Rebuild engine or put mods on??

[GSXerr]

I'm planning on putting some money down on a bunch of parts (new turbo, exhaust mani, fmic, all fuel upgrades), and one of my friends has brought up to me that I should probably put all the money into the engine's internals first..Low 12's are my goal though. Do I need to do anything to the internals, or will I blow the motor up? I have 105,000 miles on my Eclipse.

 

[Krazy_Kreationz]

see I can agree with both sides here.. but the question that still remains is this... how long do you plan on keeping the car? if you are not truely sure then I would say just do some bolt ons so that way you dont have a whole lot invested if you do decide to sell it. but if you plan on keeping her for a long time I would defianitley say rebuild it from the bottom end up. them you can truely get the power out of the motor that you are really longing for. and the low 12's or even 11'son a rebuild I would go everything new and even better then before, that way you know its going to last. Then get the bolt ons to support all the enternal mods.

 

[Shemy99]

^That's a good point...my thoughts are 50/50...see below:

I really love the car but at the same time I don't want to spend too much money on it...I mean just recently @ 155K I changed the:
Timing belt, water pump, 3 serpentine belts, alternator, the 2 oil pressure belts (don't know what they are called, but there with the timing belt), Master & slave clutch cylinders (twice), the hydraulic clutch fluid line(twice as well), clutch damper, spark plugs & wires, all the seals around the crankcase and oil pressure unit and valve cover gasket, and I changed the actual valve cover because some idiot friend mechanic cracked the first one causing a major oil leak....and just recently my wife backed into me from the driver side with her CR-V causing a big ass dent on the side panel beside my door (near the door handle on the right) and since I am married, sometimes my wife doesn't agree with everything I want to do and she keeps saying its a 99. So my options are:

1. keep the car and let it run until it dies...maybe buy a small 16g turbo (don't know if that will change anything?) and some add ones here and there...maybe some body work and paint job? but not too much to spend
2. Sell it for whatever (~6K-6.5K) and don't do jack to it and buy what she wants (accord coupe)
3. Keep it and don't do jack to it

I really spent a lot of money doing all those fixes...and that's why I am in the 50/50. I had a mechanic take a look at the engine...taking the valve cover off to see how it looks, and said it was clean and no gunk and it didn't look like it ran for 160K...engine is still smooth and quiet, and no major mechanical problems so far....so I need some inputs / more options...

 

[knochgoon24]

...and buy what she wants (accord coupe)

So what if it's a 99? These cars have enough class to hang with the new cars. For the cost of a new car payment every month, you could have your GST purring.

 

[Shemy99]

For the cost of a new car payment every month, you could have your GST purring.

Yup!!

Anywas...I called Phantasm today and scheduled an appointment to do a compression test on the car...I want to be able to produce between 300-350 HP...they suggested that I need at least 18 psi to reach the HP. After the compression test I can know if my engine needs to be rebuilts...it might not though if it doesnt burn oil and it sounds good...will keep you posted!

 

[Shemy99]

I need some suggestions.
As I was looking at Craigslist today, I saw a guy posting a complete engine for a 1g Eclipse turbo GSX that was totaled. It has about 30,000 miles on it and engine is fine; selling it for $500. Its a 6 bolt and I know the 97-99 are 7 bolts...do you think its better to swap engines and add mods or just stay with what I have and go from there?

 

[erald01]

The only good thing about 6 bolt is that you dont have to worry about "crankwalk", and it has somehow stronger rods. If the 6 bolt is $500 you should defenitly considering checking it out. If you don't like what you see tear it apart and do the rebuild yourself. Its a win/win situation, $500 its pretty good price for an engine whether its built or stock. Btw don't waste your money yet on a 160k engine with the bolt ons. You are driving a premium gasoline running engine, not a diesel engine, so i am sure you have tons of carbon and worn out internal part from the high ignition of premium gas. The best thing either get the 6 bolt and check it out before dropping it in, or get the rebuild kit with stock internals (if you dont have the money for forged) and it will be able to handle up to 400 hp. Think about it.......... how much more can you push the 160k engine with bolt ons? Another 5k,10k,20k miles?