Kind of an idea I though of/curiosity, does anyone know how hard it would be to put a D15B with a CVT into a car that is already automatic? Does anyone know if this has been done before? Not that i'm planning on doing this, but it'd be kind of a unique swap, with great fuel economy as well. The only thing that I really would think to be a problem would be finding the right wiring harness, but I'd think that you'd be able to take the mounts and wiring harness from like a 96-00 HX and throw it in another 96-00 civic that's automatic. Obviously this wouldn't be even remotely fast, but economical and fairly reliable. It's just a thought, lemme know what you guys think.

 

I looked into it a while aback....if I remember correctly--wiring harness...ecu..axles...mounts.

Its alot of work, and fairly hard to find a ecu I believe.

 

Wonder if the mounts require any drilling into the frame or anything.

 

if I remeber....the cvt trans is considerably larger....

 

Ive done some research/thought into a super mpg monster myself, however realistically speaking, Ive done the numbers and for the amount of money to do the swap, it'd take probably 2 years to break even with gas money savings.
The real way to get a jump in mpg would be going 5 speed. Without that swapping engines/trans and all the parts/labor involved is going to net you a few mpg. The problem is even 3-4 miles per gallon takes a long time to offset the cost of paying a few pennies extra at the pump now.
It takes a long time to get 1,000 bucks back at the pump, even if your getting 5-7 extra mpg each gallon of gas.

I hate to say it, however Id say enjoy your 34 mpg your getting now (2000 ex) and if anything just make that as healthy as possible, and do the mpg tricks, possibly hypermill etc.

 

It'll be hard to recoup the costs via mileage. If you have an automatic shell and the powertrain, then it can be done. Consider too, hardly anyone out there wants a CVT, so the 5 speed is a better option if you ever want to sell it.

Harness is different, I think passenger frame rail mount, and PCM is different because the TCM is integral in these years. I don't know about the axles, I re-used mine from an Auto to 5 speed swap, Honda's pretty good about stuff like that.

 

plus the cost of servicing a cvt trans is alot more $. They use a special tacky fluid that cannot be cross contaminated with any atf fluid at all or it will cause sludge issues.

 

Why would you want to?

I've seen more issues relating to the CVT then a regular auto.


If you want a CVT trans find a HX with one.

 

It would make sense in an HX that's already setup for a CVT trans. Otherwise you need to cut and weld as the CVT trans uses different mounting points than any other transmission. You'd also need to swap both the engine and cabin harnesses from a CVT HX. And when you're all said and done those HX trannys were junk when they were new.

 

If you're serious about this, go for the 3 stage Vtec D15B with CVT Honda Multimatic transmission. It would be completely worth the fuel economy, you can get about 60mpg with this swap. You can get all the parts from hmotors or even Ebay, including the ECU. I wanted to do this swap, but did not want to convert to OBDII.

 

I got a cvt in my maxima, for having almost 300 hp, it's not bad. However I have driven altimas and sentras and other cars with sub 200hp and cvt and the driving experience sucks. Idk how to explain it but it feels bogged down. The mpg you will gain will be minimal for the money you spend. If you want mpg go 5 speed and leave it in neutaral down hils and when breaking. You'll get better mpg when you just use momentum.