Slow GTO

[Eddie Wilson]

I have a 100% orginal 2004 GTO with Auto trans. What are the common upgrades for performance?
I want to wake this slug up a bit, without cracking into the motor.(major mods) Also this is my everyday driver so drivablilty cannot be affected. The trans is a slug while shifting, what could make this trans shift snappy? This thing is a dog on the bottom end performance! I know its a pig but damn!
Thanks
Eddie

[DERTY]

Eddie,

Without cracking into the motor your mods are limited to changing out the exhaust. For the money it's an area where the most amount of power can be picked up with the least amount of complications. There are a few options there that should be good to pick up a fair amount of power.

There's not a lot of other crazy mods that you can do that will really bring more power to the car until you start talking about camshafts, cylinder heads and power adders. Any combination of those can really change this up a bit. We did put a nice camshaft into another GTO that was a nice driver without the rattle your teeth out qualities of the rowdy camshafts we've been sticking in for people.

As far as the trans, I believe there is a shift kit that you can have installed that should help it out. You could also look into having some of the transmission settings changed. You would have to get a hold of a shop down in your area that could really get into that for you if you think you want to get the shift points changed. Of course you could buy a programmer and make the changes yourself as well.

Hopefully this helps.

[Eddie Wilson]

Thanks for the advise.
Is the power programmer the way to go over having it programmed at a shop?
Thanks again.
EW

[DERTY]

The power programmers are a great way to go about changing some basic things on the car. Shift points, rev limiter, etc. I wouldn't really recommend modifying any of the engine parameters unless you're well versed in them. Leave that for a shop to work through so that you can get a good tune into the car.

At this point you really don't need anything tuned, more than likely playing with shift points. The Predator may be a good option for tweaking many of the things you would be interested in. I think they can even change the transmission line pressures which should help you get some more snap in the shifts.

http://www.diablosport.com/index.php?module=htmlpages&func=display&pid=3

There are other full feature software tools out there that can do more than the Predator. But, you don't have the modifications to your car to justify the cost. Plus they are complicated to use because you have to have good working knowledge of the engine to really make a difference.