OBDII 97 EK swap to B18B1 non-vtec

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Ok......I read it in the forums and didn't take heed and now I'm paying for it. I purchased an Ebay front end kit that included ball joints, tie rod ends for a great price. After 5000 miles and 30 days my new lower ball joint on the drivers side fell apart on me yesterday. Thank God I was barely moving and just pulling out from a driveway 3 miles from home. Within an hour the go-cart was back home and up on jack stands. Upon further inspection I found the ball joint had little to no grease applied. The bottom half of the ball joint looked as if it had been ground away at high temp. Not a pretty sight. Total damage is a lower front ball joint, a front drivers side axle(inner CV pulled apart) and some fender crunch. I was very lucky. When I get a chance I'll post some pics. Guess what I'm doing this 4th of July weekend? Replacing Ebay junk ball joints with known quality ones.....maybe MOOG? I knew things had gone too smoothly with the swap!!

Shit hopefully my ebay ones hold up. I put mine in this past spring.
 
Shit hopefully my ebay ones hold up. I put mine in this past spring.

My first sign of trouble was the car getting harder and harder to steer(not PS equipped). It was on jack stands this past Sat and I looked for anything that could be binding and saw nothing. In the air the steering was easy again. Beware if your steering seems to get harder.
 
thanks for the heads up!

eBay Motors: Ball Joint Control Arm Tie Rod FULL KIT CIVIC 92-95 (item 330246946126 end time Jul-01-08 04:20:50 PDT)

Thats the exact kit I bought from that seller. Look familiar to you?

Not sure, I'm convinced the the kit I bought was a generic one and the parts are more than likely close to the same quality in all kits in $120 price range. See attch pics for the ball joint that failed on my car.
 

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Ball Joints and Tie Rods Replaced

I completed the ball joint/tie rod replacement on Friday. All went very smoothly and test rides have gone without incident. I replaced the "STAR BRAND" components with TRW components. The TRW lower ball joints and tie rod ends were made in Japan while the the upper ball joint assemblies were made in Spain. TRW lower ball joints were $33 each, upper ball joint assemblies were $60 each and the tie rods were $22 each. I replaced the left front axle as well for $80. I took the spindles to a local Ford dealer and they pressed in the new lower ball joints for $30. See pics for newly installed components as well as the only damage left from the incident....the crinkled driver's side front fender. All in all I consider myself blessed that nothing worse happened. The left axle inner CV was pulled apart which ripped the boot in half. I put the axle back together it seems to be ok. I'll purchase and install a new boot after I inspect the CV joint. I believe the axle will be reusable as I was barely moving when the CV joint was pulled apart.
 

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good to see you got it fixed! Hopefully I don't suffer the same fate. My kit came packaged very professionally and had plastic covers on all the threads and what not, so it seemed legit when it showed up in the box.
 
good to see you got it fixed! Hopefully I don't suffer the same fate. My kit came packaged very professionally and had plastic covers on all the threads and what not, so it seemed legit when it showed up in the box.

Mine came in a similar way. I keep trying to think of reasons that the ball joint prematurely wore and I keep coming back to a defective joint. I'll be monitoring the new parts closely to make sure it doesn't happen again. I bought a fender from a salvage place in NH for $60 and will be picking it up on Wed. Same color as original so all should match.
 
shifter difference between Integra and Civic?

I have a lower priority issue I want to get resolved and it seems like a good time to do it. I purchased Integra shift linkage for my B18b1 swap into my EK. The linkage itself fits great, but when I installed the Civic shifter I had to add a few washers as spacers to fill in the gap difference between the Civic shifter bushing width and the Integra linkage shift bolt-up area. I want to get a short shifter and figured if I order an Integra short shifter it would bolt into the Integra linkage with no spacers required. Does this sound right to anyone? Is the bushing area of the Integra shifter wider than that of the EK shifter? I was in such a hurry to complete the swap that I was just happy to get the go-cart back on the road.....didn't pay attention to this detail.
 
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This thread has been a wealth of info, and I thank you for it! I'm about to do a very similar swap, only I'll be ditching my D16y8. Although I'll be having a shop do the actual swap for me, I've been able to ask a lot of very specific questions to make sure it goes right.

Keep us updated on the short shifter. I was planning on doing this as well before it all gets shoe-horned into my car.

Thanks again!

Edit: I forgot to ask... I'll also be using a JDM motor, and was informed that the JDM ecu has a speed governer. So top speed is 190km/hr (118mph). Seeing as this is my daily driver, I highly doubt I'll ever see that kind of speed. But then again, I do hope to hit the drags as I obviously don't street race. I know I could switch to a USDM ecu, but is it worth it?
 
