The Guide To Cinq Chooning!

There are many stages of tuning availiable for the sporting, here's a few I've found:

Intake

By far the most cheap and easy way to add a little more 'umph' to the tiny engine. There are a few options for improoving air intake into the engine, the first is to replace the filter with that of a K&N or similar make at the cost of around £30 but this only gives 1-2hp increase. The other is to replace the whole airbox with an induction kit (I recomend K&N) which is simple to fit (few clips and two screws to take off then fit on the k&n,adjusting the air pipes)a mear 20min job at a cost of around £50. This gives an impressive growl and about 3-5hp

Ignition

Simple one this, replace the spark plugs and leads with a high performance brand like Splitfire ones. Real easy to do and due to the new plugs having dual or tripple sparks (original has only one per plug) and better contacts, they give the engine a little bit more kick and a smoother ride, especially under acceleration.Expect a 3-6hp gain

Engine Tuning

This by far the most expensive but most effective action to take. A few things can be done such as increasing the compression ratio and posishing the insides of your prized car! This can cost anything between £300 and £600 but expect big hp gains from it (around 10-30hp) and boy does it make a difference on such a small car.
You can also have the pistons changed to make it a 1.2 but for the cost its better to just put a punto 1.2 engine in which is not as hard as it seems (slight modding required as the engine is bigger but fits in all the same!)
Or if your made of money then the maddest option is to bolt on a turbo(around £1800 fitted) giving around 25-35hp

Exhaust

Well now you have all that air trying to come in at the front, if you dont change your exhaust your'll find it'll have a flat spot if you floor it as the air can't get in any faster than it can get out the exhaust!
To solve ths you can replace the whole exhaust sytem for a less ristrictive one but dont go gettin a big bore or huge one as this wont do it any favours cosmetically or performance wise. Depending on what you fit you could see a 5-20hp gain and a cost of £200-£500.
Aswell as the exhaust system its a good idea to replace the manifold(connects the engine to the exhaust) as the standard one is majorly ristrictive. This could add 1-3hp but is not cheap for the gain (£200 to £300)
All these options are best custom made.
Recommended for this custom work is www.awtracksport.com as they build to your requirements (and they did such a good job on mine!)

Wheels

The world is your oyster for alloys but picking the right ones is the hard bit! The standard alloys are only 13's and not very wide so you end up with massive understeer if you push it too hard round a corner. Fitting larger wheels has benifits as well a draw backs. Yes they look better and yes they handle better but the poor little engine struggles a bit more because of the lager radius of the wheel. In theory top end speed should be improved by a few mph's but in practice it reduces it due to fifth gear having a very long ratio and hardly any 'pull'
So this option depends on the user.
I'm not sure how big you can go up to as when i fitted mine (195Width 45profile and 15" rims)the suspension rocking arm needed adjusting so the wheel didn't catch on it.And they have also a large offset and spacers to bring the wheels away from the car. I should think if you was to fit wheels with less width they would fit easier but then you get less traction (corners I used to take at 60mph I can now take at 80mph)
Alloys also arnt cheap and the odd size makes them harder to get hold of.

Chip Change

Yes its controlled by a computer!
Well sort of, the chip monitors the levels of fuel/air and revs, changing it to a superchip gives a little more freedom and hp at a cost of around £250-£300

All in all...

if all these steps are taken then in theory you could make your lil' cinq a pocket rocket at around 80hp or with a turbo you could just be touching 100hp!! Well we will never know until one is done and tested!