i have a DOHC ZC with a 90 Si tranny on my 89 DX and i have spend quite a good amount of money on it. The problem is that the fastest time I ever hit was a 16.0.... That was last year... The mods are the as follows.. the head is ported and polished, valve job, new valve springs, new seals, 91 LS injectors, intake, exhaust, headers, new piston rings, new bearings, 4 puck ACT clutch, and short shifter..... I did a compression test and they all read around 190-205 psi.... I dont know what to do anymore... does anyone have any ideas on what i can look for to make it any faster??? I live in the bay area, if any knows any shops that actually know how to tune a ZC please let me know, or if you know how to tune them and u are in the bay area please let me know... or if you have any advice please let me know.. thanks....


[Modified by crxtreme27, 2:01 PM 7/22/2002]

 

well...what are your 60' times and trap speeds?

 

I lost the most of my slips, the only one i can find is the one were i hit a 16.209. Here are is what the slip says.....

Reaction: .770

I1: 2.375
I2: 6.790
I3: 10.433
MPH ( I3): 67.066
I4: 13.562

E.T : 16.209
MPH: 85.321

 

What elevation are you at? Also, how good of a driver are you?

 

I dont really know the elevation. This was at Sacramento Raceway... As for the driving part, I dont think im the best driver out there but im descent... i also let my other friends drive it and they also hit around the low 16's... so i dont think its the driving but i have been practicing....

 

anyone in the bay area that can help me out????

 

when i first got my zc it was all out of whack....the timing was almost fully retarded and the cam gears weren't lined up at all.....a few of my friends also ordered their zc's and they came the same way....check little stuff like that

 

HKS cams and some slicks should at least put you into the 15s.

 

On my first pass with my D16Y8 I ran a 15.3 @ 89mph. I have Homemade CAI, and a 2 1/4 inch exhaust, stripped interior, running a P28 ECU. You should be in the 14's with all that done to yor ZC! Definately do a compression test. Our engines are comparable in power, so yo should be at least in the low 15's, especially with the Si trans. Sounds like your motor is hurt, has seriously retarded timing, or something like that.

 

get all your fuel management upgraded. Fuel rail, pump, regulator etc...
Make sure you got the basics which i didn't see you mention, intake header exaust. then check out an ECU, or, an ECU regulator. NOS, turbo, and superchargers work well too

 

dude read...... he has lotz of mods.


get timing done now that is your problem i bet...... tkae it to a shop its easyer

 

I will try checking my timing and my cam gears.... i think my cam gears are not really aligned right....
thanks for the help...

 

LS injectors probably make your car bog a little dont they?

 

The cam gears should point slightly toward each other at the top. The up arrows will NOT be straight up or parallel to each other. The will point inward toward each other. Take the valve cover off and use the holes in the cams to align them.

You should definately be in the high 14s with that setup. As you probably know, a stock ZC in a Civic hatch should be running 15.2 - 15.4 range, so something is up.

Give us more details for other ideas. What ECU, what size tires/wheels, what launch rpm, is the car bogging, spinning, is there 400000 tons of stereo crap in the back, etc etc.

 

I have a zc in a 91 hf, i/h/e fuel pressure reg, pg7 ecu, b16 cam gears
Int 4 adv and Ex ret 3 degrees, seems to run best like that and i could not do better than a 16.1, how depressing is that, I also have a d15b7, w/ a 1.6 head cut 40000, and that bitch will do a reliable 15.2 all night, I cant figure it out either, i got pissed ripped off my band and bought a beer, took the bitvh home and parked it in the back yard, havent done a comp. check, yes it smokes so there is some comp. loss, but still, I feel for ya, and im lost as well

Any help would be cool, but noone seems to have a good running zc to compare too.

 

"The cam gears should point slightly toward each other at the top. The up arrows will NOT be straight up or parallel to each other. The will point inward toward each other"

Sounds like a new practice to me, never heard of anything like that before, what the hell do youmean? Mine are pointing away from each other with intake @ 4 adv and exaust 3 ret., and when i place both at stock settings its slower? Explain what you mean, are you talking from experience? is this what you are doing? My first ZC, shouldnt be that different?

 

I dunno aout my ZC either, I haven't run yet either, but maybe if any of you should know if mine has a problem....

My friend has a 2000 LS in his EG. He converted to OBD1. Now, when we race, he beats me pretty badly. Like, about 2 cars. We're SOMEWHAT even, until aboutthe middle of his rpms and then he pulls......he walks on me prettybad...LOL

Anyhow, he's COMPLETELY stock and I have and intake and Clutchmasters Stage 2 Clutch and flywheel package. I raced a CRX with the same things as me but he had an ACT clutch, and he walked on me as well....but slowly. My friend in the EG didn't even know we were racing

 

Oh yeah....when my ZC came, it didn't have the lower part of the header, so I have a stock CRX Si header.....could this be a big reason I'm losing so bad...LOL.

