Have a stock '91 Hatch sitting in the driveway since 2012. It was my brother in laws car, and sadly was a Marine killed in action. I struggled for a while on what to do with this car, but recently decided I wanted to honor him by rebuilding it and getting it a nice wrap in Marine BDU camo pattern.


That said, I was never a Honda guy, but spent a fair bit of time wrenching/tweaking on 240s over the years (sorry). I'm new to the world of VTEC and two letter monikers for each year range, etc. I'm looking for a suggestions on eng/trans, but wholly crap are there are a lot of options. I've spent literally weeks skimming through pages and pages of information on engine and trans matrices, and, its a little overwhelming. I think I have an idea of what I want to do, but, could use some guidance.

Goal:
Daily Driver, zip around town, stop light to stoplight silliness and occasional freeway sprints, needs to pass smog (CA). (when i last drove it, it was pretty... slow., but doesn't run now).
I found a lot of great information on suspension, brakes, etc, so, i'm ok there. But... this whole engine/trans thing. sheesh.

Based on the volumes and volumes of information, the essential debates seems to be D16z6/y8 + si trans, b16a + b16 trans or b18b + gsr trans for a California smog-gable daily, but, it quickly dives into lots of debate after that. From the looks of it, my biggest problem is going to be finding these replacement potentials, then of course some of these options are... cost prohibitive, even if i 'could' find them.

Which brings me to my essential problem, where do you find this stuff? ebay seems to be a terrible place to find stuff. The Japanese engine places all say nothing in stock for any of the options that might be interesting, and according to a few folks i've spoken to, the jdm equiv wont pass smog (reliably).

So, I'm a little lost for where to source these things and/or what to do next. Are there other plausible combinations i haven't considered? 90ish hp is such a downer, hate to leave it as is. If anyone has suggestions, I'd very much appreciate some guidance.

-zoloz

 

you look anywhere and everywhere for parts. its a 30 year old car. ebay is a fine place for parts. theyre past the junkyard cycle so EF's are now hard to find in picknpulls.

i wouldnt recommend a swap. if its for honoring your brother, just get it in good driving condition instead of dumping money in a swap.

and yeah, CA has strict smog rules that wont make it easy or cheap to do things legally. so another reason not to consider a swap.

 

I hear you, but, he really wanted to build it up, he talked about racing all the time, I was going to help him with it when he got home from his tour. I'd done a lot of 240 stuff, it was going to be a cool project (he was quite a bit younger) for him, he and my wife were close.

 

then theres a million different flavors of a possible swap. its confusing because theres that many options.

find an engine from any engine importer like HMO or used from facebook or ebay, whatever. buy mounts to adapt the engine to the chassis from hasport, then axles, ECU etc. and get whatever smog parts you need if you want to pass.

or do it illegally, dont register the car, or pay money to your cousins friend who knows a guy who will do it for an extra bill... kind of thing.

and no, japanese engines wont pass smog visual, will send you to the state referee who is an expect and will likely fail you or tell you what you need to do to pass. best to get a USDM used D series engine block, then make it look stock to pass smog with all the emissions parts.

truck engines wont pass in a non truck car, like a CRV B20 so avoid those.

and theres always doing a force induction single cam d-series between smog registrations too.

 

you can do a B18C1 bseries GSR swap and keep it smog legal. that will give you enough pep and go for stop light to stop light fun and freeway pulls. you can also keep ac with that swap.
other than doing a full type r swap that will give you the best bang for your buck imo

i find parts on EBAY, Honda-tech, craigslist, row52.com, car-part.com, offer up

yes it is a 30 year old car but they still pop up from time to time in junkyards. especially in california where they didnt rot away

just take your time with it and gather all the parts you will need for the swap before venturing down that road. i would get it up and running as is first and work out any kinks or bugs from sitting so long. then once you have that done then start the swap process

 

Turns out offerup is a pretty good source, hadn't used it much previously. Found L3 crx si trans for $100 and few other odds and ends for the interior that needed replacing. Also found this interesting site: https://www.zealautowerks.com/transcalc.php while looking up the differences between stock dx trans and the SI one.

 

Also found an alternative to Rywire (650 or 900 if you buy the milspec one, what the.. its just wire??) at 'norcalautostylez.com' full odb0->1 kit 380. Anyone else used this kit? (i may just wire it myself, this car is pretty... basic, but, definitely cleaner if i buy a 'built' one)

 

have you looked at the FAQ at the top of this forum? theres a lot of relevant information... some links are old, but its a 30 year old car... theres a lot of accumulated information...

 

I have, thanks, also found that google is better at searching it then its own search engine, but, thats fairly common. [tip, if folks dont know, if you put the domain in the search bar, you can get google to search only that site 'honda-tech.com: search term']. Thankfully, this old car has had a lot of fans over the years, so, the amount of information, while a bit overwhelming, its certainly fairly comprehensive. All the things i've thought to do have a document somewhere and the tips/tricks, etc have been great.. looking forward to getting started on this.

 

Poking around the various AC addition pages, and i couldnt find anything that talks about what components need to stay vs what needs to be new if you're doing an engine swap. The car is a DX, im putting together a list of parts needed to add AC, but it occurred to me, does the compressor need to be matched with the new motor, or should i get one that fits the '91 and it will mate up to the new motor? Anyone done this with an engine swap and have some advice? thanks!

