Well, I have been researching a whole lot for the past three months and last night, I got a chance to experience a H22A on an EG. Man!!, The understeering was just absolutely there and it felt like a fucken truck. How bad can it get without power steering. There is no way in hell I will turn 40mph on the 90 degrees turn. Oh hell no I would go with H22A. My guess in the beginning was right. I have learned one thing, never to touch anything when some people have bad comments about it. IMO, I wouldn't go with a H22A on hatches. Look like I will use the search again for "GSR or Type R". Please people do not flame me..

 

That is why MOST PEOPLE will tell you to go with an appropriate suspension setup......

The EG you testdrove, probably had stock suspension or was set up wrong....


[Modified by 2 B 4GO10, 8:14 AM 11/1/2002]

 

Let's get more details from this car though please.

Before anyone really flames this guy, remember it is his opinion and he even stated "IMO" in his title. You H22A guys feel free to explain what you think it takes to get the car to handle right, or explain what you have done to your own cars to try and counter the extra weight up front.

I cannot really comment until I hear what type of suspension it had. I'm thinking probably normal style coil-overs on stock or non-adjustable struts. Probably had no swaybars too, right?

What kind of tires did it have?

How was the braking, and what type of brakes?

 

This is good info for people saying the H22 is cheaper. They forget that things like this need to be addressed when putting a H22 in a civic. Not taking sides because I like the H22 also

 

Good point, I always lean more towards B series engine over H engines in my hatches. But I have rode in some H22 hatches that handled very well....I was impressed. Those hatches had as much detail into the suspension set-ups as the engine swap itself.


[Modified by SLPR, 6:32 AM 11/1/2002]

 

It was defintetly the suspension.

As stated before, he was probably running stock.

Before any swap, regardless of b, h, d.

YOU ALWAYS DO SUSPENSION.

The car is set up to handle the stock engine and needs to be modified to harness the power of the new engine and torque.

 

The guy has stock suspension to be honest. I don't care what kind of suspension the guy has. I am not going to spend $2000.00 worth on suspenions so I can't even turn on a 5 mph roll. Why did I buy a hatch for so it can't handle on turns. This is what lightweight car is all about - Thrilling, cornering, power to weight ratio, cornering, and etc. I had to use two fucken hands to turn on a roll. Excuse my language..

After the test drive, I looked at the engine bay. Goddamn, the fucken manifold touched the lines on the firewall. The engine needed to rock back and forth under hard beating. Right or wrong? Also, I do not like the setup with HASPORT motor mounts at all! Strongly agree with "B18C5-EH2".

Guys, I am only speaking from experience. Maybe, I had a bad experience. It doesn't take much to impress me...

All in all, The H22A is only good for drag racing. I strongly agree with "B18C5-EH2". B series owns the hatch. It looks almost perfect under the hood. The H22A looks like a fat chick sitting in there. Call me ignorance or whatever. All I know, I would never do a search for "H22A".

I wish the guys out there with H22A setup the best of luck. Again, THIS IS ONLY MY OPINIONS AND EXPERIENCES.

If you have some comments to say, please only reply back with experiences otherwise everything is just misleading and false statement.

 

First of all how do you KNOW it's the suspension?

Again you're speculating.

Now I don't completely disagree with this statement, but really if you're wanting the car to handle good regardless of motor you will need to upgrade the suspension. Swap or not, you'll want suspension if you want it to handle.

Actually in our civic the stock suspension is nothing but a huge compromise and it's more budget-oriented for Honda. It's meant to be cheap, last long, and offer a smooth ride, not handle good. They probably have ride comfort and budget in mind over all else.

Also our cars are getting older and anyone who is into performance will swap out the aging shitty stock stuff for better, stiffer new stuff.

The difference here is whether or not just the usual coil-over and good non-adjustable struts will make an H-powered car handle as good. A lot of guys here have the usualy GC or Skunk2 coil-overs on stock or non-adjustable struts. IMO that's not enough to have a neutral handling H22A Civic.

My fiancee's B16A-powered 1992 Si hatch has only Skunk2 coil-overs on KYB GR-2 silver non-adjustables and only the stock front swaybar - car handles quite nicely for what little sus work it has. Hell a front swaybar with no rear tends to only induce more understeer - bet it'd handle much better with a bigger rear bar and no front bar. Her car with an H22A would handle much more differently.

