The_Honda_Guy

The car I'm refering to is a 97 Civic DX Coupe 5 speed. This car is a daily driver and made to keep gas mileage, reliability, and comfort in mind. The car is mostly driven by my girlfriend.

I researched engine and transmission upgrades that I could do to increase power and reliability without sacrificing gas mileage and came up with a few things. The only things I found I could do was slightly advance the timing from the stock setting, swap to an EX exhaust setup, switch to a K&N OEM style filter, and do maintainence items. I also researched suspension upgrades, but then realized that there was nothing I could do with it to increase reliability or gas mileage besides replacing broken parts and keeping up on maintainence. Also, anything I add onto the suspension is going to make it stiffer and less comfortable to drive.

So now I come to brake and wheel upgrades. First of all, I want to swap the rear from drum to disc because I absolutely hate working on drum brakes and also they're ugly. I was looking at doing a 5 lug conversion but then realized how pointless and expensive it is. Since it requires ITR or CTR parts the swap isn't cheap. Also, you have many many more rim choices sticking to the 4 lug setup. I know there's no reason to upgrade the front brakes on the car since it runs smaller rims, not to mention the car doesn't get driven fast or hard and also the car doesn't weigh much since it has basically no options. For rotors I was going to run Brembo blanks. For pads I'm not real sure yet, but want something with low brake dust, low noise, but a little more bite than the stock pads. I was thinking something like a Hawk HPS pad. For fluid I'm going to run Castrol GT LMA because it is non-compressible, lasts a long time, doesn't absorb lots of water, and has decent boiling points. What would it take to swap the car to rear disc brakes? What do you guys suggest for pads and rotors? Any other brake upgrades I should be looking at?

Nextly I was looking at rims and tires. I know the biggest rim I would put on the vehicle is a 16" rim. With 17's you need to run a pretty thin tire to prevent rubbing which would make the car less comfortable to drive. We live in an area that gets lots of snow, so for winter rims and tires we're running the stock 14" steelies with Bridgestone Blizzak WS-50 tires. This has proved itself well this passed winter, so it's what we'll be sticking with. During the summer we want to put on something that looks nicer. My girlfriend hasn't decided on a rim style yet, but she is leaning towards the GS-R "Blades." These would be nice since they would bolt right up to the stock hubs on the car now. For tires I was thinking something like a Kuhmo or Yokohama summer-touring tire. I'm looking for low road noise and long tire life with good rain and dry traction. What tires can you guys suggest? Any specific sizes I should be looking at besides the stock tire sizes for these rims?

90_EX_Civic

brakes, my advice. get honda oem brake pads, they'll work fine for what you want and well last a while, quite, and pretty much dust free. rotors, just get some cheap autozone, advance, or pepboys. you're not doing anything series so any cheap rotor from them well be fine. brake fluid, it depends but it looks like you already have your eyes set on that.

wheels. the lighter the better(for saving gas). the blades well be fine, but if you can find a set of HX's that'll work too. tires, there are a lot of opinions on that. straight summer tire, in my opinion, any of the brigdestone potenza's. but if you wanna go cheaper in price, almost ever one on here well say kumho's.


for the engine. just make sure you change the oil and keep on the tune up. that is if you're just looking to save on gas. my only opinion is if you want to make it a little bit more peppy, swap out the tranny with one that came with the vtec. the gearing well be a little bit shorter so your get up an go well be a little bit quicker.

just my .02.

The_Honda_Guy

Yea, I know the Honda OEM pads would work fine, but I'd like something with a little more bite and a little cheaper price. Rotors I could go with the cheapies too but the Brembo ones will last a long time and would stand up to a pad with a little more bite longer than the cheaper ones. Yea, I'm pretty much set on the Castrol GT LMA fluid.

Yea, I know the lighter wheels will be better on gas. We were looking at OEM wheels and then the aftermarket Rotas too. My girlfriend isn't a fan of the HX rims, she would like something at least 15". Like I said, we'll probably go with a Kuhmo or Yokohama tire, just not sure what kind yet.

