MENUTuning the Chevrolet Onix/Prisma
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The Onix/Prisma is a awesome project car to carry out. We see loads of people wasting money on their Onix/Prisma doing the wrong mods and then having to start over. Follow our advice to avoid making the common mistakes
We examine the options for your Onix/Prisma tuning and show the best upgrades. Chevrolet Onix/Prismas are awesome to work on and with the right uprated parts you can positively maximise your driving experience.
Handling/Suspension upgrades
Many Onix/Prisma owners uprate the handling of their cars with tuning suspension kits as a priority, this will certainly increase your enjoyment of the car.
If you set the toe out to 0.8 to 1.3 degrees on the front, and add some negative camber then cornering will often benefit.
We would go to a maximum drop of 26mm - 36 mm. on most models. You risk rubbing on the arches if you go lower than this.
Top end power should be your overall aim on the Onix/Prisma with a nice fat peak torque band.
Sadly with smaller engine sizes you are wasting your time spending money on modifications, so if this applies to you get yourself an engine swap then apply the following mods.
Tuning modifications.
Typically these performance upgrades are usually fitted by our members, decide how far you want to push your car before you start.
- 1.0 L SPE/4 I4 (gasoline/ethanol)
- 1.4 L SPE/4 i4 (gasoline/ethanol)
- 1.0 L EcoTec 325T I3 (gasoline) from 2019
Getting the best performance mods for your planned usage of the car is essential. Stage 3 motor sport parts just don't work well on the road hard to control in slow traffic.
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How to tune your car
- Improve the handling
Focus on Suspension improvements, such as coilovers and make sure the bushings are in good order and that the alignment is correct. Then focus on improving the brakes, with a big disk brake conversion kit and fast road brake pads.
- Remove restrictions
Focus on the intake and exhaust with filters being the common point of restriction in a tuned car. Intercoolers may also become restrictive on turbo engines so this may also need to be uprated.
- Burn more fuel & air
Increase the fuelling so it matches the air coming into the engine. The ratio is important so you need to improve the fuel pump and injectors, so the head mods, big valve conversions, fast road camshafts and forced induction upgrades extra supply of air is adequately met.
- Test and replace any weak parts
Weak areas are commonly the clutch, the turbocharger and pistons and crankshaft in a highly tuned engine. Makes sure these components will cope with your power aspirations.
- The Tune or Remap
A cars ECU controls the fuel, timing, spark and even the turbo in some cases, so to fully extract your gains you should remap the car last and this will fully release the power. Some cars are easy to map, and others require piggyback ECU's or aftermarket ECU's but this is the most vital step of your tuning project.
Modifying to Stage 1:
Suspension upgrade (drop 26mm - 36 mm.), Alloy wheels, Panel air filter, Lighter flywheel, Sports exhaust, Remap.
Modifying to Stage 2:
Ported and polished head, high flow fuel injector, Fast road cam, Power/Sport clutch, fuel pump upgrades.
Modifying to Stage 3:
Adding or upgrading forced induction (turbo/supercharger), Sports gearbox, Engine balancing, Internal engine upgrades (pistons/head/valves), Competition cam.
Peak power is good on competition cars but for a drivable and fun car you need a long torque band and perhaps extending the rev range.
In this article we shall give a little insight into the world to the best performance parts for your car, but we'd encourage you to spend some time on the site looking into the details of each type of performance modification.A fast road cam proves to be one of the best NASP power modifications you can do with a single part fitted to your engine.
The exhaust & intake flow play a huge role in your cars power band, but be careful here, getting this wrong can upset the idle and make the car awkward to drive in traffic. You'd need to follow a cam upgrade with other mods and finish with a performance chip for the best performance gains.
You will need to ensure that the engine is not starved of fuel so will need to pay attention to the fuelling.
Using higher octane fuel is another option if you find you are suffering from pinking or premature ignition on your Chevrolet project after fitting other tuning kits. To get sufficient fuel you may need to improve the injectors on your engine.
If have increased your fuelling with bigger injectors you will also need to get a bigger fuel pump to supply it.
Intake and Exhaust Tuning.
Breathing mods are usually next up. Induction kits will only help to increase power if your cars air intake is struggling! Adding an induction kit to most small engines will see NONE OF A LOW END POWER GAIN AT ALL. If you have heavily modified your engine and it's need for air INCREASES DRAMATICALLY then an induction kit is the answer and will help remove this restriction.
Derestricting the air feed into the engine is a primary goal of performance tuning so get a freer flowing air filter if you find that the car is running lean only if you find the car is running lean. Induction kits can sound fun but due to the warm air in the engine bay they will not really increase power and usually rob you of power.
Sports exhausts can usually air flow from the engine but do not go too big or you could will reduce the flow rate. Stick to 1.5 to 2.5 inches for best results.
Head work including a gas flow (ported and polished) and 3 or 5 angle valve job will really help to release the potential of the engine. In nearly all cases of Onix/Prisma tuning your clutch will start to fail and this needs an upgrade - read our guide on clutches for more information. The best mods we recommend for your Onix/Prisma are Remapping or piggy back ecu, fast road cam and air intake and exhaust.
Remaps offer big power gains on all turbo charged cars. On NASP engines the benefits are doubtful. However a chipped ECU on a NASP engine will help unleash the potential if you have done a lot of mods. Despite the large cost involved adding forced induction to a NASP engine will give large power gains. Turbos are often harder to add than a supercharger. Turbos provide boost in increasing proportion to th engine speed and this can make mapping difficult.
Superchargers will give a boost which is correlating to engine speed so is simpler. Alternatively you could perhaps fit water injection to minimise knock.
Alloy wheel upgrades.
Due to the fact that alloys are lighter they improve performance and they can help to cool the brake disks. Further improvements can be made to your cars handling with the addition of directional tread pattern tire. Large Onix/Prisma alloys can decrease performance. If you get big alloys you will be changing your final drive ratio.
Although some people have gone larger than this we would stick to a 18 inch rim size as the maximum.
For more information on Tuning your car please join us in our friendly forum where you can discuss Onix/Prisma options in more detail with our Onix/Prisma owners. It would also be worth reading our unbiased Chevrolet tuning articles to get a full grasp of the benefits and drawbacks of each modification.
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We love to hear what our visitors have got up to and which mods work best for them on each model of car. Comments are used to improve the accuracy of these articles which are continually updated.
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