 

Its been that way since they first designed the ZC. I'm talking about checking your stock timing belt position. When you put a timing belt on a ZC. the up arrows on the cam gears... when the gears are stock or in the stock postion, should be pointing slightly toward each other.

When you take the belt off and get the motor to TDC, it is 100% impossible to put the belt on with the gears pointing straight up parallel to each other. People try to do it all of the time and get frustrated. Then what they usually end up doing is getting the intake cam right, but getting the exhaust cam 1 tooth off because they expect it should look parallel to the intake cam... it shouldn't.

So in conclusion.... cliff notes.... etc....

When your motor is at TDC, and your cam gears are set at stock position... the UP arrows should look like this.... / \ pointing inward slightly toward each other, not like this \ \ or / / parallel to each other.

 

My ZC in my 91 hatch ran a 15.2 at 91 mph with i/h/e for comparison. It runs nice. It averaged 15.3s back then (it's turbo'd now).

Honestly, on the dyno, my ZC made the best power with the gears almost set at zero. We moved the intake cam about 2-3 degrees either direction and it made almost no difference at all. I have HKS gears, so its tough to tell exactly how many degrees they've been moved (no markings).

What fuel pressure are you running at idle? I think mine ran best with 32 at idle. I can't check now because it runs way too much at idle now for the turbo.

What trans are you using? If its the HF you're lucky to be hitting 16.1.... if its the DX... that's probably about average... if its the ZC, you should be good for about a 15.5 and if its an Si, knock another 2 tenths off.

Post a complete slip. Knowing the 60ft helps a lot.

 

My brother ran a 15.8 in his ZC CRX at Ennis. It's a 88 Si, with only a Iceman CAI and 16"rims with 450 Nitto's running at about 25psi. All Si Interior, spare and all. This was also his 2nd and last time racing his car at the track. The first time he ran at the track he ran a 16.5. I coached him a little and walah, high 15's.

 

So your saying that at TDC, it is virtually impossible to get the cam gears to sit straight up, and with that in mind, you needed to put he intake alittle offset to accomplish a true tdc on th ecomplete unit,

and on the other hand you pointed the marks pointing twords each other to achieve the best performance, dosent quite make muck sence to me, I have had my cams set at zero and ya it ran good, and then i went 180 and the bitch wanted to die on me

My fuel is set at 42 psi, yours were set @ 30-32, Would this cause power loss? I would think not but if you compare this to a typical lawn mower or anything than ya probally..

and im running my si trannie i belive its stamped an L3.

Questions or comments are always cool.. thanks

 

U ARE USING A STOCK SI HEADER WHICH FITS. the ports on the si header are smaller than a zc . itsd an easy fix just grind the inside down a bit till they match right.

 

by the looks of ur MPH ur driving is not up to par no offense u should e hitting 15s but i cant tell teh way u put the time slip but ur 60 ft makes or breaks ur 1/4 mile time i say it time and again 1 tenth in the 60 is 2 in teh quarter practice ur launch so u dont spin to much but u must launch above 4 K its imperitive or ull bog out and have a bad 60 ft.....when u can get ur 60 ft down to a 2.0 or 2.1 then u will be acheiving a good 60ft on street tires that is with radials a 1.9 is opbtainable and slick gets even better but its all about control learn to control the car

 

As said before, Cam timing and Ignition timing should be checked. I like to run around 22-26 degrees timing when I am at the track. I dont understand why people have such a problem with cam timing on ZC's.. its very simple, The 2 inner marks should face each other directly and align flush with the valve cover. The 2 other marks sit about 15 degrees up from the valve cover.

Put your stock injectors back in, set your fuel pressure to a base 35psi. Which ecu are you running? If you are running the SI ecu this could easily be your problem. The 88-89 Teg ECU runs very well with the JDM 2g Blacktop ZC.

What do you shift at?.. their are so many factors in racing... I see some peoples times and just laugh and dont understand what their problem is, Most of the time its Driver, but sometimes it can be simple tuning. I personally have had great luck with all my setups.

D16a6 I/E HF Trans 16.1 89si
D16a6 I/H/E HF Trans 15.7 88hf
D16a6 I/E Si Trans 15.4 89si
ZC I/H/E Si Trans 14.8 89si
D16a6 Turbo 6psi Si Trans 14.3 89si
D15b2 Turbo 11psi Dx Trans 14.0 90dx
D15b2 Mini-Me Turbo Dx Trans 8psi 13.5 90dx
ZC Turbo 7psi Si Trans 13.5 90dx
Built ZC Turbo 14psi Dx Trans 12.9 90dx

Jeff Frank