MENUMitsubishi Lancer Evolution Tuning
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The Lancer EVO is a good car tuning project to try, one of the most popular among our members and site visitors.
Plan ahead and research Lancer EVO tuning to spare yourself making the usual common errors we frequently come across.We take a peek at Lancer EVO tuning and summarise the best mods that work. Mitsubishi Lancer EVOs are fantastic to work on and with the best modified modifications you can really improve your driving pleasure.
Turning our attention to the engine we need to get a bit more power out of the top end.
The newer your EVO the more potential it has, we see Mitsubishi revising and tweaking this great car over the years, and it entered it's 10th Generation in 2007.
Evo Engine tuning mods.
These are the tuning modifications are usually installed by our members, decide how far you wish to go in your tuning project before you begin.
Getting the best performance upgrades for your planned usage of the car is a time and money saver. Stage 3 motor sport parts just won't work well on the road difficult in stop start traffic.
- Evolution I October 1992
– January 1994 CD9A platform - Evolution II January 1994
– February 1995 CE9A platform - Evolution III February 1995
– August 1996 CE9A platform - Evolution IV August 1996
– January 1998 CN9A platform - Evolution V January 1998
- January 1999 CP9A platform - Evolution VI January 1999
– February 2001 CP9A platform - Evolution VII February 2001
– January 2003 CT9A platform - Evolution VIII January 2003
– March 2005 CT9A platform - Evolution IX March 2005
– January 2007 CT9A/CT9W platform - Evolution X October 2007
– May 2016 CZ4A platform
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Guide to the Best Tuning Mods & Upgrades
- Mods that Remove a Restriction
If the intake or exhaust are restricted in any way this will have an impact on your cars performance, so use an induction kit/filter upgrade and better flowing exhaust whenever your tuning creates a flow restriction.
- Mods that Improve Handling
Braking, Suspension and general alignment of the suspension components is vital for any tuning project even before you start increasing power.
- Fit Stronger Parts
Tuned cars will show up weaknesses, typically in the turbochargers, clutch and internal engine components. Whilst most engines can cope with mild tuning mods, TorqueCars recommend that you upgrade the internal components before these weak spots manifest themselves.
- ECU Tunes & Remapping
While some cars can be easily remapped, others may require piggyback ECU's or aftermarket ECU's but this is the most vital step of your tuning project as it fully releases the power from all of your mods and upgrades. Expect 10-20% on NASP engines and 30-40% on turbocharged units.
- More Power Needs More Fuel & Air
Every tuning project will aim to increase the air supply, but fuel supply is just as vital and will need to match the air the engine can utilise. Fuel to Air ratio is vital so upgrade the fuel pump & injectors. Also you can look to perform head mods (flowing and porting), bigger valves, fast road cams and forced induction upgrades to improve fuel.
Stages of Tune
Stage 1 mods: Sports exhaust, Alloy wheels, Panel air filter, Lighter flywheel, Suspension upgrade (drop 30-40mm), Remap.
Stage 2 mods: Power/Sport clutch, Fast road cam, fuel pump upgrades, high flow fuel injector, Ported and polished head.
Stage 3 mods: Adding or upgrading forced induction (turbo/supercharger), Internal engine upgrades (pistons/head/valves), Sports gearbox, Engine balancing, Competition cam.
You should keep as much low end torque as you can and aim for a long power band across the rev range rather than a narrow top end power hike.
In this article we shall give a brief overview to the best performance parts for your car, but we'd encourage you to spend some time on the site looking into the details of each type of performance part.A fast road camshaft is widely accepted as one of the best NASP power modifications you can do from a single upgrade to your engine.
The exhaust and intake durations play a large part in your cars power band, but be careful here, getting this wrong can upset the idle and make the car difficult to drive in traffic. You'd need to follow a cam upgrade with other mods and finish with a remap to fully release the power gain.
When pushing up the power you will need to pay attention to to the fuelling. More power needs more fuel.
If you find you get flat spots and power surges after your modified parts you should check the fuelling and try a higher octane fuel as well. Uprated injectors will enable you to supply sufficient fuel to the engine.
If you've uprated your fuelling with bigger injectors you will also need to get a bigger fuel pump to supply it.
Intake and Exhaust Tuning.
The next area for modification is the intake and exhaust. Contrary to popular belief there is usually very little power gain obtained by fitting an induction kit, they only work well and are recommended after you boost the engines power to the point where the standard air intake box cannot cope!
For most Lancer EVO engines TorqueCars would suggest you just go with a washable panel air filter. On heavily tuned engines and turbo vehicles an induction kit will help release the power providing you address the problem of supplying cold air.
Sports exhausts can usually air flow from the engine but do not go too wide or you could will reduce the flow rate. Stick to 1.5 to 2.5 inches as a rule of thumb.
Head porting and polishing the head will allow you to maximise your air/fuel charge. Leave this to a professional though with a proper flow bench and machine tools When you tune up your Lancer EVO you will reach a point that the standard clutch starts to complain so get an uprated clutch. The best mods we recommend for your Lancer EVO are Remapping or piggy back ecu, fast road cam and air intake and exhaust.
NASP engines do not achieve big power gains if you remap them, unless you have done extensive modifications. With turbocharged engines this is another story. A remapped turbo will give significant power gains and take full advantage of the strength of the block.
We've also come across some owners experimenting with twincharged applications and making some very high power hikes.
The most significant power gains for NASP engines usually involve the addition of forced induction. Turbos are usually harder to add than a supercharger. Turbos give boost in exponential proportion to increasing engine speed and this can make mapping difficult.
It is more straightforward to map a supercharger because the boost is correlating to engine speed on a linear curve. To cope with forced induction you will usually need to decrease the engine compression ratio .
Handling/Suspension upgrades
Many Lancer EVO owners uprate the handling of their cars with modified suspension mods as a priority, this will certainly increase your enjoyment of the car.
Adding some negative camber on the wheels and around 1 to 1.7 degrees of toe out, will radically improve your Lancer EVO in handling and cornering.
We would go to a maximum drop of 30mm - 37 mm on most models. You risk grounding out if you go lower than this.
Alloy wheel upgrades.
The benefits of alloy wheels include a lower unsprung weight and more efficient brake cooling. Pay attention to your choice of tyres (tyres) for your car, a good directional tread pattern tyre can really enhance your cars handling. It is worth noting that although they can look cool on the Lancer EVO large alloy wheels will actually decrease your performance. The larger you go the lower your acceleration will be - this to the change in your effective final drive ratio.
Due to this fact aim to keep the overall rolling diameter of the wheel your OEM settings. In all cases without going larger than 18 inches.
There is a more updated version of this Mitsubishi Lancer EVO Tuning article on TorqueCars.com.
For more information on Tuning your car please join us in our friendly forum where you can discuss Lancer EVO options in more detail with our Lancer EVO owners. It would also be worth reading our unbiased Mitsubishi tuning articles to get a full grasp of the benefits and drawbacks of each modification.
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