What upgrades will give you the the best boost in H.P & Torque for the money. When you start with a stock truck. Sort of like a guide for dummies

 

A good cold air induction like the Volant ($395), a good free flowing exhaust like magnaflow (@$200), and a custom tune from Nelson (dont know how much they are). You can get those 3 things and gain alot of power and drop your 1/4 time a full sec. or more. If you just want some N2O you can get a dry kit for $400 thats adjustable from 35-125hp.
I'd recommend the other mods first though because it make driving more fun.

 

custom tunes make a really big difference.

I have a Wester's tune, link is in the sig

Nelson tune www.nelsonperformance.com

 

bang for the buck?

i think the most noticeable would be nitrous, stall, gears, and tune

 

if u dnt have the money for a nelson tune u can start with a hypertech get a used one not worth the money new you can get a nelson tune from like 400 to 500



01 yellow 4.8 flowmaster and hypertech

 

I don't think there is much question that dope is the biggest bang for the buck, but you might eventually get an extra BANG for that buck that you weren't looking for if you go that route. I've done almost every mod there is down the NA highway and I found the ASP pulley made a big difference considering it's only around $200. Cam $400 helps. StageII heads big help at $1,700. Airaid $250 is OK. Meziere $550 didn't seem to make any difference, but the cam and heads and all the other stuff were already in by that time. I've spent over 5K on the motor at this point and for that amount I could have installed 2 SCs, but after having done all these mods I can take an LS1 apart and put it back together again in my sleep.

 

Yeah, best bang for buck would be:

Stall
Cam
Headers
Custom Tuning

Electric fans will net you quite a bit durring the summer also.

You can ghetto fab your own intake and see a decent gain so I usually don't add that into the equation till you have extra money laying around. LOL

For por adders nitrous is the bomb but it can quickly get over the $1k range if you add al lthe goodies on awet kit and a couple of refills.

That's all I really have for mods and look what it's gotten me (sans nitrous)

 

I'm gonna say if you're limited budget wise... make your own intake, an inexpensive weld in muffler (SuperTurbo Dynomax is great and cheap), and get a tune. That will really wake the truck up.

If you have more funds add a set of full length headers and stall, then you'll be hauling!

 

Stall, headers, intake, and tune.

 

getting the air in and out and adding the fuel neccesary for that air is the first step. so start with the intake and exhaust, then a tune. from then on it's not cheap no matter which route you take. i went s/c, some go turbo, others stay n/a and go with cams, head work, etc. but like i said it's not cheap especially if you can't do the work yourself. an s.c, turbo , or nitrous are pretty straight forward installs, but tuning for them takes skill most of us don't possess. take manufacturers of cheap bolt ons [somtimes not so cheap] with a grain of salt, if the guys on this site aren't running them, chances are they don't deliver.