Rep Power: 318

What do you mean read? If you mean read the schematics, I did that when I swaped a B16 into my old '94 civic, I had to redo the entire wiring harness, and agian when I put the turbo on a '93 civic and blew it up twice, rebuilding the motor each time in my basement.

If you mean programing, I've used two different stand alone computers and tuned the car using a dyno. I doing so I've had full control over everything from ignition timing, air/fuel ratio and all that stuff so I could creat 3D graphs of power, ignition timing, and A/F ratio.

How about you, how much have you read into the OBDII systems? If you really want something hard, I had a '95 Dodge intrepid making 321 hp at the tires, tring tuning that ('95 is when Dodge and most car companies switched form OBDI to OBDII), so they used a hybrized version that seem to change with every month, some things where reported in OBDI form while other where in OBDII form, that was a real pain.

All an OBD system is a controlling system, it's not like soem big magical box. Infact we use less complicated systems all the time to control reactors, the computer systems onboard todays car are just a fancier version of those.

 
Rep Power: 297

dang.. conat believe i read this entire thing and didnt understand half of it.. umm .. what was i gonna say.. oh yea..

in our cars it seems the bottleneck for our cars true potential lies in the ULEV..now on our cars the ULEV is it hardware based like in the engine or software based from the ECU.. you would thing after 4-5 years of the 7thgen being out someone would have found a way to override it through the software or new ecu's or something.. i mean i read about people rebuilding the d17 from the ground up with custom made parts to every little screw on our engines.. i have seem someone make 300+ hp from our engines with a turbo... now if we can find a way to overcome the ulev wouldnt that be the key factor on our cars to becoming better?

 
Rep Power: 281

well our cars weren't made for speed, so you shouldn't expect ot get anytyhing out of it, unless u go hardcore, get a turbo or swap, but small mods dont help anything, everyone knows that.

 
Rep Power: 811

ulev is hardware (gas vapor return, exhaust return, cat, etc) and software. It's just made to run as clean as possible while still having a tiny bit of performance.

 
Rep Power: 0

When you make all the mods, buy extern ecu, something like Apexi VAFC, or Greddy e-manage, go to dyno and change your parameters. Then your car wil go diferent.
If you look at dynos from DC sports,AEM, Injen ...... then you can read:
RUN 06=128hp
RUN 12=145HP
It's because they play with ecu.
But still is the best to make engine swap.

GReetz

 
Rep Power: 297

isnt there a way to modify the ulev hardware so that way i t runs like a lev or no ulev at all

 
Rep Power: 811

I doubt it. Those systems are all built into the workings of the engine. And get this...I put a bigger air filter on my intake and lost torque. That's how sensitive the car is.

 
Rep Power: 318

Actually the ULEV isn't really a bad thing. That just means our cars are burning a high percentage of gas going into the combution chamber, which in turn means less unburned or "half" burned gas is going out of the exhuast. All this just means our cars are more effiecent than ever before. The idea of low emmisions = bad performacne comes from the early 70's. Take the vette for instance, a big 454 vette in '72 made a whole 280ish hp. This is because back then they added stuff like many extra filters for the recycle and bad flowing cats to cut emmisions. That method can only take you so far though, today to cut emmisions you simply have to make a better motor that burns cleaner, that's what Honda has done. Yes some things like a cat could be removed for some extra horse, but all in all, we have a simple motor (no DOHC or iVTEC) and only 1.7 liters (that's only 103 cubic inches) and it's already pushing 127 hp, that's about 75hp per a liter out of a basic engine, that's pretty good in my book.

 
Rep Power: 0

i didn't bother to read all of it so here's my 2 cents..

first to mention, a lot of people are talking about the engine power, and quite a group of people has an AUTOMATIC transmission on their car... trust me, no matter how much engine power u have, you are still limited by the automatic tranny and it's ECU...

1. the ECU for auto tranny is desinged to be fuel effiecient...unless you suddenly press on the throttle, it wont' down shift...that brings us to the second point

2. Each car has a power band, if you could keep the car @ the power band, you have more advantage... Auto only has 4 spds meaning only 4 gears... so each gear shares a wider RPM range while a 5spd could have a tighter RPM range to be kept...

