non-high octane engines?

We may earn a small commission from affiliate links and paid advertisements. Terms

I was wondering out of all the VTEC engines (sohc and dohc) which require the use of high octane gas. And up to what compression ratio can i use 89+ octane gas in a sohc vtec engine.
 
i believe that 10:1+ CR is where you need to use 91-93 octane, but don't quote me on that.

i'm sure that sohc vtec engines all can use 87, dohc vtec B series all require premium.
 
Originally posted by 2000Si@Feb 25 2005, 04:46 AM
i believe that 10:1+ CR is where you need to use 91-93 octane, but don't quote me on that.

i'm sure that sohc vtec engines all can use 87, dohc vtec B series all require premium.
[post=465982]Quoted post[/post]​


Premium or High Octane for B series engines, cuz i've heard that B series engines need high octane, and that's kind of a deterrant for me to get a B series engine cuz high octane is like 85 cents a liter canadian where I live, I think that's somewhere around $2.50 a gallon US, but i don't really know.
 
I think you've got some serious issues if you're worried about compression ratios for high octane gas, especially when you had me writing you a book about what types of engines to build in your first thread just two weeks ago.
 
:D I still really appreciate everything you had said.

I'm just trying to make sure that there aren't any surprises when i go to start either engine setup. And because i'll be a at college around the time that i'd be able to start either engine setup, so the type of octane and the kind of gas mileage I could get are fairly important factors.

The reason I'm all of a sudden interested is cuz i got a reply in one of my other posts saying that the stock jdm first gen. B16A needed high octane to run, whereas i had been thinking that premium would've been fine. Plus considering that my mom is lending me the money to do the swap it's a lot easier for me to say that the current engine in my car needs to be replaced (ie B16A) or rebuilt (mini-me) than it is for me to explain that my car needs to be supercharged.

I'm thinking that the mini-me or B16 would be about the same for fuel and gas mileage, but i'm starting to think that with the lower compression ratio that the b16 might be a little more reliable than going to a mini-me, which even if I didn't get pg7 pistons would still net me around 10.8:1 compression ratio with an a6 block and pistons and a y8 head.

And even though on paper i could get more torque out of a sohc for the same amount of money as a b16a swap, if you factored in things like gear ratios both engine setups would probably be fairly comparable.

Plus I noticed on a few online dyno charts that sohc engines get most of their power in the first 3000 rpm's (100ft-lbs) and then stay stable at roughly 90ft-lbs until 6000prm after which they start to completely drop, whereas the b16a engine has the same increase in torque from idle to 3000rpm and then drops off again until about 5000rpm, but where the sohc would start lose all of its power, the b16 torque curve rises again until nearly peak. So to say that a sohc engine has better low end torque, on paper may be right, but isn't necessarily faster on the street.
 
think about it, its what 80 cents a litre for reg, and 85 for premium. Lets say you have a 20 litre tank

.80*20= $16
.85*20= $17

Let's say you use that whole tank every other day so

365/2= 182.5

182.5*$16= $2920
182.5*$17=$3102.5

3102.5-2920= $182.5

Ok you would have saved yourself nearly $200 a year if you went with the lower CR setup. But then you have to think about it, what if you want to upgrade later. Sure a D series has potential but the B has more and is more upgradable and aftermarket supported.

You make the decision, 200 bucks a year or another 2k when you realize you should have went with the B.
 
The SOHC has a flatter torque curve up front and up through 6000rpm because of the longer stroke- it also lacks the radical cam profile change that the B16A has on both the intake and exhaust cams. The SOHC VTEC only changes the intake profile, and it just opens up the intake more to breathe all the up through the higher revs- so it looks like one smooth power curve. Think of the B16A as two separate engines before and after VTEC- that's why the power/torque curves look different before/after the VTEC crossover.

The mini-me can be just as reliable as (or more than) the B16 if you build and tune it properly. The B is still a great path to take too. On the "high octane", most of what you're reading is just the RON rating. The Japanese get 98RON gas for their engines, but here in the US we measure by (RON+MON)/2. MON ratings are lower than RON, so the average will be different than just the RON rating alone. A B16A that runs on 98RON in Japan will run fine on 91 octane (RON+MON)/2 here in the US.
 
