i have always been a huge fan of musclecars or anything that is v8 powered and rear wheel drive. but ive recently seen new light in a 1996 mitibishi eclipse gst the car belongs to my cousin the only mods are som 17s, some z rated rubber, a blowoff valve, and a catback exhaust from tskuba or something. my point is that the car can carve corners like nothing else it is amazingly fast and it comes stock with all of the pro touring goodies like fully independant suspension four wheel disc brakes it is lighter than hell its cheap to buy and maintain and like i said it has plenty of power the exhaust sounds good [no fart in a tin can noise] and the best part is the 21 1/2 mpg my 21 year old cousin gets driving in town and hotrodding ps all of the things ive been raving about are done on a stock 172,000 mile motor soon to be rebuilt he plans to sleeve, balance, add a new head, header, bigger 18g turbo, better wastegate, and a whole new turbo back exhaust system. needless to say im hooked on the pacific muscle but only if its done right [no primered black hondas with a intake and exhaust pipe that sound like crap and are incredibly slow and smokey]  

That's not muscle.  That's rice.  You want a fuel efficent v8, get an overdrive and injection.  Or swap in a late model ls1 or triton.  It can be done.  My buddy's '00 SLP camaro gets 26 mpg on the hiway and will tear that eclipse apart.  That eclipse is SLOW by the way, if that's all he's got done to it.  We're talkin mid to low 14's tops.  Woo Hooo, a stock fox body with the right setup from the factory will run 13's.  Hell my friend's Firebird formula with a lightly modded tpi 305 should outrun that thing.  Oh well, another ricer to make money off of.

whatever why don't you ask your firebird buddy if he wants to race farther than a quarter mile or maybe race on something with a corner or two?  

The firebird will probably out handle that eclipse too...third gens were damn good handling cars...they'll pull around 0.9 g's on the skid pad stock.

Sorry, but he's right...thats rice...not muscle...muscle doesn't need more than a quarter mile to win a race.  

You picked the wrong board to post that on...

The guys right about the price off gas though, but there are alternatives to giving up on V8 power. You could convert the car to run on Liquid petrolium gas (LPG) this has the advantage of being able to run a higher compression ratio and more timing advance. With an octane rating of 104 LPG is cheaper that pump gas and has the potential to put some horsepower to the pavement once you get the tuning right.  

His formula has the WS6 package along with every other performance package available for the formula.  It's a hell of a corner carver.  He'd dust that eclipse.

you guys make a good point but the big issue is the price my coisins car costed $5,500 and included clear taillight lenses the exhaust and bov and the 17 inch rims plus the stock wheels with snow tires mounted and the car runs a respectable high thirteen second quarter mile in salt lake city utah at rocky mountain raceway which is better than some of the times that others on this site brag about another thing that i forgot is that this car is versatile it makes frequent long trips loaded up with camping gear it is driven year round and has the best throws that ive ever felt in any car ps dont get me wrong i am still a huge fan of muscle but for my situation the eclipse im now looking at to buy is the better choice for me. also the 1g eclipse im looking at makes around 300 horse with an exhaust system and some porting on the o2 sensor, a new down pipe and the stock turbo the work was all done good and cheap and for an investment of under $500 the car made more power than stock 350 with half of the cylinders and twice the gas milaege.  

The idea that none of the old American iron can handle is myth. Once upon a time there was a group of editors from a Mopar oriented publication that entered a 69 Plymouth Valiant in the One Lap of America event, a cross country endurance run which included auto cross road courses and drag strips. One year they placed second overall. In doing this they out handled and out performed Porsches, Vipers, Vettes and others with a 69 Valiant running a basically stock suspension. They called the car "The Green Brick". Some of the folks on this board may have heard of it. 

For many of us, including me, gas mileage and performance are different worlds.  Neither of my cars get great mileage, but for daily use, I swear by my slant 6 Dart. 18 to 20 mpg in town is acceptable to me. So what if its not fast. A slant 6 will run forever.

Sure, you can leave me at the stoplight, but eventually, sooner or later, Ill pass you at the junkyard.

If I want to go a little quicker, Ill drive my other Dart with a 402 stroker making 500 hp (which is mild for that displacement). I can run 11s with that given the 3100 lb weight of my Dart. Thats a lot better than 13s. And it will handle like nobodys business. Remember the story of the Valiant I mentioned earlier. So what if it only gets 12 mpg? I dont have to drive it everyday, only when I want to embarrass someone driving a sport compact.

Sure you can get 500 hp out of a 4 banger, but not the torque. And youd be lucky if it held together for more than a weekend. I read an article in a Honda magazine that made me laugh. On the cover they talked about a 500 horse 10 second Civic. I read the article to find that they guy ran one pass at 10.98 ( ok he was in the 10s.....barely) , but it was just ONE pass, guess what happened on the SECOND pass? He blew the head clean off the motor! You know he spent a fortune on that motor just to get one pass out of it! Then he found a junkyard motor since he was all out of money and now drives it daily. But the cover of the magazine says 10 second daily driven Civic??  Thats some strange logic. Guy builds a motor, barely breaks into the 10s oon ONE PASS then puts a half worn out stock motor in it and now drives it every day. All I can say is....Ohhhh kaaaay!

You know, it really nice to know that an Eclipse can run 13's with a few basic mods. A lot of 60s muscle cars could run 13's with a few basic mods. Its nice to know that  the Japanese have at last caught up to a performance standard that is 30 to 40 years old. I was starting to wonder. 

ok, so basically a new exhaust sans the turbo netted 90 h.p.? I dont see that happening. and as for the clear lights exhaust and rims, they probably had more to do with dropping the price of the car.  