If I were doing an H-swap it'd be with the understanding that if I wanted the car to handle the same I'd be in for spring rate changes, better struts, and the need for a big rear swaybar and probably the deletion of the front bar unless the H-tranny had LSD in which case the front bar would stay.

 

I know it is your opinion and i respect that,

IMO if you plan on turning at 40 mph then how can you say you dont care about suspension? I dont care how much power or little power a car has, if the suspension is not suited for the kind of driving it goes through it will handle like ****. stock civic suspension was not designed for the extra weight of the h series motor. If you take into consideration the h series weight when choosing your suspension set up, it will handle fine.

just my take on the whole h22 debate.

 

Now wait a second man, I'm not saying that H-22A swaps never belong in a hatch. I think it could be done in a way that the car could still handle pretty good, but I'm saying the routine coil-overs on stock-type struts won't cut it.

Oh jeez I can see this could get ugly really quick in here.

 

Tom, I agree with you.

But if he said it handled 'like a truck' is has to be the suspension.

This guy just dropped a new engine in and called it good.

 

Wait a seond:

When you say "stock" do you mean 100% stock? Stock civic springs and struts that are probably worn anyways? Hell of course it will handle like crap with O.E stock **** in there.

Stock meaning stock?

 

Quick! Into the lifeboats! This ships going down!

 

If he does have any suspension mods, it has to be basic, i.e. struts, springs, sway bar

 

Your English is horrible. If you wanted a car that handled well and was still a cheap econo-box style ride, you should've gotten a dodge neon. They outperform most modified civics in the handling arena and absolutely dust the stock ones.

H22 hatches kickass if they're set up correctly, although, I don't think that I'd be using one for a daily driver unless I had some serious cash to set myself up with some teins and a shitload of comptech bars.

etc., by the way, is an abbreviation of the latin et cetera, which means "and other things". you don't need to put an "and" in front of it when using it in a sentence

 

Let me give you a history of my car listing:

1981 Honda Civic (sold)
1985 Honda Accord (sold)
1998 Acura Type R (sold)
2000 Honda Civic Si (sold)
1992 Hatchback Si (keeping this baby for life)

How can you quote this like this "IMO if you plan on turning at 40 mph then how can you say you dont care about suspension?" Of course I care about suspension. This hatch is the best thing I have purchased so far. I love how it feels and handles of course the Type R comes second. Please don't flame me cuz this web page is well known for flaming people.

 

No one's flaming you, just telling you why the car felt that way when you drove it.

 

*sigh* Here we go again.

 

Unknwn_1: Is this the first hybrid hatch you've ever driven?

Just curious.

 

We've done this before?

 

lol, I guess the post would be more intuitive if it said. Tested out hatch and didnt like how it drove??!? Or something like that.. But if you call any hybrid hatch with sucky suspension hard to handle a joke then you are just splashing lighter fluid all over yourself begging to get flammed..

 

I believe this title does a great job of grabbing attention, but yes it is extreme to lump all H22A hatches into the same shitty category just because the one the guy drove was crappy.

So since the car handled crappy, what about the straight line performance though? Was that nice?

 

Guys, I am only sharing my opinions after the fact. Sure, the guy has stock suspension, but damn, the car wasn't pleasant at all. Turning on a 5 MPH roll was terrible. Yes, it was terrible! Think about what I said. "5 MPH!!" My old 1981 Civic can out handle it even with four blown struts.

I am not going to comment anything related to performance (straight line). We all know what H22 can do. Beside, if you say something someone else you will have some smart *** comments to say back. At least, I speak base on experiences. THE END.

 

Well if you feel that your 1981 handled better than that H22A Civic then I think that's a fair statement based on your experience if that's how you feel.

Stock sus and all I'd hope it would handle at least decent, but from what you're saying it was horrible.

Well at least tell us your opinion on how it went in a straight line. I mean don't just give us the worst aspect of it. What was positive about it? If you feel nothing was positive then fair enough, just say so.

I'm not ripping on you bro, but I just want to get the whole picture.

 

he's from illinois, imo, they are jerks