3. Lets say you pressed hard on the throttle but the auto tranny hesitates for a while until the tranny down shifted...please, these are civics, they are not ferraris, they won't automatically give empty gas (aka, rev matching) for you....thats why there's a hesitation from the ECU.... it won't allow you to suddenly down shift because it would be damaging to both the engine and the tranny, it takes a second for it to shift down, and push forward.......while on a manual you could simply rev match which is clutch, gas (pulls to the appropriate power band), downshift, and go...

well, let me put it this way, engine power isn't everything... i used to have an AW11, 18 years old car...but i could still kill EP3s on straights...considering stock to stock... it didn't only happened once... everything on the car counts towards the performance...

civics selling point are being fuel efficient and quality for the the price...they are made for daily driving... thats a fact from Honda Marketing...

if you want to go fast, first decide your direction, whether you want to drag race or auto cross...or whether you just want a better response for the engine on daily driving...

if you are going for drag, swap + turbo, very costly, but since you are a civic fan, you decided to stick with your civic, so thats the best way to go, not to mention weight reduction, slicks etc...

if you are going for autocross, for me this is so far the best idea if you want to race your civic....first, learn the characteristics of your car, e.g. advantages and disadvantages... you won't be able to the kill cars like a WRX on straights, practice in corners...and try to improve the handling...LSD could be a good idea... play around with suspension, if you desire for more speed and faster acceleration, save up for a turbo/supercharge/a swap...either one of these would allow you to go near the 200hp range, and that is sufficient for a civic in autocrossing...

if you just want to improve daily driving response, most likely you are going to waste your money...and i mean you will waste your money...adding a few ponies won't do much to your car...

Just my 2 cents,
Ah Long

 
Rep Power: 811

Good stuff. Sucks for me cause of the auto tranny. I should've learned manual a long time ago

 
Rep Power: 318

Don't be so down on the auto's. At first I thought that the auto's where a joke. I drive an '03 manual, but my g/f has an '04 auto, and we both drag raced a few months ago, my car only came in 0.13 seocnds faster than hers and I credit that to better tires and more grip on my car. Niether of us are pro dragers or anything, but I took her car and did almost matched her numbers and I have dragged a few cars before.

As for slow shifting in an auto, if that where the case you should feel a jerk between shifts. After all if you go from forward acceleration to no acceleration (during the shifting point) and then back to acceleration, the momentary loss of power should be easily felt. Now if you're going along at say 50 and step on it, you'll feel this. But if you floor it from a stop, you won't when the car shifts. So point is, and many people will argue this, an auto will shift faster than a manual. What an auto lacks is the abilty to go from little acceleration to high acceleration (aka gas at the apex of a corner is hard in an auto).

So my experience is that auto's are good in straights (and more consistant than manuals) and manuals are better for handling.

Just my .02

 
Rep Power: 0

i partially agree with what you say...

if Auto is better in straights, how come drag racers don't use Auto?? there's a link in the off topic section with a movie called drift bible for download...and trust me, the shifting time is AMAZING...practice makes perfect...

and 03 has a different design than 04 appearance wise, that might make a light difference in your performance...

but i do agree with what you say about sudden acceleration... either you would have to go for very expensive cars such as M3 in order to have the racing tuned semi-auto tranny...

0-60 times won't differ much from auto and manual due to a constant acceleration...but if you want to do a sudden acceleration, you would feel a major delay and lag on an auto...

 
Rep Power: 347

^^^ lots of drag cars are autos ive seen plenty of supra and WRX STIs that were auotmatic drag and kill ppl

 
Rep Power: 811

Most autos run an 18sec quarter mile, while manuals are up around 16sec. At least that's what I've noticed from people's track times around here.

 
Rep Power: 0

^^

sorry, maybe i didn't do enough research...

but personally i believe with proper skills, manaul would have an advantage in drag as there will be one more gear than auto thus there would be a tighter RPM range for the driver the keep the engine in it's power band..

