It begins!!

[Tj-zetec]

When I bought my XR5 back in February this year my girlfriend made me 'promise' not to modify it for at least the first 12 months.

Well, I made it to 6 months before saying Bollocks to that!

In light of my recent revelations I picked up a second hand Dreamscience Strategem SCT handset (funnily enough from a bloke that lives within walking distance from me)

I think the first thing I said after loading it was some thing along the lines of "holy **** **** hell!". It makes such a huge difference to the car, it transforms it into an absolute animal!

I haven't had a chance to take it for a proper run yet but I could tall the difference straight away.

In terms of bang for your buck, I don't think it gets much better than this.

The master plan is to get a better rear sway bar and possibly a CAI before I run a supersprint at Oran Park in December.

I knew it wouldn't be long before I take to it with the spanners. :evil3:

[DBourne]

Awesome mate!!!

Exactly what my plan is at the moment, CAI and tune.

How safe are these generic tuners?

[WILDB]

I know exactly how you feel TJ.

When I bought my 5' I said to myself I was gonna leave it stock.

Then I bought a CAI and rear bar and said no more, but now I'm also buying a DS and a catback exhaust.

SgtBourne - go for a drive in one that has the rear sway bar fitted, they make so much difference to the way the car handles.

PM Barnesy on the XR5 forums, he gets them for a decent price too.

[Tj-zetec]

The tunes are pretty safe, there's a lot of guys using dreamscience and I've heard nothing bad said about them.

I suppose the right thing to do is be aware that your car is making a lot more power with a tune and drive it with a bit of respect.
Things like not flogging it cold, being mindful of the clutch (which I'm told is quite capable of handling it) and letting run for a little while after a good hard run to cool down and changing oil regularly using a good quality synthetic oil, every 7500kms between services seems adequate, especially if you drive hard.

It actually says on the box more power means more wear. It's probably there to cover their own backsides but its not a bad thing to keep in mind.

Rear bar, is definitely on the list, they're only about $130-150! and easy enough to change yourself. I've done it on other cars so it cant be too different

[groops]

Yeah, you'll see tomorrow night(or tonight depending one when you read this) what a tune with IC and CAI can do to this car....it's pretty insane...I was like you TJ, I was not planning to do anything, but then I got the dreamscience tune first...cause I knew i could re-flash it back for warranty and all that, and everyone raved about it. I then decided to do CAI and IC when I found out that Lats(xr5 forum) got his CV replaced under warranty with these mods on it. I re-flashed ecu the other day back to stock for 15000km service the other day and drove it like i normally do and it's a totally different car, even with IC and CAI on. The Dreamscience system coupled with my dreamscience IC and CAI is amazing....I struggle to hold grip in 2nd and even 3rd sometimes depending on the angle or the road and turning and all that...

I think Rear bar is my next thing to do after I do tyres which will need doing very soon...almost at the wear markers after having done a rotation at 8000...now at 15000 the fronts(which were the backs) are about .5mm from the marker... grrr...crappy conti's. ;)

Mike

[DBourne]

sounds unreal!! can't wait to get it tuned then