Mitsubishi Galant Tuning tips

"Galantry is far from dead."

VR4 tuning

The Galant first appeared back in 1969. It was not until 1987 that a high powered version appeared with the 2.0 turbo engine producing 200 bhp.

When

Looking at the high spec Galants we get to see the true potential for a Galant tuning project.

In order to compete in the WRC Mitsubishi produced the VR4 a highly tuned road going version using the 4G63 engine.

 

Tuning tips and articles

Engine tuning Transmission tuning Care care Intake & exhaust mods Improve handling Forums

 

This formed the basis of the later Lancer Evo and is a popular engine choice for FTO owners.

The long run of this engine ensures that there are plenty of mods and tuning parts available for it. The engines are solid and reliable and can tolerate a lot of additional power until you need to make internal engine modifications.

 

The following mods are usually carried out by our members, decide how far you want to go before you begin.

Fast road camshafts tend to boost the bhp throughout the rpm range, you might lose a little low down power but high end rpm power will be better.

Motorsport camshafts, boost the high end rpm power band but as a result the car will not idle smoothly and low end power nearly always suffers.

On a car driven daily, really you should, ideally aim to optimize your power band to your usage of the car.

I'd never have found a Motorsport cam is a pleasure to live with when driving around busy urban areas. This is because a competition cam causes a very lumpy idle, and makes the car more prone to stall or jerk along in stop start traffic, sadly though many ignore this and end up ruining a perfectly good car and having to revert back to a fast road, or OEM cam profile.

Different Galant engines respond better to extreme camshaft durations than others.

The ecu map and fuel pump and injectors also have an effect on the bhp gains you'll hit.

Longer valve durations can alter the bhp band and on most engines the exhaust and intake durations do not need to match, although most cams and tuners use matched pairs there are some advantages to extending the intake or exhaust durations.

Please watch our video which covers the 5 principles of tuning your car. Be sure to keep up with our latest YouTube content and subscribe.

Best Engine Mods for your car

  1. Engine Tunes - engine tuning/remapping provides the most advantage in terms of cost savings,  aftermarket ECUs, and piggyback ECUs are all alternatives.
  2. Fast road cams are one of the most significant mechanical changes, but they must be installed by someone who knows what they're doing and they are not always easy to source but you might find a local firm to regrind a stock camshaft.
  3. Intake and Exhaust - Note that on their own these mods will NOT ADD POWER in most cases, but they can help enhance power after other mods by removing the restriction.
  4. Upgrades to turbochargers and superchargers - forced induction is the most efficient approach to increase air supply, allowing you to burn more fuel and make more power. It is one of the most costly upgrades but provides the best gains.
  5. Head work - The goals of porting and flowing the head are to get air flowing into the engine while removing flow restrictions and turbulence.

Typical stage 1 mods often include: Panel air filters, Sports exhaust header/manifold, Intake manifolds, Remaps/piggy back ECU, drilled & smoothed airbox, Fast road camshaft.

Typical stage 2 mods often include: high flow fuel injectors, Ported and polished head, Fast road cam, induction kit, fuel pump upgrades, Sports catalyst & performance exhaust.

Typical stage 3 mods often include: Adding or Upgrading forced induction (turbo/supercharger), Competition cam, Crank and Piston upgrades to alter compression, Engine balancing & blueprinting, Twin charging conversions, Internal engine upgrades (head flowing porting/bigger valves).

The Galant power plant make great tuning projects and thanks to their popularity there is a lot of upgrades and tuning parts around.

ECU flashing will help to establish the full potential of all the mods you've fitted to your Galant.

(In some cases, as the factory ECU is locked flashing is not an option, so an aftermarket ECU is the route to take, and many of these will outperform factory ECU's but make sure it has knock protection and that you get it setup properly.)

It will usually give you around 30% more power on turbocharged vehicles and 15% on NA (naturally aspirated) engines, but you mileage will vary depending on the mods you've done and the condition of your engine.

It is the whole point to any car tuning job to feed more air into the Galant engine

Air Intake manifolds flow the air during the suck phase from the filter and allow it to be drawn into the engine and mixed with fuel.

Design and flow characteristics of the Air Intake manifolds can make a large improvement to fuel atomisation and engine efficiency on the Galant.

Most intake are in desperate need of a performance upgrade, although some OEM provide reasonably well designed intake.

Adding a Galant larger valve kit, getting port work and head flowing will also lift torque, and significantly will raise potential for increasing the torque increase on other upgrades.

Turbo upgrades

NA (naturally aspirated) engines need quite a lot of work when you add a turbo, so we have a separate guide to help you take into account the pros and cons of going this route on your Galant

The more air to get into an engine, the more fuel it can burn and uprating the induction with a turbocharger upgrade makes massive power gains.

When the engine is fitted with a turbocharger mods are going to net you a larger power gain and most turbo engines are made using strengthened components.

However most engines have weakspots we recommend you find these limits and install higher quality components to cope with the power.

There are many people spending a loads on turbocharger upgrades on the Galant only to have the engine literally blow up soon after it's used on the roads.

Larger turbo units commonly suffer low end lag, and smaller turbo units spool up more quickly but do not have the peak end power band gains.

We are pleased that the world of turbos is always evolving and we commonly find variable vane turbos, allowing the vane angle is altered according to speed to lower lag and increase top end torque.

Twin scroll turbos divert the exhaust gases into 2 channels and flow these at differently angled vanes in the turbo charger. They also help the scavenging effect of the engine.

