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DSM Weight Reduction [merged] diet weight loss strip light

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98TsiAWD

DSM Wiseman
2,864
8
May 19, 2002
94 3000GT VR-4, North_Dakota
I personally am looking to do some weight reduction while retaining the quiet/smooth ride, and still having a spare so I can go on the highway without getting flatbedded home.

heres some of my ideas, just normal of course.

CF hood
Ditch all of my stereo and just get upgraded 6x9, 5.25, and 3.5's hooked to the factory amp/deck.
CF Hatch<<<Anyone make one for us?
CF Spoiler<<Anyone make it?
Dimple Drilled/Slotted Rotors


What else is there? I dont wanna tear out all the sound deadening or the spare tire.
 
Has anyone removed the rear wiper and motor assembly? I wanna maybe remove mine cause I don't ever use it anyway. But dunno what to use to fill the hole that'd be left in the hatch if I did so and don't want a bunch of water getting in.
 
Wiper, yes you can remove it and plug it (just find a rubber plug, body shop it over with bondo and paint, etc...) I removed it on my previoud 2G dsm and found a plug that fit it perfectly, didn't look great up close but it worked at least (oh yeah and I was wingless on that one too) But seriously if your driving your car in the rain you'd be surprised how much you want that rear wiper, at least I was.

As far as removing the underdash A/C stuff and keeping the heater defroster I would have to say no it wouldn't work. Your removing the fans which moves the air, the tubing that flows the air to wherever it comes out, and if your like me the coolant tubes going to the whole assembly. I doubt its possible to just remove the A/C stuff and not the heater parts as it was all interconnected. sorry
 
I removed the a/c components within the plastic stuff (the 2 plastic boxes on the passenger side under the dash) but kept the plastic there. The piece of metal within the one box is also a good place to route wiring thru the firewall instead of having to drill holes. Just a thought for ya.
 
How much does your AWD car weigh?
I really want to get under 3000lbs race weight with me in it.

Last night I stopped at a Trucker weigh station.
It weighed in @ 2960lbs w/ half a tank of Gas.
And 3240lbs with my fat azz in it.

I've removed the AC, cruise control, All rear seating, rear seat belts, Spare tire, tools, tire jack, rear carpet, and privacy hatch.
....looks like I've got some work to do.



What does you AWD Car weigh?

.
 
My Car weighed 3350 with me in it a few years ago...but since then Myself and the car have shed a few pounds so I would Imagine its right around the 3300 mark.
 
I personally would start on the small things. there are a lot of emissions things you can remove, you can swap out the electric seat belts for some nice none electric ones for pretty cheap, just go through your engine bay, look at something, and say one of two things:

"do I need this?"
"what would make this much more simple."

Things like the fuel pressure solinoid and other stupid shit like that can be removed in about 10 seconds. When you remove stuff like the cruise control on a 90, make sure to also cut off the support bracket for it. Dropping 240 lbs will be hard this way, so you are going to have to spend some cash on things like carbon fiber driveshaft/hood, racing seats, and the likes, but you can probably lose an easy 40 lbs just in small crap you don't need. The interior is full of them, I think they are called creature comforts, but who knows.

the hatch is a gold mine as well
 
2860 without me in it, I weigh about 185.

No AC, PS, cruise control, ABS, back seats, front seats and auto belts replaced with fixed buckets and 4-point harnesses, etc etc etc.
 
This stuff was a 120lbs all together. :thumb:

Inner Hatch
Rear Wiper
Rear Wiper motor
Rear Seats, and all small brackets
All Rear Seat Belts
Spare tire
Tire jack, and tools
Spare tire brackets, and carpet cover.


it took about a hour or so, and I felt the differance.
I say "felt the differance", because I did feel the differance when I did it.... now its just normal :D
 
For some referance I thought I'd add the factory curb weights (found on VFAQ.com) to this How-To

This list starts with the base model, Mid model, and then turbo FWD and Turbo AWD
1G Talon / Eclipse :2550 /2712 / 2791 / 3108
1G Laser : 2530 / 2690 / 2745 / 3073
2G Talon/Eclipse : No base model / 2842-2906 / 2921-2998 / 3157-3234
Galant VR-4 :Only AWD Turbo/ 3295
Eclipse Spyder :Only mid model and FWD turbo model / 2888- 2943 / 3053-3142

Most of us will be concerned with the Upper model FWD and Upper Model AWD weights which are our Turbo DSMS

Also stock rim weights from Vfaq.com

Specification 1G Weight
16" steel 1G / 28 lbs
16" alloy 1G / 19 lbs
16" mesh 2G / 19 lbs
16" alloy / 22 lbs
2G 17" alloy / 25 lbs
 
Does anyone know the weight difference in general between a full stainless steel exhaust compared to say, an aluminized steel exhaust? Has anyone looked into replacing most of the exhaust with titanium pieces? I know that doesn't play into the DSM mentality since it's expensive but it would be cool to know what the weight savings and cost would be.

My car will mostly be driven on the track, but I still drive it to events around town every once in a while so I can't necessarily do the side-exit exhaust. But I know I can definitely shed some weight from my Thermal R&D exhaust with it being so damned heavy.
 
A lot of times on chevys when you go with a stainless exhaust it is actually heavier. But the thermal properties and longevity of stainless have more gains than a marginal loss from extra weight. Titanium should be lighter because all the race bikes use it, but very expensive. For these types of cars your talking 12-1500 bucks for a full system.
 
