Weird, I bought this car exactly one year ago from today with 128,500 miles on it!

I haven't really done much, and need some ideas for not-to-expensive mods to do.

Few days after I bought it:


Rust




Got that fixed for $400, but the paint is coming off and its already rerusting. The guy who fixed it for me is going to repaint both sides for me for free:


After I washed/clayed/polished/waxed (took almost 4 hours):





Ran my Ipod connector through the center console and out the small coin thing:


Replaced the dome light, map lights, courtesy door lights, and trunk lights with LEDs:




New exhaust tips that i put on yesterday. I only bolted them on since the bottom part of the casing (right word?) of my muffler is torn and I had to keep it up by wrapping wire around it. I don't think it'll last much longer.


And i just had the rotters (spelling?) in the front and a baring in the back right replaced.

Next up is lifting my front bumper to remove the gap under the headlights and maybe some clear side markers.

Suggestions/comments?

not bad so far, have you thought of smoking the corner bumper lights? maybe a light smoke, just a suggestion since its hard to do mods when mods available are limited. other than that i cant think off the top of my head on m"cheap" mods. LED reverse lights?

Looks good. Thank God Im in the South, no rust here. Lol Start with the intake and lowering springs. Thats where I usually start with every car i've owned.

@MaxiNone, I know..theres almost nothing I can do haha. I was planning on swapping my reverse lights to LEDs at some point. What did you mean by 'corner bumper lights'? The red lights on the sides in the back? or on the tail lights?

@VQtHuRtY 5 days after I got them sanded down, bondo-ed, and painted we had rain and the paint was already oxidized haha new england SUCKS. I'm hopefully going to do a drop towards the end of the summer. I need to save money for books for next semester and don't have the money to drop on springs yet.

The only things I can think of doing are fixing a huge crack in my grill and a future drop

the side bumper lights

Looks good. How's engine bay look?

that metal needs to get cut out and replaced or it's going to continue rusting out. that's the only way to fix it.

@maxinone i reread what you wrote and then was like "why did i ask that, he wrote it right there" hahaha I really want to smoke them, but one of my friends claims that it might be illegal?

@felorojas14 dirty..very dirty, i'll upload a picture when i lift my front bumper early next week

@wesCTR Hopefully when he repaints it it'll take longer to come back. He fixed it maybe 2 or 3 months ago and its not bad. I think its only a problem because they didn't put a lot of paint on it

Anyone know what is under the plastic 'pins' that hold the front bumper on? do i need to make threads when i put everything on, or are there already threads?

Hopefully this week i'll have the bumper lifted, waxed with NXT 2.0, and maybe the crack in my grill fixed.

if you smoke them lightly to where u still see the color of the lens, you should still be good. but i figure if clear corners are ok (with the law) smoked stock corners should be too.

I've had mine color matched, at one point, and now smoked mine cause I cant stand them. I've never had any problems with cops nor passing inspection, but thats down here in TX and thus far... (knock on wood)

Hmm i might.

Washed with meguiars gold class wash and waxed with NXT 2.0. First time using an actual wax, i've just been using quik wax. The difference is unbelievable:


I haven't really gotten a chance to take a lot of pictures, today is the first day that it has not been raining :/ but! it isn't supposed to rain until wednesday, so i'm going to take a ton of pictures of other things I've done and fix my bumper sag monday or tuesday.

cheap mods

grounding kit - if made your self can be under $40
FSTB - under $30
cleared amber in headlights - under $10
bluebat taillight overlays - under $50
side marker lights - under $50 for all 4 $30 for 2

Thanks for the list of cheap mods man! Two questions though lol: what's the pros of adding a grounding kit? And what's 'FSTB'?

I got rid of my bumper sag problem yesterday, but there's still uneven gaps under my headlights :/.

Updates: most likely going to get 35% tint in maybe 6 months or less, going to paint my sub box soon (I'll get a picture of it), and my friend is going to make me a small LED strip (Only 2 or 3 LEDs) to light up my climate control lights since I do not want to open that up and half of it doesn't light up. I'm trying to make it similar to the light that shines from under the climate controls.

FSTB = Front Strut Tower Brace

This is taken from blehmco but IIRC he no longer sells them.
http://www.blehmco.com/enginegrounding.htm

I love mine, other things it can improve, stonger start ups, windows rolling up stronger, louder stereo, brighter non hid lights... all due to the additional grounding a kit can provide.

They are easy to make.

FSTB will very slightly improve the feel and handling up front. Considering its price its very slight but noticable by... some people.

Hmm...I will definitely look into a grounding kit. Are they easy for complete noobs to install haha?

Thanks for the quick replies btw!

Update: Spray painted my sub box today, it was extremely messy because I could not get the speaker out of the box (my friend and I put it in too tightly) and also could not get the amp off the side of the box. The paint got all over my hands (paint thinner took it off quickly) and need to do some touchups, but its alright for now.

Just a kicker comp 12 and a rockford fosgate amp:

Could have just taped off the sub

Looking good so far...