HA said " you can also keep ac with that swap." but, i wasnt sure if he meant 'keep your current D15 ac', but thats what i assume. Does this mean i can just get a full 91 civic AC system, and it'll bolt up?

edit: found a thread that said if i go to z6 i can just use stock, guess Hasport was saying its the same for Bs too.. guess i'll just keep collecting year specific stuff.

 

AC always stays chassis specific and then you use either a stock bracket on Dseries or aftermarket ac bracket with Bseries

 

Spent some time working on the car today, mostly just 'hey, can i get it running??' and a bit of a 'whats broke' inventory.

Turns out i can. Man, it leaks from everything, but, its running. Found some fun stuff:
Clutch is basically shot.
The plastic tab on the top of the brake peddle that presses the 'off' button is missing, so brake lights stay on and... obviously would drain the battery.. which i think explains why the fuse was missing.
Someone put a weird starter button on it, like those s2000 conversions ive seen around, only, ghetto... somehow it works though
ignition switch and column are busted, but, it still works somehow
its dirty like a homeless person and their dog lived in it.
the board over the spare tire is missing
windshield is broken
all the tires are shot, cracking, ones flat
brakes are shot, master cylinder is leaking
had a coupe fuses missing, couple wrong size, couple in wrong slots (like, 30amp was there for the sunroof the car doesnt have, etc)
carpet is shot. Drivers seat padding is all but gone
front bumper seems to be pushed in a bit on the passenger side, I'll need to pull that off and see whats bent or loose under there.
hatch door shocks are shot
oil was about a quart low, radiator fluid was similarly low and saw 'green water' on the top of the engine, which made me nervous... but, turns out one of the hoses leaks a bit, so im hopeful its just that. it WAS sitting for a long... long time.

but. it runs.

I think tomorrow i'll see if i can get the brakes safe.

 

heres that weird starter button... and, you know, the amazing start switch all busted up.

 

Also ordered a usb thing from nayton, my priorities being misplaced aside, nice little addition:

 

gonna try this, https://www.matthewrichey.com/car/killswitch. I'm a little concerned about this thing getting ripped off again, saw a few threads on kill switches, but, this one looks pretty straightforward. Anyone else seen this, or, something like it?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/RFID-Reader...UAAOxyY3ZRo4-q heres the kit, $13. if it doesnt work, it only cost me mcdonalds money.

 

Waiting for parts, also been a little busy at work... but today i gutted the inside. Got my usb connector in to replace the cig lighter installed. I'm sure other folks have done this, but heres a couple pics:
Took out my center console as part of the 'gut everything insde', to get the carpet out. In so doing, i took the opportunity to add this little usb thing to the new lower and get it ready for re-install...

taking the wires off the old socket.


figuring out what the pinouts are, simple enough, black ground, white 12v


Clip the relevant ends, add connectors, attach to USB replacement socket


and... now its usb instead of a useless lighter socket.

 

Need to pigtail off those wires to feed the usb added to the rear ashtray, but, didnt have the split connectors, so i'll do that before i re-attach it all when the carpet is in.

 

D2's showed up today, was planning to work on carpet, but, decided to get the coilovers installed instead. I think it may be too low, but, we'll see in the morning, Not much room up front, do like the back though.

 

Just an FYI on my experience putting in a USB port in place of the OEM cigarette lighter - I did the same thing but I have noticed that it produces radio interference that impacts how good I get reception on my stereo. It's way worse if I have a device charging. I ended up adding a switch to the ground side that can depower the USB ports when I'm not charging my phone, so that I can still get a good radio signal.

 

Had to look that up, interesting, it appears some usb port devices modulate voltage down to 5v when a phone is connected, which, in turn screws with the radio. Had no idea... ok, i'll check that the one i got doesnt do that (or at least accounts for it). Thanks for the tip!

 

Installed the scarebird conversion kit today.. Only to find out I didnt get the banjo bolts, so cant finish connecting the brake lines. sigh

 

In the bracket pic, it shows the stock bolts, but, those dont work. too short. The provided bolts worked great, little locktite, all set.

 

Got the shifter replaced, went with b&m and new vms bushings off e-bay, pretty quick install



Now that this is in, gotta go get some banjo bolts so i can finish the rears. Prolly wont do much more today... little by little, though, getting it ready for the road again.
-zoloz

 

In case anyone else buy's new calipers while doing the scarebird conversion (or otherwise gets acura calipers but forgets to grab all the misc parts), here are the parts missing:
missing parts from/for scarebird:
Pin, Brake Wire End Part # 43471-SD2-930 2x (pin for e-brake line to connect to caliper)
Pin, Snap (6MM) Part # 90705-SD2-931 2x (cotter pin to hold the above pin)
Clip, Brake Hose Part # 90651-538-000 2x (clips to connect the e-brake line to the caliper)
Bolt, Oil (banjo) Part # 46462-SE0-000 2x (banjo bolt for brake line)

This is for 1997 integra calipers (bought an 'upgrade' kit off rockauto)

 

today's project.

Theres a second hook on the pipe that goes over the control arm that doesnt have a corresponding body hook. Not sure what to do about that.. safe to ignore it? Should i weld a new hook to the car somewhere underneath?