 
Rep Power: 317

Turbo!!!!! wittnessed it and been in a turbo civic! -might do this still because I have an auto and seriously cant get anything else performs like a turbo auto civic out there? anyone else see an auto car under 24 grand that has potential 180hp?
if your going to cough up 7500 for a swap! jesus look at options
used evos with 28 thoudand miles cost between 20-24 grand. our civics retail lets say 10-14!
man get yourself an evo! STI hold thier value alot more than an evo so sorry . Thats the truth in why I want an evo! mistu dont hold value let the other guy take the hit and you can get a damn good sports car.
4wd, 276hp with whole **** other goodies.
civics have thier ups though. Any car can be made fast!

 
Rep Power: 0

yep to make this car quick you will have to put a k20a engine, a turbo and pray for space becuase after the k is in there is almost no space for the turbo so u cant put big turbos in there.. if you have like at least 12k u will be able to make this car pretty quick.. about 300hp at the wheels with a good setup.. but again 12k would make it a good down payment for the new rsx-s that has 210hp/187whp so is up to you. even with all the money in the world you wont be able to make it as fast as a silvia, supra or skyline or RX7 but hey ive seen 6th gen civic beat evos and mustangs gt so in my opinion i'll keep my em2 and get a k20a and see what happens

 
Rep Power: 318

I ran a 16.8 and she ran a 16.93 and both cars have a stock powertrain (other than my tires). I do however run 91 octane all the time, have Iridium plugs, and K&N air filter in both, but that's about it. Other than apperiance, I don't think there is any major difference between our two cars, but I'm not 100% about that. An 18 second quarter sounds like an LX or DX though, not sure.

Most big drag racer make to much power to be channeled through an auto and it's easier to modify older manuals to take the punishment they give their trannies. I had a '70 Camaro that ran 10.2 with an auto, and I ran into that problem, I had a choice of building up an auto to take the power (about 1500 bucks) or change over to a manual (about 500 bucks) and the manual trannies where cheaper to replace and build up. To bad the car got hit before any of that ever happened.

 
Rep Power: 0

ppl trying to make there civics fast in the 1/4 mile are just wasting there time and money.

 
Rep Power: 374

Me too! im -696 right now! yeay

 
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well, I sure hate that it had to come to this, but its been one disapointment after another...thats it, I'm getting and 05 STI.

Heh..wish it was that easy.

 
Rep Power: 318

I had a '94 that ran 10.9, put about 6G into the motor and 3 to buy the car and a one for the suspension and such, so 10G and you can have a whole nother civic to kill people with.

As for our 7thgen civic, nitrous is only 500 or so and you can beat any stock mustang GT in the quarter.

 
Rep Power: 0

golden rule for drag racing:

the faster you desire,
the more speed you need!
the more speed you desire,
the more money you need!
how fast can YOU go?!

to me, i rather go autocrossing, i could improve seconds and seconds of time by fine tuning my skills....a tighter line in every courner could save me a second or two in a lap..

as to drag racing, every split second costs money...think about the route you wanna go...

you can always kill mustangs and supras in a technical course if you have the skills, but you can't do that in a drag strip...

think twice
my 2 cents

Ah Long

 
Rep Power: 318

It just a personal preference and I've went through both already. The thing is with the lack of double wish bone on our cars, civic's aren't as easy to set up now and are very tuchy with the camber you dial in. Probably not a whole lot better than any other decent car on the market.

 
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I'm lazy and didnt check the rest of the post, but I do see what you mean. The best hope I would see would be support from someone like Hondata, but last I checked they dont have anything for a d17

 
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I would rather drive a safe car (like Civic) than a crap car (Evo)

 
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i think a swap is a great idea.....K20A or H22? Do they even make engine mounts for the H22 to go in the civic.

 
Rep Power: 299

All the more reason my car is gonna be traded in for a G35 when I move back home!

 
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i got a big question.everybody say that k20's are the only motor you could swap in a 7thgen civic,but now a man who installs motor's say's that you can drop a b-serious in there.write back

 
Rep Power: 379

that is true as long as it is a 2001 cause tht is the last year the b-series engines were out. i think its illegal to drop an older engine into a newer car or something.