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Whenever you decide to do any extensive modifications you can order a programmable Ecu from Phearable and then run and OBD-II to OBD-I jumper.
 
bfraley - Thanks for all the info about this swap. I got a 98 dx coupe with 97 USDM LS. (almost complete with help from you). I have a couple of questions for you.

1. Your throttle cable bracket says P6T - What car is that from? My teg bracket says P75 and my D16Y7 bracket is nothing like the one pictured.

2. Did a muffler shop complete your exhaust? My swap is missing the b-pipe, so I need to get a header and my DX exhaust ends at the firewall. I was told the header will bolt up to the DX exhaust w/o a cat. If I add a cat I have to modify the civic exhaust to make room for the cat. What did you do?

3. Is the LS and SI front trans bracket the same? Which one did you buy? I know the the transmissions are different. Y80/S80 vs. S4C

Your ball joint fiasco sucks. I bet you were pissed.
 
bfraley - Thanks for all the info about this swap. I got a 98 dx coupe with 97 USDM LS. (almost complete with help from you). I have a couple of questions for you.

1. Your throttle cable bracket says P6T - What car is that from? My teg bracket says P75 and my D16Y7 bracket is nothing like the one pictured..

Sorry for the delay in responding. I was at www.thesoulfest.com for the past week. Rocked my socks off! I'm glad my info was of help to you.

ok...The P6T throttle bracket was original on the JDM B18b1 I purchased. I think the motor came from and Acura Integra in Japan. My brother and I fabricated a throttle bracket extension(pic can be seen in this thread) from an old Skil saw blade wrench that was laying around. The American '97 Integra throttle cable works great with that bracket extension fab. By the way, I have 8000+ miles on the go-cart engine swap and it's running like a dream.

2. Did a muffler shop complete your exhaust? My swap is missing the b-pipe, so I need to get a header and my DX exhaust ends at the firewall. I was told the header will bolt up to the DX exhaust w/o a cat. If I add a cat I have to modify the civic exhaust to make room for the cat. What did you do?.

I'll try to answer this as best I can. Yes, a local muffler shop in Alliance, OH installed a used Magnaflow exhaust I picked up. It was designed for a coupe, but the shop did a great job cutting and fitting the new exhaust. You need to find a shop that has done this type of work before. I kept the stock exhaust manifold and B pipe from the Japanese motor, I then ordered a Magnaflow cat for a '97 Integra and bolted it on to the B pipe(CT has emissions laws that I had to meet), I then had the muffler shop install the rest of the exhaust. I looked far and wide and found no bolt-on exhaust available for an EK with a B18 installed. Gotta go custom.

3. Is the LS and SI front trans bracket the same? Which one did you buy? I know the the transmissions are different. Y80/S80 vs. S4C.

I'm not sure if they are the same or not....The motor mount kit I purchased from Ebay did not include the front tranny bracket. I went to www.acuraautomotiveparts.org and ordered a new front tranny bracket for a '97 Acura Integra 5speed and it worked great.

Your ball joint fiasco sucks. I bet you were pissed.

I was and am still very disappointed, however I can't say I wasn't warned by other posts on this forum. The money savings was too big of an opportunity for me. It's all fixed and I'm very happy with the results now. Have a good one!
 
Awesome post.I just registered with this site to thank this guy for his no bull approach and detailed suggestions and fixes,I was thinking of buying an ek coupe for a daily and this swap sounds like fun.Wife probably wont be happy but oh well.This should be broken down to the swap essentials and stickied.I think this guy just did a crapload of legwork for all of us.kudos again
 
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Hey was wondering if you had an exact part list of the parts you used for your build since, Ill have the exact same swap. It would be convient :D pm or let me know thanks!!!
 
Edit: I forgot to ask... I'll also be using a JDM motor, and was informed that the JDM ecu has a speed governer. So top speed is 190km/hr (118mph). Seeing as this is my daily driver, I highly doubt I'll ever see that kind of speed. But then again, I do hope to hit the drags as I obviously don't street race. I know I could switch to a USDM ecu, but is it worth it?

If you can get a EDM ecu, it's the same as the JDM, just without a speed limiter.
 
12,000 miles and still rollin' strong!

Just an update. The TRW front end parts are working great. At 10,000 miles I started to notice a very light shudder in the drivetrain only when under torque. As soon as I let up on the gas everything is very smooth again. Speed has nothing to do with it as I have pushed to car to 120mph and it's very smooth as soon as I let up on the gas. Maybe I'm being too picky, but I went with an XTD stage 2 clutch kit (Chinese made) and now I'm rightfully paranoid. I inspected the motor mounts but they look ok, and when I hammer on the throttle at idle I don't see any abnormal drivetrain movement. The slight shudder under power doesn't get any worse when I tow my trailer. Not a big deal right now, but I'm wanting to change out the Chinese clutch at my first opportunity.....that's the last of the Chinese junk on the car.

Has anyone out there experienced this same type of issue?
 
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