Just curious, i've been told that you "can't" autocross a turboed honda. If it's true then why? thanks

shane

 

Completely false information. There are quiet a few Turbo Hondas at autocrosses. Now, how competitive they are is a different question.

 

[seinfeld]Oh its a scene man[/seinfeld]

I am pretty sure you can run a car w/ boost, etc (meaning not from the factory like that) ... provided its emissions legal in Street Modified. Are you maybe confusing that you cannot race a turbo Honda (at least there are very few road racing sanctioning bodies that will allow you to race one at the club level)?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">i've been told that you "can't" autocross a turboed honda</TD></TR></TABLE>

What moron told you that? IF it has 4 wheels and passes a safety inspection, there's a class for it to compete it. Now, whether it'll be competetive or not is a totaly different subject....

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by MaddMatt &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

What moron told you that? IF it has 4 wheels and passes a safety inspection, there's a class for it to compete it. Now, whether it'll be competetive or not is a totaly different subject....</TD></TR></TABLE>

No not that i'm not allowed to race but that it won't do to well... Sorry should have been more specific...

 

Its sorta like this, with SCCA and the other clubs, there are "sets" of modifications that are allowed as you go up, First are bolt on mods and the like, pretty simple, then you get to internal engine mods, even more suspensions stuff, etc..

Once you bolt a turbo on, it is assumed that ALL of your car will be prepped to that level of performance. What happens is you end up running against cars on true racing slicks, sometimes tube frame, total engine rebuilds, etc.. For instance if you run a Turbo CRX/Civic in SCCA Autoross, the national champion in your same class froma couple of years ago (not sure about this year) was a 3 rotor bugeye sprite.. On a local level things are "better" but all it takes is one trailers car on slicks and you are left fighting for 2nd.

Street modified can be better, you stay on DOT tires and such, but there are still lots of other cars with lots of prep. But.. just go do it you might be surprised. we have some members on this board who i remember kicking around at local autocrosses when they were "newbies" and they did prety well at nationals this year, so don't be discouraged.

Jon K
http://www.seat-time.com

Jon K

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">No not that i'm not allowed to race but that it won't do to well... </TD></TR></TABLE>

Ah, well then, like I said....

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">whether it'll be competetive or not is a totaly different subject....</TD></TR></TABLE>

 

you'll be running in street mod. currently, swapped civics are the 2nd best car to have at the national level (behind e36 m3), and none of them have experimented with boost (or at least successfully).

having said that, a swap + boost is a lot of power, it might not be ideal as you will have difficulty putting the power down.

 

If you're new to autocrossing its the driver that I would be the most concerned about. For your first year, don't worry about what you're driving (just something reliable on good tires), and hit every event you can. Once you are able to accurately articulate to others how your car handles then I would start looking at what class you want to run in and what mods you can do.

For beginners, improving your driver skill should shave anywhere from 5-10 seconds, car mods will only shave 2-5 at best.

 

He has a good point. There a guy around here in a CRX with a DOHC ZC with a Jackson supercharger...I'd love to drive the car, and I'm not sure how competitive the car should be anginst all the WRX's and 'stangs, and everything else up there but he does pretty well.

 

We run a supercharged civic and did very well before the unibody ripped This coming year we will be running 2 cars, one supercharged (the sedan lives in a hatch body ) and one turbo. We are developing a turbo kit specifically for auto-x. People say you can't do a lot of things but that doesn't mean you can't to it. I believe lots of low end torque will help close the gap on the M3's The only way to get a nice broad torque curve or any torque for that matter out of a small displacement Honda motor is to add boost carefully. I know not everyone agrees but someone has to try. Street Mod is a very difficult class but that’s what makes it fun!

 

Are you running a B or D motor? I seem to remember reading something about it being a B motor. As always with Honda's, my thought is your biggest problem will be getting enough tire under the car. No room to go taller, and no-one makes anything wider than 225. I got a name at Hoosier of someone to contact to see about getting wider tires and will be sending something to see what they say. I'll let everyone in the DSP/SM group know what I hear back.

