story:
i got the intake manifold from a friend at a honda dealership along with an ex head for free. they were from a left over engine that looked like it had never had the oil changed. i got tired of waiting for the head to be sent to the machine shop for cleaning and reassembly so i took it upon my self to disassemble the intake manifold and swap that out for the time being.

car:
2000 dx hatch

materials:
i managed to get the intake manifold assembled with all the fuel rail, injectors, and all the sensors. i had to buy an intake manifold gasket and ex throttle cable but aside from those items (about $30-35) i didnt sink any money into this project.

swap:
this isnt a walk through, just a brief description of what i did. if you would like a fairly good set of instructions on this swap check out...
http://www.makuragi.s5.com/civic_99/Y8maniswap
its a fairly straight forward swap and i did it with no service manual but i suggest getting one if you arent too familiar with working on your car. basically you just have to pull the old manifold off swap over the dx throttle body to the ex manifold and put the new manifold on. then figure out all the vaccum lines and such.

performance:
first off let me say that as this car comes from the factory its good for daily driving. while not setup as a race car by any means the dx manifold has longer skinnier runners which place the power lower in the rpms. this makes for stronger off the line performance (ive pulled on a b16/crx off the line) but also results in the car wheezing for breath in the higher rpms (then the crx tore me a new one ). with the shorter, fatter runners the power band is shifted from the low end to the mid and high end. i pulled the car out of the honda dealship where i finished up the swap (replacing some parts that i had lost while doing the swap in my apt parking lot ) and immediately felt the loss of torque down low. not suprised i just drove sparingly until i could get the car on the highway. immediately upon entering the highway i opened it up. i purposefully upshifted because i wanted to feel the whole power band so i let it bog and then come back up. noticeable loss in power down low but not too bad. as the rpms climbed the car seemed to 'come alive' where before it would just fall on its face later in the rpm band. dare i say it amost felt as if vtec was kicking in, j/k. seriously though the power increase is noticeable up top especially if you've been driving a stock dx around for 2 years.

conclusion:
all in all i think the swap is well worth the effort if you plan to work with the single cam instead of a swap. in the long run i will probably get a swap, but for the time being my plan is to turbo this engine with it being so new. the intake manifold will help alot with this since it sits horizontally instead of vertically.

peace,
brian

if you have any questions on this swap feel free to im me on here or on aim. same screen name. or you can email. good luck.


[Modified by thinkbrianthink, 3:52 PM 6/6/2002]

 

good info!!!

 

Seems like a decent ammount of work...Always thought that would be such a simple job, now it looks a little more involved.

 

Funny thing is that I was reading that article you pointed out just before reading this. Good deal man. Ive been looking to do the same My self I just need to buy the parts. It seams easier if you get the the throtle body with it too because you wont have to mess with the IAC valve. I hace a neeter and more effective idea on how to plug the vacume fitting for the cruse control. Now I know that Gude regrinds the cams for the Y7's Im wondering how well that would work with some a1spistons and a desent heder and exhaust. It woud make your comute to work much more fun.