Hmmm... well maybe the exhaust isn't the right place to look for weight savings. The Solstice guys are swapping out their mufflers on race days:
http://www.kappaturbo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=167

Not sure I'd see much weight savings by trying that but hell, I'll keep trying to come up with ideas...
 
they are swapping the mufflers for a flow through design. Their race muffler is probably just to loud for the street so they switch. Kind of like the hot rodders did in the sixties with those exhaust cut outs.

The Biggest place to look for weight savings is unsprung weight and rotational weight. They will gain speed and handling better than anything else. 1 lb of unsprung/ rotaional is like 5 pounds of sprung weight. 1 pound of rotational weight is almost equivilent to 1 hp.

You want extreme weight savings look at this gear.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/9-in...0QQihZ013QQcategoryZ33731QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
http://images.andale.com/f2/103/117/10461892/2007/1/3/9_inch_ultra_lite_3.22_gears_2.JPG
http://images.andale.com/f2/103/117/10461892/2007/1/3/9_inch_ultra_lite_3.22_gears.JPG
 
Does anyone know the weight difference in general between a full stainless steel exhaust compared to say, an aluminized steel exhaust? Has anyone looked into replacing most of the exhaust with titanium pieces? I know that doesn't play into the DSM mentality since it's expensive but it would be cool to know what the weight savings and cost would be.

My car will mostly be driven on the track, but I still drive it to events around town every once in a while so I can't necessarily do the side-exit exhaust. But I know I can definitely shed some weight from my Thermal R&D exhaust with it being so damned heavy.

So, I've been thinking about this exact thing. I figured I'd do some research and here is what I found:

These are weights given for a 3" round tube in lbs/ft for Stainless steel, Titanium, and Aluminum

0.065 wall (16 gage) - 2.04(SS) 1.17(Ti) 0.70(Al)
0.049 wall (18 gage) - 1.55(SS) 0.89(Ti) 0.53(Al)
0.035 wall (20 gage) - 1.11(SS) 0.64(Ti) 0.38(Al)

Formulas are (SS) W=10.68*(D-t)t, (Ti) W=6.14*(D-t)t where D is the OD and t is the wall thickness.

Looks like you could save almost 1lb/ft when going from 16 gage SS to 20 gage SS tube for your exhaust, provided you don't have problems with cracking, etc. Or you could save 1.4lbs/ft when going from 16 gage SS to 20 gage Ti. Not sure how much pipe there is in a full exhaust, but there's the potential to save about 10 lbs, not as much as I thought. I suspect there is more weight to be saved by swapping to a lightweight muffler. I also threw aluminum in there just as a comparision.

Weight references: SS and Ti

Hope some of this helps.
 
Actually you could use 18 ga stainless up to the firewall then run 16 ga aluminum the rest of the way back. That way you got the best of both worlds and yet not melt or burn through right after the turbo.
 
Now since my car is not daily driven and I really want to make it lighter at least less than 2999lbs with driver I was thinking in doing some weight reduction to my car and I wanted to know what you think about the thinks I am about to do to my car.

I already remove my front bumper bracket for the intercooler install; I also want to do the same in the rear. I also removed my cruise control system.

I want to remove my radio, stock amp and speakers even the wires is its possible, I realized that its been a long time I don’t use radio in my car trying to hear the engine every time I drive, seems I am like paranoid but I have to hear everything when im driving my car, cant hear the radio on, I think im going crazy. I will install it on my girlfriend’s car. Maybe will replace the dash hole with a carbon fiber plate or something to look nice.

Now I really need to know what do you think a bout this one. I want my car to look as stock as possible from the out side but when ill open the hood I want to have a race car engine bay even if it doesn’t runs like one. So I want a racing fuel cell in the trunk, maybe a 15gal aluminum one. I will cut the trunk floors and replace it with an aluminum sheet and getting rid of my spare tire jack and windshield fluid reservoir and also getting rid of that hole. I want a gas tank lighter that the stock one and this will also help me on revising my custom exhaust system making it even straighter. This will be done on a very respectable race car builder here in Puerto Rico unless you guys have a good reason not to do it.

Also in a near future replacing my stock heavy seats and steering wheel from lighter ones from sparco’s I also have carbon fiber hood and maybe will get a carbon fiber hatch.

So what do you think about it?, any more tips? How lighter can I get my gst without removing the whole interior an everything? At least removing the most non visible parts
 
the hatch isnt so much the weight problem as the glass. many people replace the glass with Lexan. i would do that instead of getting a cf hatch; or do both.
 
my buddy has a 94 laser. he plans on doing the same thing. he bought lightweight racing seats and already has a MOMO steering wheel, he took out his backseats but still has his sub, amp, etc.. he wants to gut his whole back part of his car and fiberglass a sub box where his back seat is, fast and furious style i guess.. his car is N/T so it's completely rice. i'm hoping that you plan on adding some power to this as well.
 
The problem is that my friends have like turbo hondas acuras and mazdas and they are from 2500-2750 and the last time i weighted my car was 3100lbs, that was on stcok turbo and intercoooler, the large i/c and garret turbo are heavier i really want to get closer to my friends car.
 
if you dont use the car that often, you could just strip all the panels, back seats, carpeting, spare tire, sound coating, a/c, all speakers and radio, get lightweight racing seats, get a Lexan rear hatch window(this will help A LOT, since the glass is super heavy).

BUT, you still wont be at the same weight as them. our cars are heavy...:cry:
 
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