Currently a d16z6 with 150,xxx miles sitting in my eg coupe, After musing around a bit with the car I have decided to get a swap. The d16z6 is still chugging but is slowly dying due to the way the previous owner ran it.

My question to some of the users on here is what swap would you recommend?
b16a
b18b(ls)
or
b18c(gsr)

I plan to later rebuild and boost the car, but this will not be until I graduate, sot he car has to be a Daily Driver for the next 4-5 years. I wanted to jump on the B18b because of the low compression, thinking that it would not only be better for later(forced induction fun), but be harder for me to do something terrible to it when Im just having some stock fun(+bolt ons).

The local shop quoted me 500$ for the labor and hours to swap a b18c1, and another 300$ for the unfortunate necessity of an AT>MT swap. I assume the b16a will be a little cheaper, but I don't want to end up saving a little to have the essentially the same power I started with.

Thanks in advance.

 

A B16A isn't much of an upgrade. Essentially the only difference from the Z6 is an extra cam and slightly higher redline...get a 1.8L.

 

Go ls if you want to boost. Don't need high revs and it's torquey. If you're gonna boost I think that's the way to go, unless you lsv. ls is the cheaper of the 3 and you can just get a GSR or b16 tranny. My .02 though, do what you want, and stick with it.

P.S. you should do the swap yourself to learn your car more. Help out in the long run, my .02 again.

 

I would love to do the swap myself, but the $$$ at the shop is going to be much cheaper than renting the tools I will need and finding a place to do it currently.

Don't worry, eventually Im going to lift the engine back out and build/boost it. Ill need something to do as an adult besides work, luls.

 

what are your goals? budget? boost later? higher compression later? my personal suggestion is write out a list of everything needed per swap and figure out a budget. each one of those swaps have a different price tag on them and will vary from city to city. my personal suggestion is to build something from scratch. ie my build is a bored out LS block with GSR crank and spec hbeams, turbo pistons, with a built B16 head on GSR cams mounted to a GSR trans. not exactly a factory setup, and was cheaper to build than it was to buy a whole GSR swap. and now it is going to be ready for decent amount of boost... ...

it's all about how you wanna spend the money. and how much money you wanna spend.

 

Get an LS swap,you can find a cheap swap and its reliable for daily driver if your low on $$$.But for the extra money a B18c is well worth it

 

Budget = student, the max Im looking to spend on the engine and rando addons will be 3k, the owner of the shop is a friend and I will helping abit throught the build, thus reducing the cost :>
So essentially the lower the better, the swap that we are currently discussing is just going to be the temp powerplant for the car. Im not expecting anything out of it except for the stock performance on a slightly smaller/lighter frame. I want the engine to hold out for another good 80k miles, after that point I will be either selling the car to work on something new, or building the engine.

 

I gotta admit... that B18c has a dead sexy scream to it when you rev it up... with a stock exhaust too. My buddy's GSR hauled some serious *** for a completely stock car, and if I'm not mistaken, the Civic is a little lighter too, which should make you a smidgen faster. Once you hit VTEC, you will not be dissapointed. You can always turbo the B18c if you want, but like you said, you'll want to probably lower the compression to do so, taking away a fair bit of power (until boosted, that is). Ofcourse, you don't have to lower the compression, but you should know what you are doing. Not something for a first time builder. It's very nice having VTEC too. It's what makes a Honda a Honda, lol. I was all about getting an ITR swap, but after driving the GSR, I decided the whopping jump in price wasn't worth the small bump in power. Plus, I'd be scared to sleep at night with an ITR swap, lol.

 

Get a LS swap,save yourself some money.

 

i have a b16a in my ej1 and it runs just fine. and doesnt have any problem out performing a 1.8

 

i'm a student too, full time pre-med. i work 2 nights/week. lol. . . so i'm probably in your same financial situation.
here is my build list, i spun a rod bearing in my LS block so the block itself is being reused for the full build. and that's about it. . .

