I made a trip to the junk yard last weekend and I had a hard time finding any CRXs or Civics. I had a few questions while stumbing through the mud and snow, maybe you guys can help.

1: How can I figure out what year car I'm looking at? Some of the cars had badges inside the door jams, most didn't. Is there any way to read the year through the VIN?

2: I found a Civic DX with drums and a rear sway bar. After doing a search it seems like DXs didn't have bars does that sound right? If a DX does come with a rear bar is it bigger than an 89 HF assuming (without looking) that an 89 HF has a rear bar?

3: There were a ton of early Accords and EF 4-doors. Are there any parts worth yanking off these cars? Sway bars? Brakes? Rads? ANYTHING?

4: Are the steering rack ratios any different, faster or slower, than a CRX?

Thanks for any help.
Jamie

 

88-89 crx's you could tell by looking at the taillights.
90-91 models the lights has a darker lines around the lights. 88-89 don't have the darker lines.

 

http://www.car-parts.com good site

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by shawn_crx &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">88-89 crx's you could tell by looking at the taillights.
90-91 models the lights has a darker lines around the lights. 88-89 don't have the darker lines.</TD></TR></TABLE>
Its a junkyard he is talking about taillights wouldnt make it 30 mins, so he couldnt even see...
Well the lower control arm is differnt on the 88's than the 89-91, interior is a little different (dash bezel more round, etc...). But who knows what is left when you get their

 

90-91 ex front brake swap.

 

Would the EX have 4 wheel discs for it to have the big rotors on front?
I thought I found one but it had rear drums so I wasn't sure.

I forgot my calipers so I couldn't measure but maybe someone here knows where to cross reference. Is a 4 door Civic front bar the same as a CRX SI? It seems like maybe the bigger car would have the bigger bar. It seems like it's thick but without seeing any other bars nearby its hard to judge.

What cars have nice setups for power window switches?

 

Really the parts from the four door civics are the same as the parts from the hatch but I'm thinking the Crx parts may differ slightly. The old civics and accords really have nothing worth getting off of them unless you have an 86-87 prelude Si, 86-87 Crx Si, or an 86-89 Acura Integra. As for the sway bars, I pretty sure they are the same size on all of them until you come across an 88-91 Civic AWD station wagon which supposingly have bigger sway bars. Crxs are a little hard to figure out though, I usually look at the side marker lenses and if the have exposed screws its an 88-89. If it has the screws located in the engine bay....90-91. The standard ones are easy to pick out, they are almost always 2-toned and apparently the motors and sus. are not the same. The racks are different from the hatch to sedan to CRx and the one you want is the Crx Si rack. Way better ratio and way quicker response.