Hello,
As you probably already know I am new here. My name is Mike and I am "not" a car guy. In fact our most recent purchase is the first semi-sport car we have owned. I like sportbikes well enough. Ive even raced em but cars...ehehe
This past weekend my wife and I went on a rode trip and came home with a 97 RS. The car was picked up from a "Used Auto" dealer with 107K on it.
The car runs great, but I do not know if the car was hopped up prior to us taking possession of her. Wish I knew, I am thinking the previous owner had it all hopped up but I am only basing this on a hunch. I put a nice ALPINE stereo in her this past weekend and am having the 2-way security system put in this weekend. Now, I'm very interested in performance enhancements / mods. The car is going to be used as a commuter by my wife. And I would like to keep it as reliable as possible while still giving her something besides me to smile about. Advice, suggestions recommendations all would be appreciated. A few of the ideas I've been looking at for the past couple of days include the following:

Stage 1 Turbo?
Cool air induction-most appealing*******
By-pass valve****Suggested to me by a shop in town
Chip Kits**Something I noticed on the inet.***
Suspension-A definate-but don't want to spend big bucks.

Will be looking through the fourms, but your input here will be appreciated.
Keeping it simple but enjoying a little extra something.....

Suspension and cool air intake but where to buy and what models?

 

Stage 1 turbo... maybe if your serious and don't mind down time for time to time. Sounds to me like you just want simple bolt ons.

CAI... since your just wanting something reliable I would go this route. Here are some suggestions. Click here

By-pass valve... not sure what you mean by that unless your talking about the bypass valve for a CAI.

Chip kits.... should be the last thing since your going to want to tune the chip to the supporting mods Click Here

Suspension... get some spring and shocks and call it a day. I suggest either Tien or Eibach Click here

 

Thank you for the reply. I did order up the suspension, to include H&RSport Springs, KONI Sport Shocks-bars and struts.
Also picked out AEM CAI and a AEM Air Bypass Valve: 3.0. CD Sports CS-2 bars front and rear TANABE Sustec Sway Bar front and rear.

THE BAD NEWS
Took the car to the Mitsubishi Dealer/Service shop today and had her looked at. The previous owner did in fact have it hopped up.
So much so it needs a new head gasket, rotors, timing belt and assorted other goodies I'm not even going to mention. All said and done I
ended up spending a little over $3600 on a new motor, to arrive early next week. Now, before you go and think to yourself "man that guy should have bought up a a JDM kit motor for $1600 and had that put in". The car isn't mine, I bought it for my wife. And if I feel like bolting on a turbo I'll be more than happy too. That is if my creditors don't catch up with me first.....

LMAO

 

wow......good to go. at least a new engine is a good start for tuning.

 

When the service consultant at the dealership said labor alone would run near 1500 for the repairs needed I figured that a new engine was needed.
I called around first. Called a place called dynotuned in Madison, WI. They had a JDM engine, 6bolt with TURBO and Tranny for 1600 bucks. After labor
the cost would have been 4700 without any warranty.

 

I guess this would have been a better place to post up my question, now there are two.
Picked up the car about 1 hour ago. New 420a motor installed and running, poorly but running.
It feels as though the car is about to stall when at IDLE. And it sound rough.
I disconnected the negative in hopes this would reset the ECU and make everything alright but, It did not help
The mechanic says the ECU needs to "learn" the new engine. Does any of this make any sense
to any of you?

 

if the car is let alone to idle for 5-8min it should be all the learning it needs to do and will drive fine. if its still driving rough theres probably a vacuum line disconnected. search around or take it back an tell them to fix it right