You want affordable performance and good on gas?  Go get a late model mustang or camaro.  You can get z28 camaros and gt mustangs for 5 grand or less.  I saw a 95 z28 with 80K on it for 4500 not too long ago.  The camaro's should dust that eclipse, the mustang will need some mods.  While 4th gens are kind of ugly IMO, I think they'd fit what you're looking for just fine.  Mustangs are everywhere, there's almost as many mustang parts as there are chevy parts these days.

Did you say that the O2 sensor was ported?  Maybe you mean the MAF sensor???  I drive a carbureted 300+ horse 350 cubic inch engine in an 84 Regal (brick) and with a 200 4r overdrive automatic (and no lock up) I get 25 mpg (highway) when driving nice.   My family's 93 v6 caravan doesn't get that on the highway.  Just a thought....  

Put a turbo on a v-8 and see how that poor 4 does then.

  You want a turbo car? Why don't you get a turbo T-Type. They ran 13s bone stock and got killer gas mileage. They can be made to handle and they are fairly cheap. On the other hand a 89 TTA would put that Eclipse to shame in everyway, STOCK! Even topend. But if your stupid enough to drive over 150 mph on the street that's your problem.

I have had this same arguement with my son on a dozen different occasions, and I have to say that there is an element out there that takes foreign cars for real and do good work on them.  There is a kid two doors down from us that is a factory trained Honda mechanic, and he has made some real nice (but not inexpensive) mods to his Civic.  Fine - I have never herd him call it a muscle car though.  Why?  Because it doesn't fit the definition. 

For this one person, there are probably only a small group like him around where I live.  Most of the Honda type cars are noisy pieces of crap that couldn't pull themselves out of a steep garage.

Somewhere it's gotton out that all third gen Camaros are slow, and I just love to drive my '87 IROC around town.  They don't realize it has the tuned port 350 in it, and I have no end of fun letting them embarrass themselves.  I let them bump me off the line by about 1/2 a carlength, then dump it in low and ram rod the gas.  It's like my car goes nuts and I go screaming past.  The last dummy I did that to gave me the finger - oh well.  It was a stupid neon - I don't know what the dude was thinking (or not thinking more like it).  I always know I have another fish on the line when I hear the fart can approach then they start throwing revs at me. 

In my opinion, if a person has to have a serious gas saver then buy one, but don't put ground effects, neon lights, low wheels and a wing on it and expect it to be fast.  I like the idea of having a real piece of American muscle in the garage ready to fly when the weather is right, or when you are ready to go to the local track.  That way the idea of muscle doesn't get lost or confused with what I think would otherwise be called BLING.

Bowser 

My buddy and I drove my Vortec 355 powered S-10 from Terre Haute, IN to the middle of Indianapolis with a 500 lb motorcycle in the bed.  We both weigh about 225lbs.  When we got there I couldn't squeeze in quite 4 gallons of gas.  That is over 20 MPG with 3.42 gears a Th350 3-speed automatic, and an old leaky Edelbrock 600 carb.  If it had been just me, no motorcycle or buddy, an overdrive transmission, maybe fuel injection, who the hell knows what kind of mileage I could have knocked down.

Just for the record the gas guage doesn't work and I don't drive the truck that often so everyday mileage checks aren't easy.  That's the only time I monitored it.

well, all muscle has it's place.  I live and breathe V8 american muscle, but i also have a friend who has a 1994 Eagle talon TSI with an 18g, full 3" exhaust, front mount intercooler, 18psi of boost, upgraded injectors, a MAF translator so i can use a 3" GM maf, greddy BOV etc etc etc.  it runs low 11's.  That's with a 5 speed manual and an "ok" driver.

As for corners, they are great.  These cars are full time AWD and stick to the road like nothing else.  Sure, anyone with enough time and money can make anything handle wonderfully.

Heck check this out:
http://www.shepracing.com/sr_dragtalon.html

That's John Shepard's company.  He makes drag 5 speed tranny's for DSM's.  8.76 1/4 mile with a 5 speed MANUAL.  That is unheard of.  Best thing is that he runs a FULL interior, stock gas tank WITH a full cage. Stock suspention setup with different rate springs and he can drive the car everyday, no questions asked.

Now i know that all of you are going to scream rice, but it does take a lot do get anything fast.  Whatever floats your boat.  I'm 20, and have been involved in cars since i was 10.

I guess i kind of sit in the middle of it all.  There is nothing like sitting in a car with a 440 shaking and spitting, hardly idleing at 1500RPM screaming to have it's loud pedal hammered.  But it is also really cool to sit down in a car, turn the key and have it instantly start up EVERY time in less than a second.  Putting the car in first gear and hammering it listening to the turbo spool up and the wastegate open into the free air scaring everyone around you.  The technology behind these little rides is quite interesting.

It really isn't any different from when all the old timers were kids.  Their parents would see them puting time, money and love into "crappy" cars and making them faster than they were in the first place.  We all have to start somewhere, and i guarentee that your first car that you tweaked on wasn't the fastest on the block, the best looking, or even the coolest, but you loved it.  You took what you had, and made it work. It isn't any different with these guys.  You can get a running DSM for $600 easy, with little to no rust.  It's just what is around these days! What was around when you were a kid?  That cheap "first car" that you had.

Now don't try to say that i'm saying it's okay for a car running a 17 sec. 1/4 to have a 3 foot wing and an exhaust louder than a jet, because it's not!  Not all these cars are "good" cars, but then again how much do you see a mid 90's camaro V6 looking like it should go fast?  all the time...

Whatever floats your boat i guess.