handled like none other I had driven and had all the power I thought I would ever need. After about a week I started to want a bit more power so I started looking at a few things to get a little more out of it, but still keep it basically stock.
Here it is after just changing the valve cover out and adding a cold air intake.
Over the next month(being late march early April 2011) I did hours and hours of research on what mods to do and to make sure that I did them right because I did not want to hack this car in any way, shape or form.
During the summer I started some smaller mods such a cold air intake, 3" cat back, hard upper and lower ic piping and a 1g bov with darth vader cover!
I also started on the smaller visual parts like re painting the front black plastic pieces and getting my valve cover powder coated. I also acquired a clear timing belt cover in a trade. Once those were done I was more than happy with the power increase so I went to slowing my self down and handling.
I bought new cross drilled and slotted rotors with hawk pads, and threw them on. While I had the calipers of I painted them red to go with the car which was a nice touch I think. I then put an eBay front strut bar on, which alone improved the handling substantially. During this time I also installed a auto-meter boost and volt gauge, and got set up for an AEM wideband(now I'm just waiting to weld on an o2 bung for it).
Getting a double din soon to clean it up more here
I cant seem to find a picture of the gauges but I know I have one somewhere
Also during this time I worked on the stereo system for when I didn't want to listen to the turbo ,which wasn't often. For speakers I bought front 6.5 and rear 6x9 alpine type s wired in to my old head unit from the 1.8. I wired it in using the mitah adapter which made is sound 10 fold better especially with the clarity of the music. I also wired in two punch p3 10" subs in a custom box that I made with a 1600watt amp to get some of the bass I was used to before.
The next thing I went to work on changing out the led's in the cluster to red, I saw some pictures in a few threads and decided I also wanted to do this. I bought 10 94 wedge base led's from superbrightleds.com. The installation was very easy and it looks amazing!
Day time picture, night time will come in a second
After a saw these I decided to change out my gauges to 7 color led gauges that I had laying around to match the dash. These are some from harbor freight and so far there accuracy has been unmatched with any of the others I have had. I also went to yellow fog lights as you can kinda see from the picture bellow.
The next weekend that I came home from college now being about mid October, I had some VHT and a rear strut bar waiting for me when I got home. The VHT tail lights are awesome, I love the way they came out on the first try, they are a little dark but I'm happy with them and I will be getting the ECLIPSE part painted to match the car to finish it off.
From this
To this (snow is gone!)
I also installed the rear strut bar, I just need to cut holes in the covers to finish it off. I just barely fit over the subs!(snow is back)
That's all I have for updates for now I did just get a few things in. My next update will be with the down pipe and high flow cat install. I'm also swapping my t-25 for a new one because the old one is going down hill fast. While I'm doing this I'm putting on my JMfab heat shield and a new aluminum radiator that is on its way!
On a side note I am in college right now so the updates will not be as past as I would like them so please bare with me!
The car is not driven in the snow, and now is up to 74k miles. I also have all the stock parts so I can go back to stock if I feel like it!
First dsm:
I got my first car when I was 15, it was a 1994 eclipse base model 1.8l with an oil leak and a clutch going down hill and I paid $2500 for it, a bit much but I didn't know any better. It had a body kit, racing spoiler all the f&f stuff which I liked at that point in time.
I slowly worked on it adding CAI and an exhaust tip, and painting the interior. I also started getting into wiring starting with my first sound system, 2 pioneer 12's off a 1600 watt amp. I drove this car till I was about 17 when I found this website called DSMtuners.com....
Though hours of reading the forums I decided I was going to get a 4g63 and just swap it in. I spent about 1k trying to gather all the parts together when I realized that I was no where near as mechanically inclined as I should be to take on a task like this, so I started selling those parts and looking for one that already turbo'd. Here are some pictures of the 1.8 and the motor I had gotten for it but then sold it for my next car.
Second dsm:
After about 2 months of searching for a cheap awd turbo dsm I found a nice 1995 eagle talon tsi awd with a super 20g and the works except a tune for $2500. I went to look at it and it had a bit of frame rot and needed the 1g cas rewired but I didn't think it would be too bad. I came back the next weekend and worked on talking the guy down and got it for $1350! Over the winter I worked on it every weekend trying to track down all the problems that I had not discovered when I had looked at it the first two times. About four months later I put it up for sale because I could not seem to get it fixed and running right. I later traded it to a buddy and that was a whole other story that I wont go in to now. But I can say I never ran when he had it either. I am kind of glad we never had it running because I know it dyno'd at 417HP and after going from my 1.8l to that I probably would have wrecked it very fast not knowing what real power was like. I have just this on picture of it I'll try to find one of the engine bay if I can.
