Completely Frustrated

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Import R

Senior Member
Before I explain the problems I have been having, it might help to explain exactly what my setup is. I purchased a JDM B16 (SIR2) back about 5 months ago. The swap did not come with the shift linkage or axles (though it did come with the intermediate shaft).

I went ahead and dropped the motor and tranny in the engine, and went in search of the parts I needed. I got shift linkage from a 96 Teg, and recently I found linkage from a 97 Teg (or so the guy claims). After reading various internet sources to find out what vehicles I can pull parts from, I figured I would use parts from the DOHC Del Sol, and the 99-00 SI. I have also replaced my fuel pump with an aftermarket Walbro intank 255liter/hour pump.

Here are my problems:

-The upper and lower radiator hoses from both the Del Sol and SI do not fit the motor. The interior diameter of the hose is too small to fit the barb coming out from the motor. I had to use the upper and lower radiator hose from a Teg to fit the motor, and I had to rig up a reducer fitting to get the larger diamter hose to fit on my radiator.

-The axles that I purchased have ripped boots and I believe are bad because they make a clicking noise when I turn. So I went on over to autozone and ordered new axles from a 99 SI. When I went to install the axles yesterday, they were too long. I can get them in the tranny and in the rotor hub, but when I go to connect the assembly to the upper ball joint, it just wont go.

And now on to my biggest on-going problem:

-I have electronic issues as well. Without seeing the car for yourself my description will be a little hard to understand, but I will try my best to explain the situation. When I start my car the fuel pump and dash lights fade in and out at the same rhythm. Think of this fade as with people who have high powered stereo systems and their lights dim everytime the bass hits. My car does this the entire time it is running, and it does not matter if I am at idle, or if I am revving at 3,000 RPMs. It's almost as if my car is grounding out somewhere, but I have checked all visible grounds and made sure the connections are clean. I have also gone back through to check that there are no exposed wires touching any metal. This problem has been with the car ever since I did the swap, and was NOT present prior to me swapping motors. It got soo bad that one night coming back from the track it overheated my battery and my car shut off. I mean SHUT OFF; no electrical at all. The battery was hotter than my valve cover. This usually means I have something drawing alot of power from the motor, but I am unsure as to what it could be.


A friend of mine suggested to me that I possibly have a B16 out of a JDM integra, but could not elaborate any further on it. If this is true, would I be better off looking for replacement parts from a Teg instead of the Del Sol and SI? I'm completely frustrated as I have spent soo much $$$ trying to track down parts from the incorrect cars. Anyone with some advice would have my eternal appreciation.
 
If you are putting a B16A into a 92-95 Civic, you have the correct axles. The pre 92's have a 1" shorter track so the axle is off by half an inch, but the 92+ have the same length. Make sure you're seating it all the way, that sounds like your problem.

And on the radiator hose, also those are the right ones, I am using them myself. I know the VX has a smaller inlet than the B16A and I believe D16Z6 equipped Civics, so maybe that is where you're running into problems, they might have gven you the wrong part, as I have received from Honda the wrong parts a few times when trying to get DOHC DelSol motor parts.

As far as you other problem, is your battery draining, or just hot? I'd look to your fuel pump install. Check all the wiring again.
 
I'm sorry, I completely forgot to say what I had. I have a 92 DX hatch.

I am fairly sure the axles are seated properly. I know they cannot go into the transmission or half-shaft any further. How far should the spindle pertrude from the nut on the rotor side? I tightened them about as much as I could, but they seem to come flush with the end of the nut. Should I torque them so that they come in further?

As for the fuel pump, I used the wiring harness that was already there. Basically it was a plug and play install. The pump came with its own wiring harness, should I have replaced the old harness with the harness they provided?

On the radiator hoses, I am certain I received the proper ones. Because originally I asked for the SI hoses, and they were too small. I went to return them for DOHC Del Sol hoses, and they were the exact same hoses. It just strikes me as odd because my friend has the exact same motor and car I do. He has a 94 DX hatch and has a JDM B16 and he has NO issues using Del Sol or SI parts. His SI radiator hose hooks up fine to his motor.

