I am considering swapping in an H22, but how reliable is this swap?

Other that losing cruise control are there any other problems that will be permanent?

Will the CEL stay on?

This will be a swap of the motor and auto to manual transmission in a 94 lx.

I drive close to 100 miles per day and depend on my car daily...and I am also very **** about my car, and things being right...so my question is if everything is wired correctly, and assuming the engine is in good running condition, will I run into any major problems doing this swap?

I would also like to know how hard figuring out the wiring will be.

Im thinking the motor wiring wont be too bad, but Im worried about the wiring for the auto to manual swap.

 

pretty reliable, unless you rag the **** out of it all day. You can have cruise control, ac, and ps. I have them all. I dont know too much about auto - manual conversions though, so ill leave that to someone else

 

Im not so much talking about the reliability of the motor, Im referring to the swap of the motor itself.

Im sure the motor is reliable assuming its in good condition and taken care of...Im just trying to get a feel for ANY problems that will, or have come up for other poeple who have attempted this swap.

I already know that I have to shave the drivers side motor mount, use manual transmission axles from a 5 GEN Accord, cut and solder the connectors for the H22 to my Accord harness...but after its all said and done can it be done so that the CEL doesnt stay on, or the motor spit and sputter, or have quirky little problems?


I know it depends on the quality of installation, Im just curious to know if the best installation will still have problems...before I go spend the cash for everything I need.

 

it depends on who does the isntall and how good they are. ive done nearly 100k combined on my 3 swapped cars so far without any issues that stock honda wouldnt have.

 

Did you do an auto to manual swap on any of them?

Thats my main concern.
There doesnt seem to be as much info on that swap, and Im not too sure what to do about the nuetral safety switch, or back-up lights or any other wiring problems that may arise being that my car was designed to be an automatic.


I will be doing the swap myslef...and I am compitent enough to tackle it, as long as I can get the right info.

 

I've put about 30K miles on my JDM H22 in my '94 Accord - except for routine maintenance items - I haven't had a single problem (and I regulalry beat on it).

Like it was said above before - It all depends on who does the install and if they are compitent enough and understand Hondas!

 

i ahve doen a few auto to manual swaps and thos depend a lot ont eh quality of the parts used. one of my cars is an auto to amnual swpa and with the rigth tranny bracket welded to teh car it is fine. i dont bother with the clutch interlock switch usually. and the neutral safety i jsut jumper to appear to be always in neutral. and backup lights is jsut running 2 wires from teh shifter are to the tranny back up light switch

 

http://board.hondasociety.com/...ssure

go here, there is a complete list of everything you need to do the manual swap, including how to do the wiring. Just scroll down to the list. It is possible you may not need to weld in a new mount. I just completed the swap on my cousin's 95 lx and the mount bolted on.

 

Thanks for everyones input.

One last Question:

Is the H22 really worth the effort?

What kind of real world power gains does it offer?

I would be coming from a bone stock F22, and all Im interested in is a reliable daily driver with a good bit of low end torque to make getting up to speed from a stop light easier than it is now.

 

i think that you would be very pleased with the " real world" driving of the h22. it has a good amount of hpower over the f22, a decent amount of TQ over the f22, and responds well to minor bolt-ons( def. do a light weight flywheel & intake). that said, i have also seen some beast master f22's, but most of those were under pressure or not very friendly for use as an every day car. i opted for the h22 over my f22 and have no regrets, i use it for my summer time car, and have a good time driving it. hope i helped.

 

i'd usually tell ppl to boost their f22/23 over h22. but in your case, i'd do the swap only because you'd be going from auto to manual. seriously, manual rocks. but just don't be expecting your h22 accord to be super fast. cuz it won't be. boosted f22 won't be super fast either, but it'll be lil faster than h22. still, accords are no civic hatches. weight matters. also the reliability of the engine greatly depends on "you". take care of it and h22/boosted f22/whatever will last a good while.

