Hello everybody, I'm from south Texas and my hobby has always been working on older mustangs so I have mechanical experience just not on Hondas. My buddy bought a 91 civic SI a few months ago and told me he didn't have time for a project and just handed it over to me. Now as for the car itself
The good: body is in decent shape, it runs...sort of, interior is real nice for a 22 year old car, has nice wheels and brand new tires, and the sunroof works suprisngly
The bad: my dash lights don't work(taillights and dome light work so its not a fuse), car sputters when driving sometimes not too bad sometimes horrible, paint is beyond gone, the top timing cover is missing, no carpet, and you have to turn it on with a screwdriver(I think its kind of funny), alternator belt is loose making a wicked squeal
Anybody have any ideas what the common things that could cause the engine trouble in having? If its something major its fine considering I was going to do the b16 swap you guys seem to love.
Also any clue what's up with my gauge lights? All the gauges work, just can't see them at night
Thanks in advance. I'm sure I'll love this little car.....especially considering how cheap parts are!

 

how many miles? any pics? Tighten the alt belt first and foremost. Easier to diagnose an engine with out that noise. After that, if it's not knocking or smoking and just a sputter here or there it might not be serious. Check engine light on? If so run the codes. If not, How do the plugs, cap and rotor look? May just be a badly needed tune up. Also do a compression test, this will give you an idea of the engine's health. If you find a likely suspect to point your money at, It will be better spent. You can have a very good idea of what you have to work with already for very cheap. These cars are resilient little guys.

 

replacing all of the bulbs would be a start, they're not hard to get to. download the factory manual online somewhere (I downloaded mine from hondahookup.com). As for the rest, check spark plugs, check timing. Timing covers are easy to come by at the junkyards near me, I don't know about your area though. Alternator belt is as easy as unbolting a bolt and adjusting as necessary, or replacing since they are about 10$ at autozone. Again, don't know about your neighborhood, but you might want to get the ignition thingy (not a technical term) replaced.
I picked mine up for 300, got what I paid for, but it's slowly growing on me, have fun!

 

I live in a really small town. Auto theft is unheard of lol...especially of a Honda. People like big *** trucks here. Anyways, tracked down the last owner and he informed me its a d15 bottom end and a D16 head? And apparently was VERY neglected

 

Oh and 256k miles on the body and 93k on the motor, 4k on the tranny

 

I'm in corpus

 

I live in Ben Bolt, but work and hang around in Alice 90% of the time haha not too far away

 

If you want to keep it cheap you could just get a JDM zc 1.6. They make a bit more power than a stock d16a6 motor, and probably considerably more than what you have with a 1.5 block and an a6 head. like 3-400 you could drop it in and go. Would be better to put a water pump and timing belt and such on before you drop it in.

If you wanted a b series its totally possible as well, just considerably more expensive. and faster.

 

Yah I plan on the b16 swap just to give me a better platform to build on. As far as the current engine goes: the running horrible symptoms only happen when I turn the headlights on or basically anything electrical. This leads me to suspect the alternator? But could a bad alternator cause bogging and slow to no response?

 

Oh and idk how this forum is about starting a bunch of threads so I'll just post this question here. Is this all I need for the b16 swap? http://www.hmotorsonline.com/shop/sc...age&item=30002

 

for the swap question, not quite, you'll still need ef b series swap mounts and custom shift linkage (or pre made b swap shift linkage), and you should do the timing belt/water pump/thermostat and freshen up other gaskets so you're not dealing with a headache later

 

The bad alt could cause many things...does the battery hold it's own? All the dash bulbs could have gone, but I would check for power at the cluster. It could be a simple loose connection, or someone hacked the harness. Your random running problems may be a loose rotor in the distributor, the screw tends to back out if not properly tightened. If you're going B-swap, just do a quick visual of the engine harness and ECU plugs. Is the intake still DPFI or MPFI converted?

 

It's an si...

 

Well I jacked it up earlier and checked for oil leaks and things like that. Its leaking from the rear main seal. I tightened the belt and the squealing went away, put some cheap oil in it for now. Guess I'm going to do the b16 swap before I start on the looks