New here - great idea for a website

[quattrodave]

I've been passionate about MPG for a long time, enough to figure out driving styles for the cars, but not enough to actually do any modifications.

Just got done with a car purchase; a depressing process. We need a four-door, as this was to be our "road trip" car and we carry two adults, dogs, often music gear and/or PA equipment. Very dissappointed to see that the Honda HX engine is not available in a sedan, so we settled for a '97 LX 5spd. I was expecting 42-45 miles per gallon, because that's what I got in my last Civic Sedan, but this one is delivering a very disappointing 33 city and 37 highway. The car is far more sluggish and chintzy feeling than the turbo Audi that it's replacing, and the Audi was getting us 27-28 city and 30-32 highway, yet could punch us 0-60 in 6.6 seconds. I don't feel a need to have that much acceleration any more, but for the amount of performance that we give up in the Civic, I sure expected bettter MPG. I know a few other owners of this vintage LX, and very few are, in fact, getting as good of mileage as we are- probably because we've learned to drive "for mileage".

So, I look for easy ways to make it do better. I'm sure one could install an HX engine, and probably get 10 more MPG (and 8 more HP, which the car could use), but such a project's magnitude is far past what I'm going to be able to put into it.

Ultimately, we plan to save gas by creating a lifestyle that needs far less driving.

[Matt Timion]

Welcome Dave...

I am in the same situation as you, only my car is a 1989. I am, however, going to drop the Civic VX engine into my car. (the VX is the 1.5L obd1 version of the Civic HX).

I guess all you can do is pray for your engine to die so then you can swap out in the HX engine

Anyway, welcome here and I hope you participate much. More than anything this is a place for like-minded people to talk about anything. If you have suggestions on how to make the site better, please let me know and I'll get working on it.

[SVOboy]

You're getting pretty ****ty mileage for the car that you have. Anyway, what was your last civic. You could swap over the head of the HX engine and it'd be the same as an engine swap, but much easier.

[Matt Timion]

Originally Posted by SVOboy

You're getting pretty ****ty mileage for the car that you have. Anyway, what was your last civic. You could swap over the head of the HX engine and it'd be the same as an engine swap, but much easier.

I'd double check this before actually doing it. The VX had different pistons and rods which would probably make doing a mini-me (just swapping the head) a bit of a challenge.

As for getting ****ty mileage, I think he's getting above EPA... which isn't bad at all.

[SVOboy]

The d16y7 is touted for being an awesome mileage engine for some reason.

Anyway, I'm talking about a d16y5 head on the y7, not the d15z1, the head is basically the same and the swap would work exactly the same as the very common vtec mini-me with the d16y8 (civic ex of that generation).

[Matt Timion]

Originally Posted by SVOboy

The d16y7 is touted for being an awesome mileage engine for some reason.

I think I read this too. I do believe it was great because some guy ran the d16y7 engine with a DPFI intake manifold and and a pm5 ECU. It probably got such good mileage b/c the ECU thought it was a 1.5L engine and not the 1.6L that it really was.

[SVOboy]

You can really run any old d series on a pm5 and dpfi, I dunno why people chose the d16y7, . Meh.

[quattrodave]

A head swap is well past the level of work I want to do on cars any more. No garage, not even a paved parking place. I *could* convert the barn into a car workshop, but am trying to avoid the need to feed power to that structure. I live in a pretty rainy place.

I guess what you're telling me is that the variable valve timing mechanism of the HX engine is in the head. I'm sure that you have to have an ECU that knows that the variable valve timing hardware is in place, and controls the valve timing correctly, too. I doubt if it's just a head swap.

My last Civic was a 1990 LX 5-spd, and it was nearly impossible to get less than 40MPG with it, even when I thrashed it. Before that, I had a 1980 1.3 CVCC, which did 48-52 and before that, an '86 CRX HF, which always beat 50. Of all the Civics I've had, the CRX HF was the quickest, too. The slowest was the 1980 and the 1990 was close. The '97 is quicker than the 1990 was, but not by a lot. The engine (per specs) has 8 more HP, but the car is heavier, probably because of the required airbags.

[Matt Timion]

Originally Posted by quattrodave

A head swap is well past the level of work I want to do on cars any more. No garage, not even a paved parking place. I *could* convert the barn into a car workshop, but am trying to avoid the need to feed power to that structure. I live in a pretty rainy place.

I guess what you're telling me is that the variable valve timing mechanism of the HX engine is in the head. I'm sure that you have to have an ECU that knows that the variable valve timing hardware is in place, and controls the valve timing correctly, too. I doubt if it's just a head swap.

My last Civic was a 1990 LX 5-spd, and it was nearly impossible to get less than 40MPG with it, even when I thrashed it. Before that, I had a 1980 1.3 CVCC, which did 48-52 and before that, an '86 CRX HF, which always beat 50. Of all the Civics I've had, the CRX HF was the quickest, too. The slowest was the 1980 and the 1990 was close. The '97 is quicker than the 1990 was, but not by a lot. The engine (per specs) has 8 more HP, but the car is heavier, probably because of the required airbags.

I have a 89 Civic LX... I love this car. It's almost identical to your old 90 LX.

weight is a big issue for MPG, as you know. I'm pretty certain that it would be much more than a head swap for the HX head to work on your car. There would be wiring as well as the need for a piston swap (unless you want to use 93 octane gas all of the time).

[SVOboy]

I guess what you're telling me is that the variable valve timing mechanism of the HX engine is in the head. I'm sure that you have to have an ECU that knows that the variable valve timing hardware is in place, and controls the valve timing correctly, too. I doubt if it's just a head swap.

Well, when I say head swap I am also implying things like ecu and wiring and distributor (don't think that head needs a different one).