 

i've had the h22 in my car for about 6 months. so far its been very reliable and no CEL light.

i also did the auto to manual conversion like you are wanting to do and everything works great.

after two weekends of getting everthing ready for the swap and conversion, pulling the JDM h22 out of the front clip, freshening up the motor/tranny etc. i decided to pay someone to do it for me, as my schedule wouldnt allow me to get it done in a reasonable time. so i hired one of the best mechanics in florida. a man who has the fastest CRX in forida(8seconds).

needless to say, the engine looks like it came in my car.

also, you only need the passenger side axle from a 5-speed accord, not a driver side. you'll also need a 5-speed intermediate shaft from an accord. also, someone mentioned that you have to weld in a 5-speed tranny bracket. you do not have to do this(i'll post pics later). all you have to do is drill a new hole in the existing tranny bracket and save yourself a good amount of money. also, in order to retain cruise control, you have to put the accord throttle body on the h22 intake manifold. if you decide to do this, your engine will be choking when vtec kicks in, due to the smaller TB.

and lastly, even though this swap is popular on accords, i wouldnt do it again. i spent almost $5k for everything.
JDM prelude front clip($2700) i got the front clip because i was doing the auto to manual conversion and got most of the extra parts from the clip.
swap labor($750)
conversion labor($350)
extra parts, and parts to freshen up the motor/tranny($900)

if i had it to do over again, i would have taken the wise road and sold my car and bought a prelude. the swap cost me $5k, i could have purchased a same year prelude for less. sold my car for $5k and put that into the prelude.

but in the end, its your money.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by ASSASSIN &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">... Im just trying to get a feel for ANY problems that will, or have come up for other poeple who have attempted this swap.
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Only problems I have encountered with the swap is making a new mounting bracket to retain cruise and custom exhaust piping.

I would suggest doing an h23 manual tensioner conversion if you're going to run stage 2 cams or better.

 

That makes sense.

I like my Accord, even though I know its big and heavy...I just like how it looks, handles, and is set up inside, so I think I might do the swap.

On a side note I test drove an Acura RSX-S today and I wasnt THAT impressed.

I dont know what kind of HP this car puts out(Im about to search and see)...I want to say aroud 200-220, but it was weak down low until you hit 5500 RPM then it kicks in....ehhh No torque

So the problems seem to be
-Get one new passenger side half shaft and axle
-drill hole for manual mount
-weld exhaust flang to header??
-braze power steering hose (high side) together
-wiring

..and then there is the manual clutch and brake pedal
Is there a good write-up anywhere on the problems Im facing with that?

BTW how bad is the wiring? Is it a major headache or fairly straight forward?

I really appreciate all the help

EDIT: I just saw that boost guy left a link for the manual swap
If you know of other articles on the H22/manual swap please post them.

 

so far so good, just make sure the shop that does the swap knows what they are doing and will back you up if you have issues, and besides doing 110mph while in park, (auto to manual for me) is just amazing

 

also, the place i took my car to do the swap, didnt have to braze the power steering line. since there was an auto airconditioning shop next door, he had them do the hose for me, since they work with hoses alot. they put fitting on both ends and now it screws together instead of being brazed or welded. looks alot cleaner IMO. i'll get some pics up soon so you can see, im having a problem with my camera or computer.


Modified by JDMaccord95H22 at 2:27 PM 8/27/2004

 

im using a 97+ prelude line with my PS setup. bolted right up with the prelude bracket and pump. This is in a 95' accord.

 

so you changed out the whole accord power steering line? i went by the directions from the link previously posted. which states to cut the accord power steering line at the metal part by the pump, and weld or braze the remaining part of the prelude line to it. my mechanic had fittings put on each side that would normally have to be welded, it looks like two nuts(no pun intended) side by side.

 

yup. no custom nothing. prelude bracket and line. thats it...

 

The H22A is an engine on a factory car. Assuming you don't romp on it constantly, it would be just as reliable as stock..