19bonestock88's 2004 Saturn "Ion Green Line" build...

[19bonestock88]

Ordered the rest of my exhaust components yesterday, I’ll have everything by the end of the month; got a Blackhorse Racing stainless header, ZZP flexpipe (really nicely made downpipe flange with curved flexpipe), and two mild steel 02 bungs, one of which will be filled with my downstream O2 sensor, and the other one reserved for a wideband O2 sensor for an AFR gauge... all pipe will be 2.25” from the manifold to muffler, which should be adequate for up to ~ 235whp I think? (what the LSJ community says at least)... with the exhaust upgrades paired with my existing intake upgrades the engine *should* make between 160 and 170bhp

[California98Civic]

Originally Posted by 19bonestock88

I’m getting serious again, guys... in the prototyping phase for new wheel skirts and some air separation plates (sharpens the corner of the rear bumper) to boost mileage some... still gotta fabricate mounts for all this stuff but I’m getting there...

This one here looks quite familiar! I like it.

[19bonestock88]

I’m still trying to wrap my head around mounting them... being made of plastic, my car doesn’t have distinctive fender lips to which to attach mounts like you done... I’m half considering drilling directly into my quarter panels?

[19bonestock88]

I’ve received the rest of the components to remake my entire exhaust system, just waiting on a good opportunity to cut all the pipe off and try removing the manifold and sensors...

[2000mc]

Originally Posted by 19bonestock88

I’m still trying to wrap my head around mounting them... being made of plastic, my car doesn’t have distinctive fender lips to which to attach mounts like you done... I’m half considering drilling directly into my quarter panels?

I never permanently put skirts on my Saturn. Made the prototype shaped for maximum coverage where I could still remove the wheel, and planned to use 3m molding tape to semi permanently mount the final version.
I think the air separation plates are a great idea to add at the same time, I couldn’t detect any improvement with skirts, but wondered if it was because my rear bumper had the radius of a beachball

[19bonestock88]

Maybe I should tape the skirt back on and see if I can get a wheel off?

The entire rear end of the Ion has the radius of a beachball, probably terrible for aero... ideally I wanna extend the air separation plates upward and wrap them across the top of the taillights (in clear Lexan there) to meet my spoiler, make a kind of box cavity at the rear... in my mind it looked really badazz, in real life it might not but it’ll still give me a good FE boost... and there is still massive amounts of low hanging fruit to be plucked if I’m so motivated...

I *STILL* don’t have:
wheel spats
any form of belly pan
any mirror deletes
sealed panel gaps
passenger wiper delete
any synthetic fluids in engine OR trans

[California98Civic]

Originally Posted by 19bonestock88

I’m still trying to wrap my head around mounting them... being made of plastic, my car doesn’t have distinctive fender lips to which to attach mounts like you done... I’m half considering drilling directly into my quarter panels?

Don't drill the quarter panels if yuo do not have to. The steel lip on my wheel wells was revealed after I took a rubber/plastic trim piece off for weight. Is there a similar trim piece on your Saturn? What do you mean that your car is made of plastic?

[19bonestock88]

The only metal panels on the exterior are the hood, the rooftop and the top of the trunk lid, the rest of the exterior panels are plastic. I don’t have a fender lip to which I can attach anything... the mounts I made for the previous versions of wheel skirt were screwed into my fender liner but they were aligned to hold the skirt inboard of the edge of the fender

[19bonestock88]

Got wheel skirts in “final” phase and mounted... I was inspired by the post in the wheel disc thread about putting a piece of pipe behind the opening and screwing the coroplast to it, so that’s what I did.

I cut two pieces off my big coil of 3/4” HDPE water pipe and screwed it to the inner fender (also through the lip on the plastic quarter panel, bumper cover, and dogleg... no visible screw holes if I remove the mod, good enough for me)

Then, I screwed the (painted black) skirts to the pipe... I guess I’ll need to carry a Phillips screwdriver with me for tire changes but since I no longer possess a good spare that’s of little consequence at the time being...

[California98Civic]

They look great. Quite clean look.