Engine Swaps

One of the best value modifications has to be an engine swap. Tuning a small engine will only ever give small returns for your investment. There is a plentiful supply of engines from your local breakers or salvage yards and with most makes and models can be a simple modification.

Lighter Flywheel

Attached to the engine is a huge heavy metal disk, the flywheel. Its presence actually helps to keep the engine running smoothly. We know it takes effort to accelerate or decelerate an object and this law applies to flywheels. Due to its weight it resists changes in engine speed which can be a good thing […]

Electric Water Pumps

The coolant needs to run round the engine taking the heat from the block and dissipating it in the radiator. Most cars come with mechanical water pumps which have a number of drawbacks, www.CarTuningTips.com will take a look at the benefits of upgrading to an electric water pump.

Gas Flowing A Head

Gas flowing a head Many things go on in the head of an engine. Primarily the air coming into the engine flows through the head and into the cylinder via an open inlet valve. The air moving into an engine is travelling at high speed and any turbulence caused can substantially alter the flow of […]

Hybrid Turbos

One great way to easily uprate and improve a turbocharged engine is with the aid of a hybrid turbo. You’d basically take a standard turbo housing and uprate the internals giving yourself a bolt in replacement. Sometimes it is quite hard to fit a larger turbo to an engine, the most notable reason being the […]

Performance Sport Exhausts

Engines need to get rid of the exhaust fumes created by the combustion process in the same way that we need to breathe out when our bodies have consumed the oxygen in our lungs. If our nostrils were blocked up we would and we had a narrow straw to breathe through we would be comfortable, unless […]

Induction Kits Cone Filters

Like all of us, car engines need to breathe. They use an air fuel mixture which has to be precisely balanced into what is referred to as an air to fuel ratio or AFR. For petrol engines 14.5:1 is the petrol cruising AFR but under load the engine needs more fuel, with typically around a 13:1 AFR. In […]

Fast Road Cams Sports Camshafts

What is the camshaft, what does it do and how can it be modified. The camshaft is located at the top of an engine. Is is a long shaft with a series of lobes along it and it rotates relative to engine speed. The lobes push close the valves in the head and allow the […]

The basic job of a silencer in an exhaust is to dissipate the sound waves coming from the engine. In the UK and America where early cars had poor silencers we have a culture that associates noise with power. In Japan where engines were introduced with silencers the accepted exhaust note is very quiet and […]

Nitrous has many names, the most popular is NoS which is actually a brand. Dinitrous Monoxide is the chemical name but for the purpose of this article we shall refer to it as nitrous. We will explore how it works and the various setup options available and see what this does for performance.

There is an ever increasing array of fuel on offer. With the addition of a whole plethora of additives the motorist can be left wondering what is the best for his car. Which octane is best and should you use additives? Are all brands of fuel the same?

The modern diesel engine has moved on a long way from those agricultural units of times passed. Many dismiss diesels because they have experienced them in the past as being slow smelly and noisy. The diesel engine has moved on a  long way from this and they are now very refined and offer petrol matching […]

A turbo charger has a finite capacity to force air into the engine. The basic principle that more air equals more power holds true (as long as there is a sufficient supply of fuel to match this). Hybrid turbos are one way to increase the capacity of your turbo, with different impellers the characteristics can […]

When building a new engine you really want it to be as strong as possible. Cryogenic treatments were discovered by accident. It was noticed that metal exposed to the cold temperatures of space and high temperatures of re-entry were substantially stronger.

To increase the power of an engine you can increase the cylinder capacity.  The best way to increase the cylinder capacity of an engine is by physically making each cylinder a larger diameter. 

In a forced induction engine (turbos, superchargers and twin chargers) and to some extent a NASP engine with a high compression ratio you have the ever present risk of detonation. This is where the fuel prematurely ignites typically causing major engine damage. When adding or increasing the amount of air going into the engine you […]

You will often see modifications available in stages. Typically manufacturers of performance parts and car tuning companies use stages 1 – 3 to denote the state of tune provided. So what does a tuning stage mean and what are the differences between a Stage 1, Stage 2 and Stage 3 tune up. There is a […]

You may have noticed that your car feels much more powerful on cold mornings than it does in the middle of summer.  This is due to the effects of air temperature.  It is a simple fact that cold air carriers are more oxygen and warmer air. An intake vent will help to address this problem, and […]