mrbusto71

Hey folks.

I'll spare everyone the sob story, but ultimately I ended up having to acquire a 2000 Honda Civic EX recently. Not what I wanted to do (I had a 360 hp v8 before this that I loved), but my old car exploded and this was the cheapest thing I could get my hands on.

That said, it's a 00 Civic EX and the crappy part is it's an automatic.

I know my options are going to be SEVERELY limited, but I'd like to do some budget mods to this thing to maximize its potential. I already bought a K&N air filter and dropped that into the standard air box (I saw reports online that the standard airbox provided better airflow than most aftermarket cold air intakes?), popped in some platinum spark plugs, and I'll be replacing the old, chewed up spark plug wires with new ones soon.

That said, what else can I do to make this thing as zippy as possible without having to buy a whole new engine? I'm not loaded, so I can't drop too much money into a used car that I'm not sure how long I'll keep, but I want to spice her up a bit in the short term.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated! Again, I know I'm kinda hosed with it being an automatic, but I'm all ears on what I CAN do vs. what I already know I CAN'T do.

Thanks!

Wankenstein

Pretty much nothing. Bolt ons won't net you any gains. Don't waste money on a cold air intake. Drive it and manintain it. The EX transmission gearing is pretty comparable to a 5 speed manual. I've owned both (6th gen EX) manual and automatic and I preferred the automatic and felt is was as quick or quicker from a dead stop than the manual..though both are slow comapared tto many other cars.

ezone

I hope you purchased NGK or DENSO plugs.
If they aren't faulty or damaged, the original wires are probably more reliable than just about anything you can buy aftermarket.
This.

Brag about gas mileage instead of speed LOL