I have just had the best drive in my car ever . I really can’t wipe the grin off my face, I’m sitting in the office giggling to myself like a child.
Picked up my car from Maidstones yesterday and it now has a very shiny new engine in the back which says ‘Honda’ in nice big letters across the bright red cam covers. What an engine, turns the car into what it always should have been. The sound at 8200rpm is fantastic (especially with my minute EliseParts exhaust on) and it just wants to keep going.
I better stop because I could go on about it all day.
Hi, I’m looking to do this myself one day to my 190
Can you tell us roughly how much the coversion cost ?
1 - Engine & box
2 - Labour
3 - Any downsides
4 - How much quicker & noisier is it
Thanks
Hi, I’m looking to do this myself one day to my 190
Can you tell us roughly how much the coversion cost ?
1 - Engine & box
2 - Labour
3 - Any downsides
4 - How much quicker & noisier is it
Thanks
So far I can’t see any downsides other than the expense but I havn’t driven it for many miles at all. First impressions are very good indeed, the engine really transforms the car. More torque, more power but the most impressive thing is the power delivery - very smooth and linear. The car is so easy to drive around town and really tractable, I was going round roundabout this morning in 4th gear, amazing. The gearbox is great as well, the ratios are far far better than standard and the change is not bad considering it’s still cable operated. I will be able to tell you a bit more in a couple of weeks when I have done some more miles in it, will also send you a private message re cost.
Just saw youre post … see we are on the same wavelength… british toilet humour strikes again … note to self must remember to read rest of postings first ehmmm
BTW Is your beast at Sinclairs ? saw a sorry looking Ali with a sizable dent in the front on Saturday?
Just saw youre post … see we are on the same wavelength…
Get some therapy Trust me LOL!
british toilet humour strikes again …
Ooo-er! That sounds a bit rude! Sounds a bit like… BUM!!! Hah ahhhahhahha!
BTW Is your beast at Sinclairs ? saw a sorry looking Ali with a sizable dent in the front on Saturday?
That’ll be it… Pretty messy huh, amazing what happens as such low speed! But sounds like Sinclaires (as it’s an insurance job) are pretty much gonna replace the whole front end! Eep!
But they’ve cleaned it up and the assessor is heading down today hopefully… Still what a massive bill!!! Possibly more like �9k
I know! Madness it seems but it’s the front clam, then seems like everything from the chassis forwards!!! But as it’s insurance I guess they’re “loading” it up a bit, some armourfend (which I DID have!!! Honest guv!!!) and a bit of profit (they are in Romford after all )…
But f**k it, I’ll just be paying up for the next few years… C’est la vie as I’m now very fond of saying
Very glad to hear you are so happy with your transplant ! I’d be very interested to know - honestly - how different does the handling feel ? since you have 30kg more behind you now and i guess a lot of that is high up in the head , or has the variable valve system been junked for a track set up ?
Is the engine standard ? or does it have a lightweight flywheel ?
what are the power torque figures ? some graphs would be very interesting.
I’m told the conversion for a non new and essentially stock engine +exhaust - 197bhp , 145lbft @5900rpm + bit for the exhaust costs 10,000 quid , which seems a fortune to me, is that correct?
Hope you get real pleasure from it - there should be 5 properly done Ks to compare with in the next 2 months and a few 1.9/2.0 litre Ks soon after all with owners pleged to post with dyno graphs ----- will be interesting , hope everyone will be very open about it all
regards Simon
On the handling front there is no real difference caused by extra weight. I had aircon before which has been removed so I doubt there is much of a differance, maybe 5-10kg? I would be very interested to get it on the scales. What I have noticed is that the standard, soft, setup is struggling with the extra power. The car moves around at the back more under acceleration as there is a fair amount more of it. What has been improved dramatically though is the exit from the corners. Because the power delivery is so linear you can get a really really smooth exit and this is also helped by the vastly improved gear ratios, will be fantastic on track.
I’d be suprised if the valve train weighs much at all. I looked under the cam cover on one of the engines and it’s like a swiss watch in there. the extra weight is more likely in the block and the gearbox casing.
My engine is a bog standard UK Civic Type-R motor with the new design 4-2-1 manifold and the last version of the re-flash on the ECU. I was at Maidstone this morning and I saw the results of the latest mapping session on their car hot off the press. Peak power at the wheels was just over 190 which is supossed to translate to ~212 at the flywheel. Their engine is the same spec as mine. I’ll get a copy of the dyno graphs when I get my ECU uploaded with this latest map.
It has cost me significantly less than 10K. You have to bear in mind that VHPD’s fetch good money second hand and you can also make some saving if you source your own Honda engine. Over the course of the next 50K miles I’m convinced that this option will cost me less than a highly tuned K of equivelent power. We will see in the fullness of time!!
I’m very much looking forward to seeing what your K-Series engines end up like and it will certainly be very interesting to make some direct comparisons. Can you get a car to Bruntingthorpe for the group test?
There is defo a change in handling and braking but it is more to do with the extra power than the extra weight. If anyone local has some scales I will weight mine to see what the real difference is, otherwise i’ll try to do it next time I’m on track. It really needs some adjustable suspension on now so I can set it up properly. Better brakes are a must now too as all that extra speed needs to be scrubbed off.
My VHPD had Emerald, verniers, dave walker map and that is an improvement over standard. Better mid range a bit more up top and smoother all through. Mine was 177 spec before that so the improvement would have been more noticable than changine from a Lotus from a 190 spec car. I’d recomend that upgrade to anyone. The Honda is in a totally different league though, as you would expect. Had 140 out of it on a stretch of, ahhem, private runway this morning and it was still pulling like a train. Wouldn’t have done that by a long margin before.
Simon - where are you based? Maybe we should meet up for a beer and a drive. Would be interesting for all of us to know your opinions are once you’ve tried some different conversions on the road.