 

thanks guys for all your info.. i'll be researching it more... right now I drag but I want to get into autocross. nothing to serious at first just want to try it out and see how well or not well i do... thanks again guys

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by clemsonhatch &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">We run a supercharged civic and did very well before the unibody ripped </TD></TR></TABLE>

How come this happened? Fatigue due to the amount of power you made with the car, or was this car hammered throughout its life?

 

It was hit by a Dodge Ram on the front drivers side 4 or so years ago. Then all the auto-xing slowly ripped it apart right when it was most important. Well I think super sticky concrete had a lot to do with it.

We actually saw some cracks in the unibody on the way to nationals. We had the ones we could get to welded in Kansas City the Monday before we had to race. They lasted one day of competition but you could hear a loud cracking ever time the metal flexed. Then on day two the car was too hard to handle at a competitive pace. After the race we looked at the damage...not good. Basically the strut tower was separated from the firewall. I will miss the sedan and the look on people's faces when we would start turning fast laps. It was a super fun car to drive but the 88 DX hatch we swapped everything over to should be about 300lbs lighter

 

Thanks.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Split Image Prez &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">thanks guys for all your info.. i'll be researching it more... right now I drag but I want to get into autocross. nothing to serious at first just want to try it out and see how well or not well i do... thanks again guys</TD></TR></TABLE>

with boosted cars, you always run the risk of blowing the motor. another option for you to consider is to go out and buy an old CRX or something for like under a thousand bucks and beat it till it dies.
less than it would cost you to fix if something happened to your boosted car.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by chris1866 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">with boosted cars, you always run the risk of blowing the motor. </TD></TR></TABLE>

Not true...come on use your head.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by chris1866 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">with any car, you always run the risk of blowing the motor.</TD></TR></TABLE>

Fixed it for ya.

 

ok that's better

 

you can auto cross anything....you just gotta know how to drive!!

 

I spent a small amount of time auto-xing a boosted eg hatch before my s2000. Granted I was a noob but I prefered running the hatch in n/a form even with 100 less hp. The n/a B16 seemed to do better than the boosted LS. I just didn't enjoy the way a spool would come on. It was like you would go into the corner with tons of power on tap and as soon as you let off the gas the boost was gone and you were left wondering where the hell the power went when you would try to put the power down coming out of the corner. When you'd put the gas down at the apex you'd be underwhelmed and then from no where the boost would build and you'd go pushing to the outside of the turn. You'd hold on to the gas to take advantage of the boost and then you'd be too hot in the next corner entry.

I could probably drive it a lot better now but I think n/a or SC is more favorable for driving in a really tight cornered course where throttle modulation is key.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by glagola1 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I spent a small amount of time auto-xing a boosted eg hatch before my s2000. Granted I was a noob but I prefered running the hatch in n/a form even with 100 less hp. The n/a B16 seemed to do better than the boosted LS. I just didn't enjoy the way a spool would come on. It was like you would go into the corner with tons of power on tap and as soon as you let off the gas the boost was gone and you were left wondering where the hell the power went when you would try to put the power down coming out of the corner. When you'd put the gas down at the apex you'd be underwhelmed and then from no where the boost would build and you'd go pushing to the outside of the turn. You'd hold on to the gas to take advantage of the boost and then you'd be too hot in the next corner entry.

I could probably drive it a lot better now but I think n/a or SC is more favorable for driving in a really tight cornered course where throttle modulation is key.</TD></TR></TABLE>

Alright cool thanks for the info...

 

Who cares.... go out and have fun.

If you're out there to win, chances are once you get over the learning curve, you'll want to build and run a more specialized car anyways.

On the other hand, if you're out there to have fun, who cares how well you do?

That said, a hopped up and turboed car may not be the easiest/quickest car to learn on.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by glagola1 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I could probably drive it a lot better now but I think n/a or SC is more favorable for driving in a really tight cornered course where throttle modulation is key.</TD></TR></TABLE>

We do have a supercharged hatch We're developing this turbo kit to have no lag above 3000RPM.

Matt have you rode with Joel in his STi? That's the kind of performance we're looking to get. That car has no lag and tons of low end and mid-range power perfect for auto-x.