I just bought a 2003 Honda Accord EX with the V6 3.0. automatic trans. 4 door. what can i do for a decent price to improve the speed etc? what air intake etc? im new to this and dont know anything about cars but i would like my accord to be the best it can be. thx

 

AEM, Injen, K&N are some good names for cold air intake, could give you like 5hp or so, then an exhaust system, Honda is not strong with their automatic, so you can't really do much to it with out the risk of transmission failure.

 

Just don't come back and complain about lower mpg after mods.

 

Well I've personally noticed a small gain in MPG since I put in my AEM intake and got a catback, about 4mpg city over what I've gotten the past 2 years and 6hwy when I'm driving economically (which is rare since it makes such a nice noise now), so if he's just doing beginner bolt-on mods I wouldn't expect to lose mileage and I don't know many who have.

But I would say don't expect any real increase in power, especially low end. I feel like I've lost a bit if anything but it seems to pick up better when I'm going 70+. That's just my butt dyno talkin though

 

Any small gains in MPG are probably the result of better driving habits.

People who install snake oil equipment usually imagine improvement because they don't want to feel they have been suckered.

If the OP wants to improve speed he should have bought a car built for speed.

 

my 94 accord was quick. no doubt that the Honda automatics are not built really for performance but mine was. you can do anything with an automatic if you have the money. all i did was intake,exhaust,headers,intake manifold and a few other things. the gas mileage was the same and the performance was always there. my transmission never failed. when you make changes you have to overwrite them in the ECU, that is what i did and everything was fine. So to conclude my argument about the trans problems with the upgrades the trans will be fine with or without it.

 

your low end torque should have improved from day 1 after the install. from 70mph the car does have ***** i used to put my foot down on the highway and it went no time to waste.

 

the 98-02 were the accords that had tranny problems.

if anyone thinks a 2.2 accord is "fast" has not driven a car with power.

my 95 ex is slow as heck.(which is why i wont waste money on simple bolt on mods that will barely make a difference, going turbo f22 or h22 swap with light boost)

my built 1.3L metro was just as quick if not faster.

lol that dang metro ran a 11.1 in the 1/8 mile

 

My driving habits have definitely not improved though. It's gotten a consistent 21 city for 2 years with a mixture of conservative and pedal-to-the-metal driving, and all of a sudden it's getting 25. And the intake and exhaust have, if anything, made me more heavy footed than I've ever been.

And these cars definitely aren't fast stock. They're Accords. All I was saying is the place where I really see it shine through is when I'm already rolling at a decent speed and I put it to the floor. Compared to other cars I've driven this thing is slow and bulky. Which is why I stopped after doing a few cheap bolt ons. The intake and exhaust cost a grand total of $250 in the end, so it didn't hurt my wallet. I didn't go in expecting power or mpg gains.

 

I see, can you please tell us how or where can we go to get the ECU overwrite ? I want to get it done because mine is slow, probably the slowest 2dr car i ever own.
Sorry for my bad mouth on automatic, yes my buddy does have a few Supras 2jz with 800+ hp running 9s with automatic, built turbo 400. Just for what i do every day in the last ten yrs or so i built at least a few Honda/Acura on weekly basic. I'm also a member of Acurazine and just 99-03 TL forum, they had 84 pages of transmission failure with over 70,000 viewer.