Road Trip to USAF Tech training in MS - 2002 Continental

[Thorpower1988]

Alright, it's time for my 1st trip in my 2002. It now has 85+ miles on it (bought it last June '12 with 77K). I've changed oil to full synthetic Mobil-1 months ago. New Primacy tires. Overall, I love this car. I own 3-1988 Ford Thunderbird Turbo Coupes and this is my road car. Only 3 issues I need to address.

1. Passenger rear brake light warning comes on, when doing ops check, it doesn't work, but then later that day it's working. Should I change it anyways?
2. Is this normal for all Continentals, but when I have the a/c on and at a stop, it's not as cold as when I'm moving. Which is excellent.
3. Last, but kinda sad, I noticed my tranny occasionly, and slightly starts to slip after a hard stop. I heard these tranny aren't the best. Or is it the fluid?

I have all the Helm technical manuals on my year and body type.

Plus, is it a hard swap for Xeon or HID headlights.

One more bonus question. What kind of exhaust upgrades can be done to my car?

 

[JDS353]

GOOD luck on the training and wish I could help with the vehicle. would change the fluid in the tranny and check your wiring on the light and the ground could be the bulb is corroded and not making good contact. Very good looking auto for a ROAD CAR< have a good holiday drive safe. JD

 

[Thorpower1988]

Thanks for the info. Also being in Texas, I might want to get the car windows tinted.

 

[ground_zero298]

-Change the light and check the socket for corrosion. Sometimes contis trunks leak allowing water in from the "caulked seams"

-A/c slowing down at a stop is normal.

-Trans fluid on these should be changed at every 30k miles. I recommend using a ford dealer to do it. Slight trans slip can be fixed by unhooking the battery for 5 minutes and reseting the computer. These are electronically controlled. Takes up to 500 miles to retrain them. It learns from your driving habits to control the shifting aspect of the car.

-headlights are a simple plug and play and easy to do. Any kit off ebay will work for years. I prefer the low/high kits that have magnets in them and move the bulbs in and out when you switch from low to high. Think I paid $80 for my kit, have had it for 4 years with no issues. This kit comes with 2 ballast and a 12v relay. Ballast go under the front bumpers on each side just in front of the tires, relay can be mounted on the top bracket of the air box.

-While were talking air boxes, you can remove the air silencer front the air box that is located in the front drivers wheel well.

-I've had 5 different exhaust setups on m conti. I can say that flowmasters are quiet and disappointing, straight pipes have to much metal crackle. Magnaflow magnapacks are the way to go on these. I recommend 2 setups and 2 pipe locations for this depending on what tone/power you are looking for.

Easy less power full set up, center section of exhaust cut out (from flex tube back). Install 1 magnaflow 10415 magnapack (order from summitracing cost $67) in the center of the car. Pull rear mufflers and add 3.5" stainless tips in their place. Has a nice deep tone, will give you a couple extra horse. Very quiet inside the cabin, no drone or crackle.

More power- Center section stripped including 3rd cat. Mangnaflow X over installed in its place W/bung added to reinstall o2 sensor. A pair of 10415's set side by side behind the x over. Then both the magnapacks Y'ed back together into the existing rear exhaust with a 6" flex pipe installed, rear mufflers deleted and tips added. Will notice a very deep tone and a big hp increase in the mid/high rpm range. Still no drone or crackle, will hear the more aggressive tone upon full throttle.

Most power/true duals- Same setup as before except whole exhaust is removed, 3rd cat to the back bumper, bumper cut out will be left open. After the 10415's you will 45 degree out the pipe to both sides of the car towards the front of the rear tires, w/flex pipe added to each. They will be routed out right in front of the rear tires. Power increase will be very noticeable. Car will rumble the ground and will sound meaner then all hell. Exhaust note will be more noticeable in the car and will still have no drone or crackle.

 

[ground_zero298]

Had a couple exhaust sample vids on my phone I uploaded for you to hear. Guess I didn't do a vid of my dual out setup, I'll record 1 for you later on.

If your heavy on the pedal after these upgrades you will run through tires very fast. With traction control off tires will break loose from 25-45 mph, second gear shift and again at 70-80mph. Car will Pull, not creep from 90-130mph if left in third. It will pull 110-130 almost as hard as it pulls 60-80. On my dual set up I did not have my tune adjusted for it yet, or a bung installed for my o2 sensor, hence the CEL light and long shift.

Belt squeal in second is normal for a conti, mpg's went up 2-3 mpg after install and computer reset.

Sample clip of dual 10415's
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KP5cUFdHX1A&feature=youtu.be

Sample clip of single 10415
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_hXHEdd7wI&feature=youtu.be

 

[Thorpower1988]

THANK YOU ground_zero298! I've been searching for some type of mods for this car! Now I can't wait. Got to make an appointment with a good "Lincoln/Ford" dealer for my tranny fluid

 

[jrdnhsnbrg]

How would I go about removing the intake silencer? I heard about people doing it but could never figure out how. I've been thinking about replacing the mufflers, is it cheapest to do the single magnaflow magnapack in the center or do 2 mufflers in the same spot as the stock mufflers? Also I've heard that HID headlights if you don't have them in a projector lens they scatter the light more, blinding oncoming drivers and sometimes actually lowering your visibility. Is this true in Continentals?

 

[ground_zero298]

Been a real long time since I did the silencer delete. I believe I pulled the drivers front tire, undid the inner wheel well plastic, then unscrewed it and removed it. It's not a hard job.

HID's work fine in the conti. They are a excellent upgrade. Headlights can be adjusted down if you have any issues. I noticed I will get flashed once in a great while if my car is set to firm, in normal or plush no issues at all. Firm lowers the rear end the most.

If you are looking for just a deeper exhaust, replacing the back mufflers will be easier then adding one to the middle of the car, use the factory tips on them. If you want some added power also, do the center upgrade and get rid of all the added bs in the middle of the car.

Pic of my hid vs stock. Go with the white hid's, purple and blue just look dumb. I went with a shade of blue at first, then changed them out to white the next month, white has a cleaner look.

 

[johnvpr]

Can anyone can help me figuring out how groundZero upgraded exhaust, a picture or a drawing will be perfect

John

Most power/true duals- Same setup as before except whole exhaust is removed, 3rd cat to the back bumper, bumper cut out will be left open. After the 10415's you will 45 degree out the pipe to both sides of the car towards the front of the rear tires, w/flex pipe added to each. They will be routed out right in front of the rear tires. Power increase will be very noticeable. Car will rumble the ground and will sound meaner then all hell. Exhaust note will be more noticeable in the car and will still have no drone or crackle.

 

[Septimus]

Can anyone can help me figuring out how groundZero upgraded exhaust, a picture or a drawing will be perfect

I've been curious about this for a while now. I attempted to replicate his piping on my '00 Continental, bringing everything into a local exhaust shop, and they basically told me it couldn't be done. Once you get under there, there's not a lot of space for much of anything other than what's already there...let alone getting it all in without scraping the road on every bump. Unless there's a huge difference between spacing on a '02 and an '00, I'm stumped. For reference, you can see pics of his Continental in this post.

 

[johnvpr]

on his picture it looks like the exaust are sticking out of the frame since there is no space