Third dsm:
After not succeeding with that dsm I decided to look for one that was unmodded and running. Over that summer and most of the winter I saved up my money looking for a nice one. At the end of February I finally found a clean one not to far away from me. It was a 1997 eclipse gsx with on 69k on it and COMPLETELY STOCK! I immediately called him up to arrange a time to meet up with him too look at it. Two days later I drove two hours away to look at it after school. When I got up there and saw the car I knew it was the one for me! An older gentleman was the only owner of the car and bought it in 97 with all the features in it that he could. I got to take it for a test drive and the power put a smile on my face instantly. I ran to the bank right then to get the money out and I purchased it right then for $4700, which was a steal considering the condition of the car. It had never seen the winter and had been garaged every year during the winter, and the leather seats showed no wear what so ever.
On the way back I had some trouble getting used to the hydraulic clutch since I had learned on the 1.8 which has the mechanical clutch. The only thing that was wrong with the car is the Fuel Pressure Solenoid though a cel which I know because I brought my scan tool, and the front speakers were blown. I managed to talk him down $100 because of that but that was it. The car handled like none other I had driven and had all the power I thought I would ever need. After about a week I started to want a bit more power so I started looking at a few things to get a little more out of it, but still keep it basically stock.
Here it is after just changing the valve cover out and adding a cold air intake.
Over the next month(being late march early April 2011) I did hours and hours of research on what mods to do and to make sure that I did them right because I did not want to hack this car in any way, shape or form.
During the summer I started some smaller mods such a cold air intake, 3" cat back, hard upper and lower ic piping and a 1g bov with darth vader cover!
I also started on the smaller visual parts like re painting the front black plastic pieces and getting my valve cover powder coated. I also acquired a clear timing belt cover in a trade. Once those were done I was more than happy with the power increase so I went to slowing my self down and handling.
I bought new cross drilled and slotted rotors with hawk pads, and threw them on. While I had the calipers of I painted them red to go with the car which was a nice touch I think. I then put an eBay front strut bar on, which alone improved the handling substantially. During this time I also installed a auto-meter boost and volt gauge, and got set up for an AEM wideband(now I'm just waiting to weld on an o2 bung for it).
Getting a double din soon to clean it up more here
I cant seem to find a picture of the gauges but I know I have one somewhere
Also during this time I worked on the stereo system for when I didn't want to listen to the turbo ,which wasn't often. For speakers I bought front 6.5 and rear 6x9 alpine type s wired in to my old head unit from the 1.8. I wired it in using the mitah adapter which made is sound 10 fold better especially with the clarity of the music. I also wired in two punch p3 10" subs in a custom box that I made with a 1600watt amp to get some of the bass I was used to before.
The next thing I went to work on changing out the led's in the cluster to red, I saw some pictures in a few threads and decided I also wanted to do this. I bought 10 94 wedge base led's from superbrightleds.com. The installation was very easy and it looks amazing!
Day time picture, night time will come in a second
After a saw these I decided to change out my gauges to 7 color led gauges that I had laying around to match the dash. These are some from harbor freight and so far there accuracy has been unmatched with any of the others I have had. I also went to yellow fog lights as you can kinda see from the picture bellow.
The next weekend that I came home from college now being about mid October, I had some VHT and a rear strut bar waiting for me when I got home. The VHT tail lights are awesome, I love the way they came out on the first try, they are a little dark but I'm happy with them and I will be getting the ECLIPSE part painted to match the car to finish it off.
From this
To this (snow is gone!)
I also installed the rear strut bar, I just need to cut holes in the covers to finish it off. I just barely fit over the subs!(snow is back)
That's all I have for updates for now I did just get a few things in. My next update will be with the down pipe and high flow cat install. I'm also swapping my t-25 for a new one because the old one is going down hill fast. While I'm doing this I'm putting on my JMfab heat shield and a new aluminum radiator that is on its way!
Last edited by a moderator: