Hey guys! Newb here. Soon i'm going to be new to the Honda world, but long time CRX owner.

My friend is moving into a new house that is not as spacious has she would like so she decided that she would GIVE me her 1990 CRX. For right now, this will be my daily commuter to and from work (approx. 80 miles round trip) so this car is like GOLD in my eyes right now. My daily driver is a 2k1 eclipse gt (stone throwing commence) and is a great car, but not the best in gas (approx. 350ish miles / tank).

With that said, I am most likely going to keep the eclipse as is while I start working on the CRX to bring the performance up. While I know greater performance = less efficiency in gas, but I believe what I want to do will(should not) effect the mpg too much. My questions are as follows.

1. Should I get into an engine swap, what is going to be my best choice all around? I would like to get the VTEC effect, but I also don't want to throw the car's balance way out of wack by throwing the most powerful engine I can into it. I really want to make this car a canyon runner with some power to pull me up and around the mountains. At the same time, I want to be able to commute daily with this and achieve a min of 35 mpg's (Hwy miles).

2. Am I asking too much for what I want? Again, i'm new to the Honda world so please bare with me.

3. Also to consider, besides some of the other components that are meant to be swapped (ecu's etc.) do I necessarily need to do a tranny swap with all engines?

I won't be getting the car for another 2 weeks do to her being in Seattle now, but as soon as I do get the car, I will shoot some pictures up.

I am very excited, growing up in Rowland Heights, CA I grew up in a predominately Asian culture, and saw many CRX's back in the day. Now is my chance to come out and play.

Here are a couple pics of my eclipse until the CRX comes to play.

 

https://honda-tech.com/zerothread/2086185 read this and get comfy with it please.