Like I said, engine wise I've got all the maintainence done and was looking into other things to do to improve reliability and gas mileage. I was thinking of doing a tranny swap, but decided to stick with the DX tranny because the gearing is pretty low on it and will net good gas mileage. My girlfriend likes how quick the car is right now, even after driving a 5 speed 5.0 Foxbody Mustang.

CivicEK321

If you go on TireRack.com, they have a lot of all season and durable tires and they even let you take a test to see what tires best match your needs. BFG and TOYO are just some of my personal favorites but check TireRack.com out. They also have a huge brake pad section that has cool star rating for how the pads rank on stopping power, noise, and dust, so that would be perfect. YEA!

http://www.tirerack.com

The_Honda_Guy

Well, I've decided that for rotors we will be going with the Brembo blanks since I do not want slotted or cross-drilled. These rotors will last much longer than the cheap ones do, won't warp as fast, and honestly aren't that much more expensive than the cheap ones anyways. They've been getting awesome reviews too. Link:

http://www.tirerack.com/brakes...ode=P

I've decided that for pads I would like to put ceramics on, mostly for the fact they are much much quieter and produce much less brake dust than the semi-metallic. So far I'm looking at the Hawk Performance Ceramic pads. They have a much better bite than the OEM pads and decently low noise and brake dust and they are ceramic. I'm ruling out the Hawk HPS pads because they are more a performance pad than a street/daily pad and produce more noise and dust. Link:

http://www.tirerack.com/brakes...ode=P

For fluid I'll be sticking with the Castrol GT LMA fluid for the properties I listed above. Link:

http://www.castrol.com/castrol...24043

Now, I'm wondering about doing the rear disc conversion. First of all, I know that I don't need anything bigger than the 9.4" rotors that came on many of the Honda vehicles. Since the fronts are only 9.5" on the DX model I really can't use anything bigger and honestly, I'm thinking that I'll need to upgrade the fronts if I want to upgrade the rears to disc.

Since my girlfriend is leaning heavily towards the GS-R "Blades" I've been researching the stock tire size for them, which is a 195/55/15. I know for sure this rim and tire size won't even come close to rubbing, and will perfectly fit over the stock brakes. So far I've been impressed with the Kuhmo Ecsta ASX. They're rated as an Ultra High Performance All-Season tire and are honestly pretty cheap. I wanted something that was going to be good dry and wet traction for spring, summer, and fall and also wanted something that would be pretty low on road noise. They apparently very well meet my traction and low road noise due to their tread compound and design after reading the reviews and overview. The only problem is that since they are a performance tire the tread life isn't as good - warranty states 30k. Other than that though they seem like a great tire, good price, great traction, low noise. Link:

http://www.tirerack.com/tires/...ing=V

So after posting this long thread, I've got a couple questions. Firstly, am I going to need to upgrade the front brakes on the car in order to upgrade the rear to disc? I can't imagine it's a good idea to run 9.5" front with 9.4" rears. Opinions on this? And lastly, are there any other tire sizes or brands you guys could suggest to use instead of the 195/55/15 stock GS-R "Blades" tire size? Thanks guys. :D

90_EX_Civic

other option for tires is 205/55/15. if you want to you could also go with 195/50/15 or 205/50/15.

n1_egsex

hawk hps do not dust

autozone/kragen rotors perform the same as brembo blanks, doesn't matter what you're doing, it's been proven on and off the track

any rear disc setup from 88-00 honda civic or 90-01 integra will bolt onto your car, you need rear e-brake cables from 99-00 civic si

you might as well upgrade to stainless braided brake lines while you're at it if you want to

if you want cheap light wheels, you can get rota wheels for cheap, they're way lighter than OEM wheels, and some even think they look better, i personally don't care about the brand of wheels as long as it functions properly for me on the track, but i've seen people use rotas on the track and street just fine, who cares what the world thinks about your car, it's your car, you can pick up a set of 15x6.5" rota slipstreams with tires mounted on them for 3-500ish and those come in at around 11lb's per wheel

