My buddies doing a swap and I'm looking for outside input. It is all for show, but for about the same price, which would you all go for?
the ls vtec is B16 head.

 

I am going to put it to you like this:
ls/vtec-not reliable
h22-loose power steering and your a/c
In my opinion go b18c5 with lsd
but that just my opinion

 

LS/VTEC can produce great power, yes b16a head will work. However if any mistake it made you can blown the block quick.

If you have to chose between the two, jspec H22A. Great show quaility too.

 

h22 is nice. has good torque. u can retain the a/c just not power steering unless u re-route the radiator on the sideframe. now u gonna have to do some custom fabrication.

ls/vtec is great if u gonna go just for weekend drag racing. they can and have made more power then a b18c5 type r motor. its basically a budget type r. but be warned that if u gonna go daily driven on this set up its not as reliable as pure engines. the block of the b18b/a wasn't designed to handle the kind of power from a vtec head driven hard on a daily basis. of course if you take care of it and monitor the engine like a muthaf***** then it can be reliable. ask yourself do you really wanna go through all that hassle. if u wanna go turbo for say a weekend racer go for ls/vtec but if u want more reliability and wanna go natural aspirated then drop that h22 in there. n/a cars need that extra displacement , its always nice to have.

 

Ive seen LS/VTEC setup daily driven for years, its all on how you biuld it. yes there are LS/VTEC setups that dont last long, my friends blew up as soon as he got the car home from the shop! If you build it right and break it in properly it will not have reliablity problems.

I would rather have the LS/VTEC over the H22a

 

what car is this for? i wouldnt want ls/vtec just cuz of the cloud hanging over my head knowing that it could detinate at any moment.

 

If the motor is just for show than an h22 will always catch more attention than a b series simply because far away at a show if i saw your car id probably think it another b16, but with the h22 it stands out. If your going to be doing anything besides shows, than i would definitely say build up the lsvtec

 

what da....i asked this same question few weeks ago...only reply i got was "do a search!"

 

hehe, he wants to do a swap for it's "show" quality. LOL!

 

You know I love how people talk about how unreliable LSVTEC's are but it's obvious you either have a crappy engine builder or you did it your self. Look I had an LSVTEC (now B20VTEC) and I drove it for work to New York with the FDR traffic, Pennsylvania, Deleware and so atleast 800 miles a week with no prob. It all depends on who builds your motor if you do it yourself and have problems don't come on here complaining or if your engine builder screws it up blame him not the motor you heard!