newbie alert, this is my very first post on this forum. My wife has a nice slick '02 protege5, manual and in red. The only change so far is the Yakima bike racks on top. Soon to come: lower it a touch, MT-90 in the gearbox, maybe intake and exhaust, and other little mods. I've also got a '87 rx-7 (Racing Beat/KYB suspension, RB exhaust, bunch of little stuff), a '68 chevy 1/2ton (468bb, black w/flames, Colorado Custom wheels, very slick), and a '00 Dakota (4.7l, bunch of little mods, suprisingly fast).
So on this site i've haven't seen hardly anything on replacing the stock thermostat with a colder one. This has always been one of the first mods I've done on my other cars, it cheap, easy, and has always made a seat-of-the-pants power difference. I've never seen a mpg drop either, and I monitor every tank of gas. The last one I did was on my Dakota, went from a stock 195 to a 160, and it made a bigger difference than the stage 2 Jet chip. You know how the car feels stronger in cold weather? It feels like that all the time. I'm under the impression they put in hot thermostats (195-210 these days) to "aid emissions", which sounds good but i really don't care if I make a bit more noxious fumes. Any comments??
So on this site i've haven't seen hardly anything on replacing the stock thermostat with a colder one. This has always been one of the first mods I've done on my other cars, it cheap, easy, and has always made a seat-of-the-pants power difference. I've never seen a mpg drop either, and I monitor every tank of gas. The last one I did was on my Dakota, went from a stock 195 to a 160, and it made a bigger difference than the stage 2 Jet chip. You know how the car feels stronger in cold weather? It feels like that all the time. I'm under the impression they put in hot thermostats (195-210 these days) to "aid emissions", which sounds good but i really don't care if I make a bit more noxious fumes. Any comments??
