Some more great ideas, thanks a lot guys!

I was about to snag the oem grille from eBay and just saw they have site wide 15% off sale FYI. Let's see what else I will be compelled to add. :-)

As far as sway bars go (I've always driven smalls suvs) I'll buy into the handling will drastically change. Not to start a topic of the best brand, but is the manufacturer's part#22441 for hotchki's the one that everyone recommends? Link here from tire rack is what I'm about to snag.

https://www.tirerack.com/suspension/...=Sport+Package

I did like the idea of getting my grille painted and was asking around different body shops but they told me the paint might not correctly stick if it's chrome (this is the material, correct)? So I figured I'll just go ahead and get the OEM midnight black grille. The uh, OEM style which looks recommended is currently out of stock. At least with OEM there will be 0% fitment issues! Can't wait to put that one one.

 

It’s not really chrome, it’s plastic. I’ve had no issues

 

Sweet! That looks very nice. Alrighty, you leaned me towards having it painted.

 

Painted mine as well. Either scuff the surface really good for the paint/primer to have something to bond to OR you can give your grille a bleach bath for 2 days and it will wipe right off.

 

Change the interior lights and door lights to LED bulbs. I changed mine to white and it looks very nice and bright at night

 

I had a shop do mine, IDK what they did for surface prep. They also did my fog light surrounds a matte/flat black.


And I've been running a color matched chrome trunk lip spoiler for 6 years, also with no issues. It's all in the surface prep

 

Almost every G could use a bit of a drop...

 

I went ahead and installed a few things today - oem midnight black grille for a decent price, jdm depo tail lights from eBay, carbon fiber element steering wheel with red stripe up top and red stitching and modified led push to start gtr button from grojas over here. I will get a local shop to help install the front and rear hotchkis sway bars.

I can definitely see what people mean by wheel gap. It really does stick out. I've never lowered my car before but I'm pretty tempted to get a basic coilover set such as the tein street basis z ones. I've read here they are very similar to sport stock. The car is plenty quick enough for me anyways as a daily driver. I keep it in drive mode most of the time. I like how the car knows when I want to baby and work on mpg and when to push me back when I do some spirited driving on some back roads. I never did the ecu update or whatever people recommend for lag on the 7AT. I usually only notice lag between shifting when in drive sport mode. Weird.

I'm probably doing it wrong, but I'm definitely shooting for "aesthetic" mods over performance ones right now haha. From what I read, this isn't the type of vehicle I should even bother trying to work on performance for cost to performance ratio. I already turn around at look at my car when I park, now I just won't turn around in the first place!

Next baby steps will probably be a drop then powder coat wheels to gunmetal/dark grey. The VIS carbon fiber hood looks real nice but I'm wondering if the 1k would be justified elsewhere. IPL side skirts seem enticing too. They really flare out. I definitely recommend a carbon fiber steering wheel. It feels very bolstered/thick. I really dig it.

 

That wheel upgrade sounds good, especially considering it's the thing we contact the most during all the miles driving


Unless you go all out w/ body mods I'd stay away from a big CF piece like the hood, it will look out of place.

 

Heck yeah, I'm loving it so far.

I'll follow that advice and not bother with the hood yet. I'll work on smaller things to continue making it that much more enjoyable. :-)