The 90 Dodge Shadow ES

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90 Dodge Shadow ES

Ah the mighty Dodge Shadow. What is there to say about it. I picked up the Shadow for 1000 bucks and it was then very much a POS. The whole front end needed repairs. From new wheel bearings to steering rack to rewelding the core support. The car need new tires, had a bad headgasket, incorrect front bumper, missing foglights and two ruined halfshafts.

So why did I decide to buy such a piece of shit. Well simple, it was a turbo Shadow ES. The body was clean and was fully load with everything but power windows. Besides parts are cheap, easy to work on and takes very well to performance. All perfect reasons for buying the car to continue my further adventures into motorsports. Shadows are plentiful and cheap to buy. So who cares if I crash it.

The best part about the shadow. Its a sleeper, with its 4 doors and veteran's plate. Seeing the faces of people who realize that the shadow isn't slow is priceless. Destroying riceboys is the shadow's favorite past time. Well, actually its my favorite pastime. Nothing more fun the teaching people with all the graphics and big exhaust tips about performance with a good healthy ass kicking delivered by the shadow.

So, how fast is the shadow? So far I've run 14.5@93MPH nonintercooled. The Shadow isn't fast yet in autocross. But as I build the car and gain experience, that will change.

The Shadow's performance parts/mods run down. The engine has crossdrilled ghead, 88TII turbo, ported exhaust manifold and engine cooler. Boost is controlled with a grainger valve along with a map sensor overboost cutout riser. Boost is set to 14lbs. a Lebaron GTS TII's complete intercooler/radiator with a cone filter and Talon BOV are used. Exhaust is a full 2.5in exhaust system with high flow cat. A Dynomax race magnum muffler is used as a resonator and an Ultra Flo is where the stock muffler goes. The installed tranny is a 92 A568 for its 3.85 gear ratio. It was rebuilt and a Quaife LSD was installed.

Suspension/brakes have also seen upgrades. Springs are Eibach's shadow kit for the highest springs rates out for turbododges. Koni adjustables are used to dampen. A 89 Shelby Daytona swaybar to control some roll. Brakes are the factory 4whl discs that came on the car. I've improved on them by using the Caravan 60mm piston calipers and matching brackets. Stainless Steel braid brake lines replace stock OEM rubber lines. A 24mm Master cylinder from a Daytona was added to improve pedal feel. Valoline Synethic DOT4 brake fluid was used flushing out the very old/dirty fluid.

What is in the future? A reprogrammed computer from Relentless Performance products for bigger injectors, intercooler and 3bar map. I'm hoping to push 250WHP using less then 20lbs of boost. I rebuilt short block maybe in the cards too.