Also, I forgot to ask another question. I was under the assumption that OBD1 did not have a knock sensor. I used the JDM harness for the install (had to cut and solder to lengthen some connections). The harness has a knock sensor. And the P30 ecu I have trips the knock sensor code if I don't have the knock sensor connected. There are also 3 other wires that come from the ecu, but there are no matching connections to be found anywhere on the JDM harness. It is odd, but I am not throwing any check engine codes. Any ideas on this as well?
 
The axles threads should be past the nut, not far, but past it, and I believe it is torqued to 112lbs-ft, but you'll want to make sure that's right.

The hoses should be right, they should be pretty tight fitting over the inlets.

Your harness may shed some light on the battery problem, I mean, if you hacked the JDM one up, maybe you misconnected something, don't really know from here.
 
hmm....
Just another reason why a JDM engine harness should NOT be adapted to US vehicles - weird dimming phenomenons.

I suggest you use your DX engine harness and wire in VTEC & the Knock Sensor (KS) to it. Perhaps this will eliminate those pesky dimming problems you're having.

You just might want to recheck your ground connections too. You should have these ground connnections:

- ground wire mounted from valve cover to front radiator support area
- ground wire from tranny casing to inner passenger side frame rail
- wire harness should be grounded at the thermostat housing area w/a 10mm nut

OBD1 DOHC VTEC ecu's look for a KS. It's the OBD1 SOHC VTEC ecu's that do not look for a KS. But you can have your P30 ecu reprogrammed to have a disabled KS if you wish.
 
nah, its not a big deal to me that there is a KS, just baffled that it appears on an ODB1 car. Most of my knowledge over the last 2 years has been with my SOHC motor. There are just subtle changes I need to adapt to.

Thanx for the tip on using the DX harness, I might try reinstalling it this weekend to see if that helps out any. I apprciate everyone who has taken the time to respond so quickly to this post.
 
Its possible your alternator is shot, if you can get the car to start, pull off one of the battery terminals to see if the car keeps running, you could have a bad diode in the alternator.
 
Ok, so I put the DX harness back in and wired up the missing wires. It solved my electrical issues. I'm gonna have to take a look at the JDM harness I wired up, I guess I must have wired something up wrong. Kinda weird, since I pulled no codes and everything ran fine.

On a side note, I'm still not able to install those 99 SI axles. I have them torqued into the rotors as much as I can get them. And I am 100% sure they are in the tranny as far as they will go. I push the rotor into the tranny as far as I can to compress the CV joints in the axle, but I still can't get the damn upper and lower ball joint bolts to get into the suspension arms. If I put one in, the other is off by about 1/4-1/2 inch. And trust me, I'm pressing as hard as I can and angling the bolt as much as I can and it still won't drop in.

I think I am just going to get the CV joints fixed and replace the boots in the teg axles I have. I threw them back in this morning and they fit PERFECTLY. I later matched them up with the SI axles I just got, and the SI axles are about 1/2 longer. Anyone got any ideas on that?

Oh, have one more question. My car had been sitting for about 6 months before I did the swap. There are all kinds of deposits in my fuel tank, and my fuel pickup is chock full of crap. Any recommendations on how to flush all that crap out of my fuel tank, or would it be best to take it somewhere and have it done?

Thanx to everyone who made suggestions, I really appreciate it.
 
Originally posted by Import R@May 23 2004, 11:19 AM


On a side note, I'm still not able to install those 99 SI axles. I have them torqued into the rotors as much as I can get them. And I am 100% sure they are in the tranny as far as they will go. I push the rotor into the tranny as far as I can to compress the CV joints in the axle, but I still can't get the damn upper and lower ball joint bolts to get into the suspension arms. If I put one in, the other is off by about 1/4-1/2 inch. And trust me, I'm pressing as hard as I can and angling the bolt as much as I can and it still won't drop in.

