So, due to my true love affection I have for my 89 Crx, the fact that I hate the idea of buying a brand new car & making a fair amount while still living at home haha, I have decided to completely over haul what is suppose to be my “beater” (so much for that). Basically, I want to make this thing look like how it did when she arrived in the port of albany way back in 89 but with a twist. Although the stock d-series has been giving me a solid 36-37 mpg, it is far from a quick car. So this presents my problem. I want to use it for daily driving still but I want a sleeper. I’m not saying I want this thing being a 10 second car, but something that will actually get the hell out of it’s own way would be kind of nice.
A friend of mine is in love with the current rims on the Crx & has offered to trade me a b18b1 long block for them. So it has me thinking about engine swaps, thus the point of this thread. Is it really worth doing a b series swap or should I just do the infamous mini me swap. I’ve heard mixed things about both swaps but really what is the best bang for my buck? I’m not a Honda guy, this is just a cheap little toy I can drive when fixing w/e vw or audi I own haha. Let me know what you guys think. If I were to do a b-series swap, more than likely I would buy a early 90s integra so I could stay obd1 & just strip everything I needed out of an integra parts car. Just curious on opinions, car won’t be getting started for an overhaul until October/November but I just need to figure out what the best direction to go is.
Lightly modify and restore the car, little at a time. Keep a simple d series in it. If you tear the whole thing down and do a motor swap , restoration etc you will eventually be dissapointed and lose interest in. Just my honest opinion.
Yeah see that is my concern is doing this engine swap & then being like wow what a waste of money. At 1st I was all for it but now I’m more so leaning towards just doing the head swap. I’m really more concerned about making it look oem again.
I agree with sdp on this, but if ur interested i have been toying with the idea of selling my crx, the body is mint. It looks stock except i painted it viper red, it was a carolina car so there was no rust to begin with but the paint was really faded. Even has all new door moldings. Right now it has a built gsr swap with a turbo tuned to 400whp, type r trans, type r cams. I would be willing to sell just the roller if u dont want the engine.
Also has tein basic coilovers, rear disk conversion, fast brakes front 11in rotors, blox rear lca’s, integra seats, and a bunch of other stuff im forgetting lol
Yeah I’m keeping this chassis until it’s no longer salvageable haha. Plus I have to sell the GLI & track down a nice Audi to use so I can have an awd car for the winter time driving to Selkirk
Yeah main focus is the body work. Definitely regret rushing it. I was going to paint it silver but I was too concerned with getting it on the road & rushed the body work. I’ll probably only do the mini me swap, keep it simple & cut some costs. Still want that good mileage haha.
My thoughts:
Budget Turbo setup - D16A6/D16Z6, HF manifold w/ adapter plate, T25 or a 14b ($50 in servicable condition if you know where to look), ebay intercooler painted flat black, figure out the charge piping and downpipe yourself. DSM injectors (390’s or 450’s). Convert to OBD1 and tune with crome.
Stick an F22 or F23 in it. Under the hood it will look like a D-series, but will have shittons more torque.
I mostly know about these things in the context of accords/preludes, but I’ll do some quick looking for you/see what I can remember.
Mounts and axles are just like doing an H swap (some combination of integra axles with accord inner CV’s is supposed to work), but the motor is smaller and lighter and cheaper. Tranny is cable shift (you need 94-97 accord trans for some reason 90-93 won’t work), so you’d need the cables (probably from a 90-97 accord) and shift box from the same.
Will look like this under the hood when finished:
Into 90 hatch:
For the most part, its exactly like an H22 swap, just with less wiring. Mounts and axles are the same.
An F23A1 would be a decent candidate. 150hp/152tq, new enough that decent ones are easy to find, and they have better head and intake manifolds than an F22Bx engine. Either that, or an F22A6 with an H23A1 intake manifold. A D-series just won’t put you back in the seat from the immediate torque of an F-series. They make most of their torque right off idle.
Message me if you’d like more info when I’m more awake.
My personal opinion on this woould be to go B-Series. Me being a past CRX lover and owner. I have had all of the d-series engines in my EF and once I went B-series. I never looked back. If you can pick up a reasonably priced B-series engine and trans, the rest is nothing. Since your car is a DX you will need to do the dpfi to mpfi swap. Lucky you I have a write up on doing this conversion in the DIY section here.
I simple LS swap should only run yo uabout $600 if you can find the main parts cheap. My fisrt swap in my 91’ CRX was a complete JDM B16a swap which is basically bumping the car up to SiR standards. It’s all really what route your willing to take and how far.
Dont even bother with the headache of an f series… Cost not a factor, the same amout of work to put an f series in the car you could k swap it and if you wanted a k swap on the cheap throw a crv/element engine it rather than an rsx-s or tsx k series. B series is easy and you could throw an Ls in it still get really good gas milage and throw a gsr head on it when and if you find a good deal on one and do an lsvtec. A minime is not gonna give you the bump in power your really looking for imo.
You can get a K20A3 from an RSX base / EP3 for around 400 bucks as well. 160hp/140tq or so. I get mid 30mpg range with my rsx, I’m sure with a lighter platform you could do better. Plus it takes 87 octane.
The engine isnt really the cost. Its everything else, not to mention the cable to hydro conversion he will have to do to the CRX to get it in there. To me B-Series is always the best bang for the buck.
Yeah I dunno the first thing about the details of a swap of that caliber lol. I was just giving another example of a somewhat affordable k series haha.