$300.00 to spend
 

Being retired I have repaired the little problems
On the Boxster. I know have $300.00 a month
To send on upgrades. I world like to do the
Exhaust first. Your suggestions please.

She is a 03 base 2.7 Trip, 63,000 miles
No upgrades have been done.

Thanks in advance.

One big bang for cheap bucks is aftermarket headers. They'll give you 15 extra HPs. Then, in a month or two you can buy an eBay twin chamber muffler like I have and that will add a lot of growl and another couple of HP.

If you're not married to exhaust mods right now, an undersized drive pulley will also give you some low end grunt in acceleration and they're about $200 or less.

Frankly, if I were you I'd save your $300 a month up and go to a High Speed Driver's Education course with your local PCA in PA. You'll find out you don't need to do a thing to your car because it's a Porsche and it will feel blinding scary fast to you on a track.

Since you have the Tiptronic trans, you are limited in the choice of headers or you will need to do some modifications to get cheaper headers to work with a Tiptronic trans.

These headers here work with no modifications needed.

http://www.speedtechexhausts.com/images/ast1006023.jpg

986 Boxster - Cayman

Personally I would start with intake upgrades.

http://986forum.com/forums/show-tell-gallery/56928-bang-buck-mod.html

+1 on track days! Here I'm ready for a 2 day DE at le Circuit Mont Tremblant!
http://986forum.com/forums/uploads01...1432843755.jpg

+1 on a track day. All you need is a decently well maintained car and a helmet (which you can often rent). You'll pee your pants from having so much fun and you'll wonder why you didn't do this when you were 20.

Old adage; First invest in yourself, then invest in the car. When you can out drive the stock car, then think about performance upgrades (other than cosmetic, of course).

I spent 25 days at the track before I upgraded anything. Hopefully, you're a quicker learner and a faster driver than me; but you'll be amazed at how much true capability a stock Boxster has.

On what years would you suggest this upgrade? I am aware that some years have one set of cats, and others have two. Does this have any impact on what can be done?

I like the idea of the additional growl, and the additional h.p., but, I am leary about any exhaust change that causes the "drone" that I read about. Have you experienced drone with your upgrade?