I think I am just going to get the CV joints fixed and replace the boots in the teg axles I have. I threw them back in this morning and they fit PERFECTLY. I later matched them up with the SI axles I just got, and the SI axles are about 1/2 longer. Anyone got any ideas on that?


the 00si axels I have fit perfect no sweat at all,I have a 95dxcoupe w/00sib16a2. I pulled the engine myself so I'm sure they are 00si's and really fit easy.
 
More and more I am coming to the conclusion that my motor was pieced together from various sources.

The block is stamped B16A, but to tell exactly which JDM B16 it came from is next to impossible. (As you can see from the list HERE)

The engine wiring harness has grey plugs (indicating it is a 2nd gen B16). And I have a 4 wire O2 sensor. The ECU is a P30.

The ECU came with the interior harness cut. There are 3 wires coming from that harness that do not match up to anything on the enginebay harness plugs. (if anyone is interested, I can find the harness and tell you the plug locations on the ECU and the wire colors). I do not have these wires hooked up, and I throw no check engine lights.

There were no axles included in the swap. All that I have if the passenger side spline and the intermediate shaft. They rest of the axles were removed right at the inner CV joint. I do not know if there is a difference in the B16 and B18 intermediate shafts. I would venture a guess to say they are the same. Regardless, the 3 bolts connecting to the block line up properly, so I assume it is correct for the engine. The current axles I am using are (supposedly) from a 98 GSR. The axles I recently purchased are from a 99 SI and do not fit properly.

I am unaware as to what tranny I have. The normal metal tab on the tranny isnt there to indicated any serial numbers. (Anyone point me in another direction to find out which one I have?) It is a hydro tranny, not a cable tranny.

Finally, the SI and Del Sol upper and lower radiator hoses do not fit over the motor barbs. The interior diamter of the hose is too small to fit over it. The upper and lower radiator hoses for a GSR works perfectly. All I had to do was rig up a reducer fitting so it could fit the smaller diamter barb of my radiator.

So my general idea is that I have the B16 from the 1990-1993 Integra XSi/RSi since all the teg parts I have used fit perfectly. Anyone else had these issues with their car? Since my last main issue with the car happens to be these axles, I could really use some help pointing out which tranny I have.
 
well, glad to see your wiring issues were resolved :spin:

Do you think you can snap a picture of your axles & half-shaft for us?
 
I will grab some pics of both once I get out of work tomorrow. I still have the GSR axles laying around, so I will take some side by side comparison pics of the GSR axles and the SI axles. I'll pull the intermediate shaft and snap a pic of that too.

Anything on the tranny that I should pull pics of to help out? Any pics of any other motor parts you might wanna have a look at to help? I should be back home with pics posted on my webserver by 8 or 9pm est tomorrow night. :ph34r: <--- ninja

I'll also track down those misc. ecu wires and see which spot they pinout to on the ecu for anyone who has spare time to track that mystery down. :)
 
Of course my digital cam is broken. :( gg technology

I went ahead and took some measurements of the axles. The driver's side axles had a difference of 2.5 inches. The passenger side axles had a difference of 1.75 inches. The SI axles were by far longer. When I compressed the SI axles, they came REALLY close to the GSR axles.

I went ahead and got my CV joints and boots replaced. I'm all set now. Thanx to everyone for taking the time to help out. :)
 
No, I actually purchased it from a company out of Canada that sells JDM motors.

http://www.osakajdmmotors.com/

That's the place I got it from. I guess I just got some weird tranny with the motor. And without the stamp on the tranny, I guess there is no way to tell exactly which one it is. :(
 
Osaka motors fucking sucks. If ordering online, hmotorsonline.com is the only way to go. You might pay a few hundred bucks more, but goddamn they take care of you. Any busted sensors? They replace 'em for free. Any shitty looking parts at all? They replace 'em. And their swaps come with everything.
 
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