98intrigue's long overdue journal

98intrigue

I've been checking into this forum more often lately and figured I'd post pictures of my newer (to me) Viper. I sold my black '06 coupe and picked up an '03 vert in July. I sold my black car for 2 reasons: it made 100whp less than I expected it to and I bought a house. I was able to put some money into my house AND lower my car payment. Win/Win. This is the first time I've ever bought a car already modified, but I've done some things to make it my own.

When I bought the car, it had an APR carbon fiber rear wing installed. I removed it a week after buying the car...just not the look for me. I also touched up the scrapes at the bottom of the front bumper and shaved the rear bumper emblems. Oh yeah, I removed the tow hook too.

During the same week, I replaced every light in the car with white LEDs (gauges/map/footwell/license plate/reverse lights) and also put in 6K bulbs for the DRLs, fogs, and projectors. At the same time, I painted the gauge rings to match the color of the car and replaced the shift knob. I did the same mods to my previous Viper and it made a huge difference with updating the interior.

About a month ago, I sold the 19"/20" iForged Aeros that came on the car and put on the 18"/19" Forgelines with drag radials so I can finally get traction. While the wheels were off, I painted the e-brake calipers black and paint matched the calipers and applied the black Viper lettering (calipers were previously red with no lettering). Since then, I've been adjusting the coilovers to get the ride height to my liking. The front tires are now tucking and the rears are maxed out. I also added a front bumper emblem to try to take away a bit of the Jay Leno chin look the car has with the Hennessey bumper. I think I finally have the car where I want it to be.

The car has an extensive mod list:

• HOK Tangelo paint job
• Hennessey front bumper
• Coupe rear end conversion
• Custom Gen 3 to Gen 4 hood
• Penske coilovers
• 18"x11" & 19"x13" Forgeline ZX3 wheels
• 295/35/18 Nitto NT05 and 345/30/19 Nitto NT05R tires
• Polished Paxton supercharger
• Polished strut bar and timing cover
• PC'ed valve covers
• Built heads
• American Racing headers
• Mopar exhaust
• MGW short shifter and knob
• LED lighting conversion
• Inner gauge rings and calipers paint matched

A picture of when I bought the car with the wing compared to after removing it


This was taken at the dealer before the previous owner installed the wing


Updated gauge lighting and paint match gauge rings


This picture shows off the pearl in certain lighting


From it's first Cars and Coffee


Showing off the pearl in the paint and paint matched calipers


From FL2K where I took 2nd place Best Domestic (my black Viper took 1st place last year)


I made 1 pass at FL2K and went 11.6 @ 122mph, which confirmed my feeling of being low on power (car was misfiring). The car should trap in the mid 130s.


I took off the airbox/filter this weekend and polished things.


Final ride height taken this weekend


670whp/640wtq

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