Civic Si Race Shows the Potential of Dyno Tuning vs. Off the Shelf Tunes
FA5 and FG2 Civic Si roll race shows the importance of a good tune.
You have got to love the K20 engine. Whether it’s an all-motor setup, or boost is involved, the K-series responds well to breathing mods of all sorts. That also means that, while you can go the route of the off-the-shelf tune, from Hondata, or similar, if you really want to optimize the suck, squeeze, bang and blow of your engine, you will want to get a professional dyno tune. This video from Gerb Productions shows just that.
Both this silver FG2 and black FA5 Civic Si have the same mods, namely, an intake, exhaust and race header. However, the Civic Si coupe has an “e-tune,” while the black sedan is packing a pro tune. Both, in theory, should be making around 220-230 WHP. On the road, however, it’s clear that the FA5 is able to pull away from the FG2 pretty easily. Well, at least when the driver isn’t missing gears. We will give them the benefit of the doubt, because that 6-speed transmission tends to not like quick 2-3 shifts.
Now, you may be sitting there, thinking that the weight of the passenger is skewing the results. After all, these are relatively light cars (for modern standards), and don’t have much power. However, that gets thrown out the window about half way through when the camera man swaps cars. The results are the same.
While it’s great to have access to basic, off-the-shelf tuning readily available, nothing beats having a good dyno tune by someone who knows what they’re doing.
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