Calesta, I know this is fairly unrelated, but I read in another thread that you said after you dropped your b16a (i think it was b16a) into your car that the added weight lowered your front end.

I'm not so worried about running high octane anymore, but I was wondering just how much did your front end lower, cuz if i have to buy coilovers around the same time as I drop in a dohc engine that'd be a much bigger deterrant than having to run high octane gas. ($200 a year more for gas vs. $500 CA for coilovers before installation.

Also, I was wondering if you might know about how much it would cost to bring a B16A engine up to 125 wheel ft-lbs of torque (on a dyno)? Because I'm thinking it would cost about $8500 to drop in a d16z6 engine, supercharge it, and buy and install a ATS 4.73 final drive gear. And a B16a would cost me about $2800 CA to buy and install, and i figure that the Y1 trans would have pretty much the same performance as a zc/si hybrid trans (CRX Si 1st, 3rd, and 4th & ZC 2nd and 5th) w/ 4.73 FD, so all that's left is horsepower and torque.

Sorry I guess i'm a little unorganized today.

Oh and at what kind of compression ratio would i have to resort to race fuel, cuz i know i can't afford race fuel. The highest grade pump gas i can get is 91 octane.
 
I didn't measure... maybe half an inch? My springs were already pretty old though. Progress makes springs that are wound specifically for the heavier front ends of swapped Civics.

125lbft at the wheels with a B16 might be a bit high- but it's been done. 115lbft is more realistic, and you can still rev the B16 high enough without reinforcement to make power to 170-180whp all motor with that amount of torque. Just go high compression and get good cams, then port the head to match.

I've run 12.6:1 compression on 92 octane, but that was running pretty rich. There are people in California running 12.8:1 on 91 octane- I'm doing it on 93 here in Texas. It's all about the tuning. 12.0:1 is a safe level... but you can go lower, like 11.5:1 and just run more timing to get your power/torque numbers up. Considering that the Celica GT-S runs 11.5:1 from the factory and Toyota has to tune it to deal with retards who might use 87 octane gas, you can tune a 12.0:1 B16A to run very nicely on 91 octane gas.
 
The reason I was wondering about the potential for a b16a was becuase i saw a supercharged z6 making 125 ft-lbs on a dyno sheet, and if i can get the transmissions to perform fairly smilarly the only other factors are torque and rpm.
 
Originally posted by Panther550@Mar 7 2005, 01:10 AM
The reason I was wondering about the potential for a b16a was becuase i saw a supercharged z6 making 125 ft-lbs on a dyno sheet, and if i can get the transmissions to perform fairly smilarly the only other factors are torque and rpm.
[post=470163]Quoted post[/post]​


First of all, 125lb-ft is not that much. My LS motor will make nearly that stock, and LS motors are a dime a dozen. Second, for $8500, I could buy a nice CRX, a BUILT LS/Vtec motor making more than 200 whp, and buy a nice suspension setup; my car would tear circles around whatever z6 build up you were talking about. ANd when you are talking engine weights, you have to remember that the difference in engine weights is less than 100 lb, not really anything to worry about. If you were talking about dropping an H22a into a crx, that'd be a different story, but you're not, so don't worry about it. And don't worry about running race gas if your aren't willing to fork out 500+ for custom pistons. You won't need it. Even if you were running PCT pistons in an LS block, you could probably get around it one way or another. I am going to be running ~11.5:1 in my LS build, and I'm going to tune for crappy California 91 octane, and I'm not worried at all. As far as the potential for a b16 over a D-series motor? The blocks are beefier, the technology is better, the aftermarket support is larger, two cams instead of one (excluding the 1 dohc d-motor), stronger connecting rods and crank, Better transmission gear ratios, More people familiar with tuning them, etc.....
 