It is not unusual that there's a limitation in the air flow sensor AFM/MAF on these engines when considerably more air is being drawn into the engine.

We note 4 bar air sensors coping with quite large power gains, whereas the OEM air sensor sapped torque at a much lower level.

Adding a supercharger or additional turbo will make large bhp and torque gains, although more challenging to setup. We have a twincharger bhp and torque adding guide if you want to read more.

Fuelling

Don't omit to pay attention to the fuelling when you are increasing the performance - it makes the car more thirsty. It is important to be generous with your flow rate on the injectors.

As a rule of thumb add 20% to the flow rate when buying an injector, this allows for injector deterioration and provides a little spare capacity should the engine need more fuel.

We think this one is common sense, but you'll need to match your fuel injector to the type of fuel your car uses as well.

The later VR4 in 1992, was kitted out with a more refined V6 engine fed by a twin turbo. With the full attention of Mitsubishi on the Lancer the Galant was relegated to be more of an executive saloon than a road burner.

The Galant become a "tour de force" in the WRC rally when Mitsubishi introduced the road going VR4 showing what tuning potential there is.

On the 1992 VR4 Galants we would strongly suggest that you upgrade the suspension to give a tighter handling ride (other years come with reasonably good suspension setups as standard).

By 1996 we saw Mitsubishi turn its attention back to the Galant VR-4 and they introduced a 2.5 litre V6 engine - the 6A13TT. This has to be the engine of choice as far as the tuner goes.

Avoid the tiptronic gearbox as this saps a lot of power from the wheels and go with a 5 or closer ratio 6 speed box instead. An estate or station wagon version of the VR4 was offered and was badged the Legnum, essential with the same running gear as the Galant.

VR4 tuning

In 2007 ralliart were let loose on the new Galant and obtained a stonking 260 bhp from the V6 engine.

This model revision from 2004 is a lot heavier than previous models so we would favour the early Galants as tuning projects. This is borne out by the large quantity of parts around.

On all turbo models you will make substantial power gains simply by getting the engine remapped.

Some owners swap the twin turbo setup for a larger turbo to make big power, although this setup is somewhat laggy low down.

Non VR4 model owners usually look to the VR4 parts bin for suitable upgrades. Engine swaps are popular with our Galant owners and when you have the turbo you get one of the best tuning bases around. If you have a standard Galant we would recommend that you uprate the brakes and suspension using VR4 spec replacements where available.

VR4 tuning

Why not join our forum and pick the brains of our resident Galant Tuning fans. Please also read our tuning articles to get an overview on the suitability and benefits of popular modifications for your Galant.

Please Check out my YouTube channel, we're regularly adding new content...

PLEASE HELP: I NEED YOUR DONATIONS TO COVER THE COSTS OF RUNNING THIS SITE AND KEEP IT RUNNING. I do not charge you to access this website and it saves most TorqueCars readers $100's each year - but we are NON PROFIT and not even covering our costs. To keep us running PLEASE Donate here

If you liked this page please share it with your friends, drop a link to it in your favourite forum or use the bookmarking options to save it to your social media profile.

Feedback - What do You Think?

Please use our forums if you wish to ask a tuning question, and please note we do not sell parts or services, we are just an online magazine.

Help us improve, leave a suggestion or tip

Your Constructive comments on this article, I really want to improve this article with your help and suggestions.


Please watch this video and subscribe to my YouTube channel.



3 Responses to “Galant VR4 Tuning”

  1. jdmvip says:

    This article waa well done. A lot of my club members like Mitsibishi and the VR4 looks amazing along with Legnum.

    I like the early EVOs too but I’m wary of Mitsubishi reliability but it sounds like 6A13TT is solid.

  2. Brenden Kuhn says:

    In the future I am looking to upgrade the twin turbo’s and intercooler. As well as simple engine modification s to increase hp figures. Also cant find much info on ayc service. Would be much appreciated if you could provide some more information about these topics. Thanks oh and its a legnum vr4 6a13tt

  3. kasumba ngulube says:

    i have learnt something i didnt know, good and clear explanation. nedd help on how i can increase power on my galant viento it uses a 6A12. i have already bought a super charger and high performance air filter. am abit stuck on how to modify my exhaust system

Member Benefits

Join our forum today and benefit from over 300,000 posts on tuning styling and friendly car banter.

You will also have full access to the modifed car gallery, project car updates and exclusive member only areas.

(All car owners of all ages and from all countries are welcome).


BMW 335i - 2021 COTY

We gave the BMW 335i our coveted car of the year award, read more about this awesome car and see why 335i Tuning Guide

Tips for N54 Tuning

Tips for N55 Tuning
Tips for B58 Tuning

Popular articles

Diesel tuning
Remapping ECU
double clutching
Induction Kits
Customize a car
Chipping cars
Modified Car insurance
Track day insurance cover
Diesel remaps
Work out your MPG
DPF cleaning
Tuning Stages


Limited Slip Diffs

Limited slip diffs, which LSD is best for handling.
Read more...

Converting A Car To Ev

Converting a car to EV
Read more...

Customizing Cars

Customizing a car guide
Read more...

Single Wiper

Conversion to a single wiper
Read more...

Air Conditioning

Care and use of a cars air conditioning
Read more...

Pro Street

Need for speed pro street
Read more...

MPG Calculator

MPG calculator UK miles per Gallon – calculate MPG
Read more...