How competitive can this car be in this class? Being that there are a million Neons in the US, parts have to be readily available and relatively cheap. How reliable are the early ones and what are their weak points?
wheres redconquesttsi when you need him 
Well, the parts are readily available, and theyre quite light and handle very well…
Now, if im correct,(i might have heard this wrong), but i beleive one weak spot is the valve cover gasket tends to leak with age. Theyre awesome and reliable cars. ID love to rock one as a daily/beater. The DOHC 5 speeds (sport, R/T,ACRs) are decently quick.
:lol: for you posting that question here of all places…
http://itforum.improvedtouring.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=9793
It’s my opinion that the lighter SOHC would the way to go.
I just looked up his times on MyLaps, only showed one race the car placed 3rd, with a pretty good time. The car is easily worth ~$3000 or more.
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And I guess a couple other people felt the same way…
neon is a decent car to autoX. definatly get a manual, the autos are garbage. sohc or dohc weight is pretty much the same. 2 door coupes weigh a little more than the 4 door sedans. i prefer the dohc, but the sohc wouldnt be bad either. the dohc’s come with a 3.94 tranny, the sohc’s come with a 3.55. the 3.94’s are better for n/a neons
i would say keep the car stock, competition will be a little harder once you do some mods. if you are going to mod it, do suspenion first.
most important… get good tires
I thought only the ACR cars came with the 3.94 gears. BTW… the car above was a four door, SOHC, ACR with a refreshed head, and was built for ITA. Tons of spares not listed in the ebay ad, but not raced in over a year. Max bid was $3k knowing that at least the cage would not have met the 2007 safety standards.
The search continues…
,and illegal for ITA.
Wrong, the SOHC is allowed to weigh 2450, the DOHC must weigh at least 2650.
How does the competition get harder after doing modifactions to go faster?
It would have taken 6’ of tubing and 19" of weld, even if you had to pay for a professional it would have cost ~$100 to fix.
From what I’ve heard from people quite competitive in ITA is that the Neon takes too much of a weight penalty to chase the CRXs well.
Reliability should be great. The engines are very low maintenance and solid.
ACRs and RTs had the 3.94 with the .81 5th.
DOHC cars had a 3.94 with a .72 5th.
SOHC cars had a 3.55 with a .72 5th.
If you end up with a car, I have a brand new 3.94 diff that you would be able to make use of, if you’re interested.
My R/T with full interior and a bunch of crap in the trunk weighed 2480.
You won’t really gain much power on a neon with bolt-ons. you’ll go from 112whp to maybe 120 if your lucky.
all dohc has the 3.94, the acr’s and r/t’s have a different 5th gear. which if your racing and going fast enough to put it in 5th then yes the acr & r/t trans would be better. But if you never use 5th then it really doesnt matter.
I don’t think you understand. They’re not talking actual weight. It’s the weight allowed by the sanctioning body. They will put weight in your car to bring it to spec with the competition rules.
well in that case, then the sohc would be better off. i wouldnt want to add an extra 200lbs. that’s kind of dumb that they have it set that way. I would understand maybe 100lbs. the dohc isnt that much quicker than the sohc.
that might be a great use for my car. someday. I didnt know the 4 doors are lighter than the 2 doors.
But…if you use a pound per horsepwer formula the DOHC is at an advantage. Given stock BHP:
SOHC
18.5 #/HP
DOHC
17.67 #/HP
CRX
21.74 #/HP
NX2000
18.04 #/HP
You mean F31st in 2005
http://www.arrc-online.com/results_2005/ARRC2005.RaceGroup4.pdf
And a FDNS in 2006.
I’m kidding, he has some wins and some impressive quals at the ARRC. But definately not “ftw” as you put.
[sackriding]That title doesn’t belong to a Honda at all, what you should have said: “The NX2000 dominates. Greg Amy FTW”[/sackriding]
i hate “ftw”
Eh, he doesn’t do so much SCCA. NASA ftw.
http://thundervalleyracing.com/archive/topstories/archive/20061001gilio.htm
True, but the only thing is the dohc is over rated compared to the sohc
stock whp is more like:
dohc 115-118
sohc 109-113
brings it to
dohc 23.04-22.46 #/HP
sohc 22.47-21.68 #/HP