Originally posted by MikeBergy+Mar 7 2005, 02:34 AM-->
Panther550
@Mar 7 2005, 01:10 AM
The reason I was wondering about the potential for a b16a was becuase i saw a supercharged z6 making 125 ft-lbs on a dyno sheet, and if i can get the transmissions to perform fairly smilarly the only other factors are torque and rpm.
[post=470163]Quoted post[/post]​


First of all, 125lb-ft is not that much. My LS motor will make nearly that stock, and LS motors are a dime a dozen. Second, for $8500, I could buy a nice CRX, a BUILT LS/Vtec motor making more than 200 whp, and buy a nice suspension setup; my car would tear circles around whatever z6 build up you were talking about. ANd when you are talking engine weights, you have to remember that the difference in engine weights is less than 100 lb, not really anything to worry about. If you were talking about dropping an H22a into a crx, that'd be a different story, but you're not, so don't worry about it. And don't worry about running race gas if your aren't willing to fork out 500+ for custom pistons. You won't need it. Even if you were running PCT pistons in an LS block, you could probably get around it one way or another. I am going to be running ~11.5:1 in my LS build, and I'm going to tune for crappy California 91 octane, and I'm not worried at all. As far as the potential for a b16 over a D-series motor? The blocks are beefier, the technology is better, the aftermarket support is larger, two cams instead of one (excluding the 1 dohc d-motor), stronger connecting rods and crank, Better transmission gear ratios, More people familiar with tuning them, etc.....
[post=470168]Quoted post[/post]​


Sorry man, but the $8500 I was talking about was canadian not american so maybe around $5000 US. And for some strange reason CRX's seem to be fairly overpriced, recently i've seen '92-'95 Civics priced lower than CRX's. And considering the b16a already adds a fair bit of weight, I'm not even considering dropping in an LS. Plus it would cost more for me to do an LS/VTEC setup than simply swapping in a b16a. And yes the stock b16a cable transmission is better than the stock d-series cable trans, although there is no aftermarket support for upgrading the gear ratios of the stock b16a cable trans, whereas i could do a zc/si hybrid trans w/ ATS 4.73 FD. And just for reference sake it would cost me about $2900 CA to swap in a b16a and about $5000-$6000 to swap in a LS/VTEC. Although I was wondering if it would be possible to mate a first gen b16a to a YS1 cable trans from a usdm b17a1.

OH and i don't know what type of car you're looking at dropping your ls/vtec into, but 125 ft-lbs at the wheels in a crx is a fair bit, and the numbers that i saw were just with the supercharger, everything else was stock. So there was still plenty of potential left in the engine.

Oh and aside from stroker kits the aftermarket support is pretty much the same for d-series and b-series engines.
 
Oh and what kind of transmission are you using, cuz if you using the stock LS transmission the amount of performance you'd be able to get out of your engine would be severly hindered in comparison to a b16a cable trans or the zc/si hybrid trans with ATS FD.
 
You can say that an ls tranny has tall gears and all, but overall it isn't going to be a big deal for me. I am going to stay with a cable tranny setup, and use my LS tranny until I can find a hydraulic gsr tranny and do a full hydraulic swap into the car. None of that hasport cable to hydro conversion garbage. You should price the ls again, I gaurantee it will not cost that much, even to ship it from the states. As for aftermarket, you won't need to modify the b16 tranny much, as it is already fairly short geared. And yes, the ys1 cable tranny from the 92-93 gsr will bolt to a b16a. ALL b series trannies will bolt up to any b-series motor, you just have to get the right number of splines on the clutch plate so it will match the transmission. Also, if you are willing to crack open a tranny and swap out gears, you have more experience and money than I do. I won't touch a transmission until I have at least 3 grand in the bank and a couple more years of engine repair experience under my belt.
 
haha..i bought my 91 crx hf with a B18a in it..intake,cams,cam gears,kyb gr2's,integra springs,and crossed drilled and slotted rotors for 1500$...then just yesterday i bought a b18b motor complete for 300 bucks,which i will build up,and then put it in my car..so LS motors arent expensive,u just gotta know who to get them from.
 
