Are 2gs made in 95 the best year to own and modify in California because they can't check ECU tunes?

[randizzle420]

I own a 95 gsx and apparently California can't check for ECU tunes on my car. Does that make it less a pain in the ass when you go to smog legitimately? Mine was built in early 94 so might have eprom as well. Besides cosmetics is there really anything that 97-99s have that are better for the 95s other than cosmetics and it's ABS system? Also was told the transmissions on the 2ga are stronger than the 2gb by one of the main transmission builders that still work on these cars.

 

[chrysler kid]

The 95-96 cars are not as desirable because they have a less “iconic JDM” appearance. They also did not have any black interior options

The 95-96 cars suffered from crank thrust bearing failure at a higher rate, in 97-99 cars the cranks had a split thrust bearing for the crank which were known to be less prone to crank walk

Transmissions stronger? Not that I’ve heard of, I’ve destroyed both at an eerily similar pace.

For the computer aspect, the 95-96 lacked dedicated internal memory. My 96 was nearly impossible to pass emissions because every time you turned the car off the ecu would reset into “not ready” status. It was so bad back in the day that I had to file for an exemption with the state to put the car back into obd1 emissions test protocols, or make sure to drive the car for half an hour and have the inspector not turn the vehicle off during the obd2 testing

Technically the 97-99 computers are vastly better and can be tuned using open source software, but yes the early 95 computer is desirable because it can be modified to have a custom chip set. However the 95-96 ecu’s fail at a high rate due to capacitors leaking, where as I have yet to find a black box 97-99 ecu fail for any reason. Having your 95 ecu modified to take a dsmlink chip will save you $200 up front, but it may require repair to even be functional for the chip.

To me the 99 models were the vastly more desirable cars. You can get them with a black leather interior, white face gauges from the factory, big hoop tail spoiler.

 

[pauleyman]

95 to 97 motors have the single piece thrust bearing. 98 and 99 are 3 piece. I dont know that it matters. I have 2 esrly cars above 130k on stock motors.

 

[Pjj]

i have a 98, the 98-99 had the split thrust bearing design factory on their engines which would be found with block codes x,y, and z. they also came with a black dash top, blackbox tunable ECUs and much more benefits. a 1995 did have some rare options of a brown interior AND a blue interior. i have seen both in person and they are quite cool if you like that kind of stuff. But if you were talking about bare shells i would say the 1995 was built the best, it still fell under the true DSM catagory not the Mitsubishi motors of America. They spent more time fitting everything better and having more seam sealer in ideal places. The quality control was waay better. If youre ever looking in a 95 engine bay comparing to the 96-99 you will notice the seam sealer around the upper control arm bolt holes on the strut towers and DSM on the firewall over Mitsubishi.

 

[pauleyman]

i have a 98, the 98-99 had the split thrust bearing design factory on their engines which would be found with block codes x,y, and z. they also came with a black dash top, blackbox tunable ECUs and much more benefits. a 1995 did have some rare options of a brown interior AND a blue interior. i have seen both in person and they are quite cool if you like that kind of stuff. But if you were talking about bare shells i would say the 1995 was built the best, it still fell under the true DSM catagory not the Mitsubishi motors of America. They spent more time fitting everything better and having more seam sealer in ideal places. The quality control was waay better. If youre ever looking in a 95 engine bay comparing to the 96-99 you will notice the seam sealer around the upper control arm bolt holes on the strut towers and DSM on the firewall over Mitsubishi.

I don't think some of those are indicative of 98 99. My 97 has a black top dash. Very interesting comparison of 95 vs 96 up. First ive heard about the seam sealer and ive been here since before the 2g existed. To be fair I wasn't a 2g guy until 2011.