GSR Crank $75.00
Pistons $240.00
H Beam Rods $250.00
Built B16 Head $700.00
LS Vtec Conversion $105.00
Block Machining $115.00
Dr Side Mount $40.00
Obd1 ECU Tuned $200.00
Head Gasket $100.00
Piston Machining $50.00
Clutch/Flywheel $350.00
ARP Head Studs $135.00
Jumper Harness $70.00
GSR Cams $60.00
Drain Pan Bolt $10.00
Balance Rotating Assem $175.00
Bearings $100.00
Summit FPG $25.00
B16 Cam Cover $30.00

Total Cost $2,830.00

*edit* you'd have to add in a trans, and axles, and little things here and there. but this should give you an idea... this is the exact build cost sheet i have been plugging away at, saved on my laptop in a microsoft excel program.


alot of this i picked up here and there. but as you can see, you can fully build a motor for less than 3000 bucks. and it's turbo ready, ready to handle 10000rpm and plenty boost. . . my suggestion to anyone would be to start building a motor, and drop it in whenever it's finished. and daily drive the motor you're currently rocking.

 

i have a 94 eg and it as a b18b and i love it but i wanna turbo 1day but for now its funn fast to bc its a hatch lol

 

i built and swapped a LS-Vtec motor into mine. Still waiting on a couple parts to get it started for the first time.
heres a pic.

 

how built is that LSVTEC? i see a victorX ... what kinda ram horn is that? and are you planning on welding your charge pipe up? at least to the bov?

 

wiseco pistons, eagle rods, block guard, arp main and head studs, cometic .051" mls head gasket, port and polished head, competition stage 5 clutch and its a shitty manifold i got off a friend of mine for now, just until i can get the motor and the turbo broken in. I think ill be getting either an afi top mount or ramhorn when i get the money together. as for the charge pipe, this is also temporary until i get the time to make my own.

 

nice work. but no built head? and how much did you spend on building? less than the cost of a typeR swap??????

my thoughts on the mani: get a decent ram horn if you're sticking with stock or typeR cams. top mount if you wanna cam it up a bit. . . i think that's pretty general. . .

i'm working on my build. . . all i need do is: buy bearings. balance rotating assembly. and assemble it together. boost ready, with no turbo.

 

i did all the work myself. prolly have about 2-3 grand into it. no built head this year. next winter the head is getting built and possibly goin with a different set of cams. i really wanted to go top mount but just wasnt able to do it this year. next year is a different story though. well see what happens.
thanks for the compliments too.

 

Yeah I have a few things so far set-up.

LS engine bought completely torn apart with intake $140
arp rod bolts $45
Piston rings $35
full gasket set $50
block deck $30
head deck $25
rehone $20
bearings $95

Things I need to get
b18b head $100
resize rods $40
balance engine $200

I'll be putting the b18b internals in the b18a I have just for a little extra hp while I build the b18b head for boost.
Gotta lot of work for me, but it's been fun. All you really need for the engine build though is:
engine stand $40
basic ratchet set $25
torque wrench $35
manual $20-40

I believe you will use 8,10,12,14,17,19,21 for most everything on a Honda outside the axle nuts. Not much you'd need to build an engine.

 

fo sho... yeah i'd say don't waste the money ona top mount till your head is fully fully built. . . you won't really see the benefit till you can run the bigger cams. from what i have learned. here's a pic of my build... where i'm stuck at till i can assemble the rotating assembly. (which is always fun)

 

i have a b18b1 head, all disassembled, glass beaded and ready for re-assembly.
i want to get rid of it so shoot me an offer if youd like.

 

rod bolt stretch gauge is what we use for the rod bolts instead of torque wrench... not that it can't be done with a torque wrench, the RBSG is just more accurate. about 80 bucks for one from jegs off ebay. http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/JEGS-...ehicleQ5fParts

 

Oh never heard of that before. what is the difference?

 

your rod bolts need to be at equal stretch. not exactly the same as torque. especially the arp rod bolts. your head studs should be too, but as you can tell there is no way to measure the stretch on a head stud thus defaulting on the good ole torque wrench and stepping the spec to get them all as close to even as possible. for our gnarly bottom end builds, we use and only use the rod bolt stretch gauge for the rod bolts. . . it's what it is for. lol.

 

Lol I see now, but I'm only doing a mild build. I want between 200-250HP. Torquing them down should be sufficient. If I was going higher I would invest in one now. I might get one for my 2nd build though. Trying to see how cheap it will be to put this all together. I have an estimated cost of 2500 before turbo. lol Not too cheap

 

i also like using ARP exhaust studs, and main studs along with the ARP head studs and rod bolts. studs are just a better design instead of bolts.... imo. i even changed my oil pan to all studs and nuts instead of half and half. intake manifold too... almost everything is changed over to studs.