Hey all;
I actually just hijacked my gf's account she made a long time ago and never uses. She has a Pontiac G5, and I'm looking to get her something for xmas. So far all we've done to it is put some rims on and paint the calipers and some grounding in the engine bay:


SOo, My question is - what is a good first mod for the basic cobalt/g5? My first thought was a SRI/CAI (as this was my first mod for my mazda3, and it was the best money ever spent), but I cant seem to find any obvious choices, and I hear that a lot of people seem to have problems with CELs and stuff.

My second thought was lowering the car, cus jesus its so high i can crawl underneath it, but she's worried about warranty and stuff.

Last idea was tinting the tail lights or putting on some eyelids, but i'm not sure about where to get the tint, and I'm not sure its a good idea for legal purposes. I also looked for eyelids, and all the cobalt ones i found looked kinda.... ghey.

So... what do you guys think? Whats a good first mod for a cobalt/g5? Preferrably less than $250. Let me know asap, need to start xmas shopping!

 

strong suggestion....


Go read/Search before you get flamed on....

Welcome to the site..

 

I already have searched... thats how I found the eyelids that didn't make the car look any more aggressive (more like tired lol), and found all the CAIs/SRIs that people said gave them CELs and other issues. I figured it wouldn't be too hard for people to point me in the right direction for a first mod... thanks for replying at least lol

-edit-
found a list of mods for the 2.4, but she has a 2.2.... not sure if that makes a huge difference or not. Are the 2.4's supercharged?

 

No...

and get some darker headlights on that thing!

 

Lower your monster truck

 

Lowering it will not void your powertrain warrenty at all. Paint the headlights black is a freebee

 

Find a local tuner with HP tuners and get a tune.

 

^^^ 2.2 no hptuners

get a rear swaybar, the car will change dramatically on how it drives, and a shift kit. it will be fun to mess around with and handle better for under 200 bucks all together.

after that get a cai any kind and a 2.4 intake manifold that will open up the engine alot and make some great sound.

then find a used 2.0 s/c exhaust system, you could prob get the entire thing for 200 bucks used from someone on here. it looks factory but it bigger than the stock setup you have.

so for under 1k you get sway bar, shift kit, cai, intake mani, exhuast. the car will move down the street and corner better, and chirp second gear.

seems like a big win

 

bahaha :P yeah, it needs to be done... badly!

Is tuning really worth it, considering its still completely stock? I figure that tuning is more for people that have already added a few bolt ons and want to get the most bang for their buck

Can you actually buy new headlight assemblies for it (aka projectors...?), or do you mean just paint something? I dont want to push the cops more than necessary by blacking out lights because we're already hiding from cops with the tinted windows which are no long legal now that we moved to quebec =/

Thanks for the suggestions guys, much appreciated (and keep it coming )

-> question: is adding a CAI going to do much for the 2.2L sound/performance wise? Like I said, i've been reading mixed reviews on them for the 'balts...

 

On my 2.4 the cai made a good difference.

Headlights you can either paint black or buy in a premade HID projector setup. Though honestly the cops can hassle you more for the projectors off ebay than they can the factory lots modded due to the factory lights are "technically" still DOT approved
And by blacking them out they mean baking them removing the lense and painting the inside of the light not tinting the outside of the lense.

Tuning can be worth it. But it can be a reason to void your warranty if you get a ***** of a dealership.

 

my first mod for my cobalt 2.2 was a CAI...but if i could redo my first mod i would DEFIANTLY have bought springs first

So my vote goes towards lowering the thing

 

Neat car, I Like the black wheels. Mine also is yellow
I have a K&N Intake on my car. Keep in mind, that
you'll probably have to have the K&N guys call up
the GM dealership to get them to honor the warranty.
While the K&N Intake/filter leagally can't void the
warranty, the dealership still says it does.

They blamed my K&N for throwing a P0172 System too Rich,
However, after switching back to stock, the code still presisted.
I put my K&N back on. You should be able to tune out a engine
light though with the K&N. Check out their website for more info.
Also read their warranty page as well.
-Jonathan

 

Heh thanks, i dunno why so many people bash yellow, cus it stands out really nicely! So many people have dark and boring colors :P

Ok, i'll keep that in mind. Did the CAI not make much of a difference, or do you think it was still worth the money?

Once again, thanks so much for the help guys, I dont know much about these cars, all I've ever worked on is my Mz3.

FYI/Threadjack - have any of you tried grounding your throttle bodies? Its huge in the mazda community, but I didn't find much info about it here. Anyhow I did it for my gf's G5 the other day because I had some spare 10gauge wire laying around, but I didn't tell her what the purpose of it was. Got her to go drive around in it, and then asked her if she noticed anything different. She said the acceleration seemed a lot smoother... interesting... cus thats one of the two things its supposed to do! (apart from potentially improving throttle response)