i have an 88 350 IROC and was curious what mods i should start out with. i have a butch of ideas and know what i want to do with the car, but my experience with f-bodys have only been in the restoration dept. and not the peformance dept. what do some old farts suggests i do with my beautiful car!!! Open for directions on where to go form stock, a good handling, third gen that will give some new GT a run for his money!!!!THANKS

 

In order of start:
Tune-up
Free mods- modify maf.
Subframe connectors
Exhaust
Air intake


Once you get that far, it's all personal preference.

 

buy some K&N's. port you plenum, get a 3 angle valve job on the heads. youshould probably rebuild the engine and drop in a bigger cam and port the heads. get a msd coil, msd 8.5 wires, and cap and rotor for the ignition. my email is goldrush089@sol.comif uwanna askany questions or just talk. c ya

 

https://www.thirdgen.org/newdesign/tech/ramair.shtml

https://www.thirdgen.org/newdesign/tech/tpimod1.shtml

 

Leave the MAF alone.

Get the SFC's, 3" exhaust, tune up, (AC Delco plugs, MSD 8.5mm wires) K&N filters, headers, ram air, and read more of these https://www.thirdgen.org/tech

 

i just got a third gen trans am and i was wondering too, what should i do?

tune up popped into my head and my dad was like "son, tune ups can be done by yourself! those dumbasses mechanics...all they do it change the spark plugs and the wires, and charge you $150!!" i laugh at him sometimes

what do they do exactly, when they do a tuneup?

 

What do they do? Why they change the spark plugs and wires, put in a fuel injector system cleaner, and then charge you $150. You dad was right, lol. You may be able to get them to change the distributor cap, rotor, and coil but you can do that yourself, as well as the plugs and wires anyway. Do all that, set your timing and your tuneup is done assuming you don't have any trouble codes/bad sensors and such already. No need to get a shop to take your money for a simple tuneup... You need to get familarized with the engine setup anyway if you're serious about your car.


For any TPI car I would start out with exhaust. Headers, hi flow cat and a decent catback. Then look at the intake, you can port the plenum (knock down the EGR walls right behind the throttle body) yourself for free (use a dremel/die grinder if you have one, else a power drill with a "rotary file" bit can work). You can also shim the stock fuel pressure regulator instead of buying a $50 adjustable one. Something like a quarter for a shim will bump the pressure up approx 5 psi... And doing one of the many "cold air mods" to the intake system yourself is a good idea too. If you've still got some money for mods aftermarket intake runners and a baseplate are never a bad idea. If you have a peanut cammed 305 TPI then you will really see some suprising benefits from a cam swap (in fact you'll see great benefits even if the motor is nearly bone stock...). Even a very mild cam can gain 25-30+ hp over the peanut, and it's not hard to swap it out with the engine still in the car...

 

amen to the cam idea. I got an LB9 305. it came with a .350 /.384 cam i think. i rebuilt the engine and used a ramjet 350 roller cam (.431/.451 lift) from GM for 135 DOLLARS!!!!!! This cam boosted the hp about 30 since i had to keep the stock manifolds for budget reasons. keep in mind that duration is important. anything much over 200 @ .050 will kill low end torque ona 305. The ramjet cam is 196/206 i think. perfect for a 305. If u have headers, the hp will rise another 15 or so. Keep in mind when using a cam with so much more lift, the valve springs might not handle the lift for very long. even though the springs are rated to hold .470 lift on all 305's, the springs get worn out easily and it would suk to have to bind a spring and rebuild the heads again. so get a set of set of LT4 springs for like 30-40 bucks and reatiners to match it for very cheap. Scoggin dickey (SDPC2000.com) will have what u want. aLso while having the springs installed, u can get a 3 angle valve job for considerably cheap. ( i got my heads milled, manufluxed, hot tank cleaned, 3 angle valve job, and new springs instaleld for like 230 bucks for both heads.) a good 3 angle valve job will add 15hp or so. email me if ya have any questions. good luck

 

i would start out w/ the tune up and some k+N's then get an airfoil andafpr then save up and get headers to tips, all at once, then u can see how shes runnin and whats her weak points and work on those.
my .02