Originally posted by MikeBergy@Mar 8 2005, 12:13 AM
You can say that an ls tranny has tall gears and all, but overall it isn't going to be a big deal for me. I am going to stay with a cable tranny setup, and use my LS tranny until I can find a hydraulic gsr tranny and do a full hydraulic swap into the car. None of that hasport cable to hydro conversion garbage. You should price the ls again, I gaurantee it will not cost that much, even to ship it from the states. As for aftermarket, you won't need to modify the b16 tranny much, as it is already fairly short geared. And yes, the ys1 cable tranny from the 92-93 gsr will bolt to a b16a. ALL b series trannies will bolt up to any b-series motor, you just have to get the right number of splines on the clutch plate so it will match the transmission. Also, if you are willing to crack open a tranny and swap out gears, you have more experience and money than I do. I won't touch a transmission until I have at least 3 grand in the bank and a couple more years of engine repair experience under my belt.
[post=470562]Quoted post[/post]​


Well I've actually emailed a few places based in the states and they'd told me it would cost about $500 US to ship any engine to canada. And the only other places for engines are either onine stores or ebay.ca, I've yet to go to any non-online stores in my area and I don't have enough mechanical knowledge to go to a scrap yard and find a motor, so I don't know, and the only b18b i've seen for sale online in canada was @ jspecauto.com going for $990 US engine only. Although I still don't like the idea of having to buy springs right after swapping in a b-series engine, don't get me wrong i love NA, but the supercharged z6 just seems like a lot less hassle.
 
Well I've actually emailed a few places based in the states and they'd told me it would cost about $500 US to ship any engine to canada. And the only other places for engines are either onine stores or ebay.ca, I've yet to go to any non-online stores in my area and I don't have enough mechanical knowledge to go to a scrap yard and find a motor, so I don't know, and the only b18b i've seen for sale online in canada was @ jspecauto.com going for $990 US engine only. Although I still don't like the idea of having to buy springs right after swapping in a b-series engine, don't get me wrong i love NA, but the supercharged z6 just seems like a lot less hassle.
[post=470571]Quoted post[/post]​


A supercharged z6 will be more hassle. I'd just turbo it for the money you'd spend on the sc kit. Superchargers suck unless you are looking for low end grunt. It runs out of steam on the top end. Talk to beerbongskickass about turboed d-series, he seems to like that setup and has experience with it. I'm sure there are plenty of others who have experience with it too. Bottom line, modifying a stock engine will almost always be more hassle than just swapping a better engine in there.
 
Flat out, the best performance to money in that car is going to be an LS motor with a Y1, S1, or J1 tranny (JDM B16 tranny). You'll make 120ft*lbs torque and 140hp and you'll have the option of later swapping the head to a VTEC one. You should be able to find an LS motor for about $500, a b16 tanny for about $500, put $500 into mounts, SL, and swap related shit, and you have a monster CRX for under $1500USD.

I have a b16 in my CRX and I can tell you that it is an awsome swap. It makes mad power up top and is fun as hell to drive. I also get really good gas milage and its runs just fine on 91 octane gas. However, the swap cost me a little over $3000USD.

Either B-series swap will do you well. I'm sure you'll be happy with either. I was amazed by the power my CRX had after the swap. (I almost lost it in my pants during that 1st run arround the block :D ).

Oh yeah, don't worry about shit like extra weight of B-series motors, its completely negligable. So don't worry about petty shit like that.
 
Originally posted by ktanaka@Mar 8 2005, 02:11 PM
Flat out, the best performance to money in that car is going to be an LS motor with a Y1, S1, or J1 tranny (JDM B16 tranny).  You'll make 120ft*lbs torque and 140hp and you'll have the option of later swapping the head to a VTEC one.  You should be able to find an LS motor for about $500, a b16 tanny for about $500, put $500 into mounts, SL, and swap related shit, and you have a monster CRX for under $1500USD. 

I have a b16 in my CRX and I can tell you that it is an awsome swap.  It makes mad power up top and is fun as hell to drive.  I also get really good gas milage and its runs just fine on 91 octane gas.  However, the swap cost me a little over $3000USD. 
[post=470750]Quoted post[/post]​


The price for the LS swap sounds nice, but i don't have enough technical knowledge to pull that off on my own, so i'd also have to pay someone to install it.

And how did you pay $3000 USD for your b16 when i can get one bought and installed in my car for $2800 CAN.

Oh and how good is really good gas mileage.
 
Back
Top