The_Honda_Guy

Alright, I went through at looked at a few more tires. I decided I'll just stick with the stock GS-R tire size of 195/55/15. After looking at a few more tires I think I've decided on the Yokohama S.drives. They seem to be a very quiet, smooth riding, and excellent tire in wet and dry conditions. They're also reasonably cheap, around 70 dollars a tire. Also, they're supposed to last at least 25,000 miles, not to mention they have the 30 day test drive and if you're not happy with them, Yokohama will refund your money.

I would like to get a tire that's going to get some more mileage out of it, but I'd have to go for a Grand Touring tire that's going to not be as good on traction and usually the touring tires don't look as nice as the more performance tires. The trade of is that they're smoother riding and lower noise and usually they're cheaper. If I do go with a touring tire, it'll probably be the Kuhmo Solus due to their incredibly long tread life, low noise, and smooth ride. You also can't beat the price.

I know the Hawk HPS won't dust as bad as most do, but they do produce more than the Hawk Performance ceramics. I know the cheap rotors will probably perform the same as the Brembo blanks, but the quality isn't as good and I can guarantee they won't last as long.

For the rear disc setup I know what I can go with and what I need to do to convert to rear disc. The problem is that I'm not sure if I need to upgrade the fronts first or not. 9.5" front rotors with 9.4" rear rotors will probably cause some problems with the brake bias. I don't want to run the risk of the rears being too strong and locking up. I was just wondering if anyone here had put rear disc on with stock DX fronts.

I was thinking of going with the stainless braided brake lines and clutch line too. I had read awhile ago that they had some issues with rupturing, but that was because people were using the ones that didn't have the plastic sheathing over the lines. Rocks and debris would then hit the lines and cause them to rupture. What brand do you guys suggest for stainless braided lines?

For rims we're going with the GS-R blades for summer and stock steelies for the winter. :D

The_Honda_Guy

Alright, I just did some reading on BrakeExpert's thread about brakes and found a few things. First of all, I know the DX has 9.5" front discs with the rear being the 7.9" drums. I wanted to convert the rear to the 9.4" disc because I'm not a fan of drum brakes, but was concerned about throwing the brake bias way off. I know that the front brakes on a car do about 70% of the braking, so I wasn't quite sure if the rear brakes being almost the same size as the front brakes would cause rear lock-up, which of course is bad bad bad.

After researching a bit on the thread he made, I came up with this:

"The most common upgrade people want to do to their EK is put disc brakes on the back because they stop better, and have less nose dive than drums. Now drums do last longer, but if you want better stopping, go with discs. Also, please read about brake bias before you decide if you want to put discs on with the stock 9.5" front brakes if you have bad tires. Many will attest that discs with the stock DX front brakes causes the rear brakes to lockup first. This may be true with non-performance tires and on a track, but on the street under normal braking, you will be fine."

BrakeExpert states that as long as you aren't tracking the car with **** tires that rear lock-up shouldn't be a concern. Considering the car will never see the track and is driven very lightly and will have a semi-performance tire on it, I'm pretty sure I shouldn't end up having a problem using the 9.5" front disc with the 9.4" rear disc.

Like I stated, the car doesn't need anything extreme for brakes, but I just wanted to get rid of the PITA rear drums. Since the car is a DX and will be running a 15" rim it won't take much to stop it quickly, even in emergency situations. I'm sure the Hawk Performance ceramic pads, Brembo blank rotors, Castrol GT LMA fluid, and stainless steel braided lines that the car will stop very quickly when needed and will still maintain the Honda reliability.

Now all I need to figure out is what parts I need to do the conversion. I know for sure I need the Civic or Integra (except ITR) rear disc spindle, caliper braket, and rotor. Is there any other items that I need?

mynewHaircut

man im glad you are doing this, and in such a great format and your questions are everything i would like to know just worded better than i could produce. in it for the answers. thanks again.

The_Honda_Guy

Haha, thanks for the compliments.

I did some more reading and found my answer:

to 99-00 Civic Si
Take the rear spindle (with bearing, hub, calipers, caliper hangars, rotors, and pads) and swap them onto the Civic DX. Use the 99-00 Civic Si e-brake cables.

My plan was to use the 99-00 Si setup since it's the most direct swap onto my DX EK. Everything should bolt up perfectly without any problems. The thing I'm wondering now is if I need to modify the rear brake lines since the rear lines now are hard lines but the rear disc uses flexible lines. Anyone know what's needed?

Also, I did some looking around at stainless steel braided lines for the clutch. From my research is looks like the Russell lines are very popular. My girlfriend's Mustang has them on it and them seem like very good quality. I believe I will be purchasing the Russell stainless steel braided brake lines and clutch line for my DX also.

Another thing that nobody mentioned on here that I just thought of were these:

http://speedbleeder.com/

If you've never heard of them they're awesome. It makes it so you can bleed brakes by yourself, not to mention that they don't let any air into the system. They're also very cheap too. I figure if I'm going to be opening all the bleeders on the car that I might as well just replace them with new ones so that next time I go to bleed the brakes I don't have to worry about snapping any of them off. Does anyone here know the stock bleeder screw thread sizes?

The_Honda_Guy

Well, here's what I got so far:


Brembo blank rotors (front and rear)

Hawk Performance ceramic brake pads (front and rear)

Castrol GT LMA brake and clutch fluid

Winter rims - 14" stock steel rims with Bridgestone Blizzak WS-50 stock size tires

Summer rims - 98-01 Integra GS-R "Blades" with Kumho Solus HP4 Plus stock size tires

Russell stainless steel braided brake lines and stainless steel braided clutch line

Speed Bleeder bleeding screws

99-00 Civic Si rear disc setup


I know for sure when I go to order my rotors and pads that I need to buy them for 96-00 Civic DX front disc and 99-00 Civic Si rear disc. I wanted a quality rotor that wasn't cross-drilled or slotted, so the Brembo blanks were an obvious choice.

I also wanted a low dust and low noise brake pad with some bias to stopping power. Since ceramics were the obvious choice I went with the Hawk Performance ceramic pads.

For fluid I wanted a low moisture absorbtion fluid that was cheap and had good boiling points. The Castrol GT LMA meets my needs perfectly, so I went with it for my brake and clutch setups.

For winter tires it was a no-brainer to go with the Bridgestone Blizzaks since they were very cheap and work very well and to use the 14" steelies. For summer we wanted something nicer, so we went with the Blades. I decided to go with the Kuhmo Solus tires because I wanted to focus more on tread life, price, and low noise and wanted a touring tire instead of a performance tire. I will be using the stock tire sizes for both of those rims so keep things simple.

I wanted to replace the brake and clutch lines since they are starting to get old and instead of waiting for them to rupture, I would replace them with new ones. I wanted to go one better and get the stainless braided lines to increase pedal firmness and have something that would last longer and not flex like the rubber hoses. I looked around and the Russell lines seemed to be really popular, so I went with them.

The Speed Bleeders with kind of a no-brainer also, mostly because I wanted to replace all the bleeder screws with new ones. They'll allow me to bleed the systems by myself not to mention I won't have to worry at all about any air in the systems.

I decided to go with the 99-00 Si rear disc setup to replace the shitty rear drums. I know I need the spindle, bearing, hub, caliper, caliper braket, rotor, pads, and e-brake cables to make it work.

Now, for my questions. What do I need to do to make sure the rear brake lines bolt up correctly to the rear calipers? Does anyone know the stock bleeder screw sizes for the DX front brakes, Si rear brakes, and DX clutch slave cylinder? Also, how much different are the Si front brake lines than the DX front brake lines?