245 replies to this topic

[TheOdditie]

You could go get the crank lightened(and balanced) also, but don't know if you want to take it even that far apart.

As for cutting the block...at first I agreed with you David, but after reading the thread, I don't see that causing any problems considering there is no mounting bolt there. But from what I hear, the transmission is where most of the H series weight comes from. I do believe they make a H/F2B plate as well which would knock off a lot of the weight, and shouldn't require any cutting/grinding on the block.

[strudel]

What would be cool is if I could figure out some way to run the radiator in the back. It would have to be under the car, with air getting to it somehow. Hmmm......

David

Here's one idea that I remembered and had to hunt to find for you. As you know I am a split personality as far as cars go! Read both pages for the pictures. JS
Bottom rear mounted radiator thread

[DEIVIONCRX]

I forgot the autotension deal. The Auto-Tensioner on the 5th gen Preludes was manditory that you replaced it anytime you did the timing belt, unfortunalty most people didnt and they usualy failed, destroying the motor. The manual tensioner is the best thing you could do if you want to keep the motor, lol. You can source all of the parts from the 4th Gen H22 Prelude.

[firstgencrx]

Here's one idea that I remembered and had to hunt to find for you. As you know I am a split personality as far as cars go! Read both pages for the pictures. JS
Bottom rear mounted radiator thread

Jerry,

Thanks for the great link. You and your mini pals are a bunch of clever people! And no, you don't have a split personality, YOU ARE A CAR GUY! We are all car guys, OPS! and Gals! (Sorry Jeep Girl!)

I now have PROOF you spend way too much time on the internet! Every time I have a problem figuring something out, you already know 10 guys that have solved the same problem!

One of the interesting things in the thread was the concern for needing more energy (bigger pump) to move the water in a system where the radiator was so far from the engine. That didn't make any sense to me. If both paths (return and feed) are full (without any air), the only extra energy needed to move the water would come from the friction of the water moving through the system. And that can be easily solved by using larger tubing for the feed and return lines. I did like the idea that the feed lines could add to the cooling.

Water is heavy though, so adding a bunch more water to the system is probably not a good idea, but I will still keep thinking about it until I am convinced otherwise. Fun ideas.

Thanks Jerry!

David

[firstgencrx]

I forgot the autotension deal. The Auto-Tensioner on the 5th gen Preludes was manditory that you replaced it anytime you did the timing belt, unfortunalty most people didnt and they usualy failed, destroying the motor. The manual tensioner is the best thing you could do if you want to keep the motor, lol. You can source all of the parts from the 4th Gen H22 Prelude.

Brandon,

I can't remember where I learned of the manual timing belt tension thing, but I read the same thing about the auto tensioner failing and destroying the motor with it. The achilles heal of the H22! It's the mechanical tensioner from the non-vtec H23 that you use, or at least, those are the parts I ordered. I will do a short post about it when I put it all on.

I did a little more research on the oil pan problem you shared earlier, and I would love to build some baffles, or even make the sump a little larger (not deeper!). But my concern is I have no real solid knowledge of how to do it right. I have seen pans with baffles and one way trap doors before that help direct and keep oil around the pickup while cornering. I just don't feel 100 percent comfortable designing something like this without any real theory or background on the subject. Any articles on the art of this subject you could point me to would be greatly appreciated.

I will post soon with progress of getting the H22 prepared. I am anxious to get it positioned on the floor under the chassis so I can lower the car down onto it to see how stuff fits up!

Take care,

David

[DEIVIONCRX]

IF you dont feel comfortable with it, pick up a aftermarket pan like a Morosso. I dont know the theory behind it, but IMO you just want the oil to stay in the sump.

[strudel]

David,
You are right. I am an internet junkie but in a good way. Research saves your bacon a lot of the time.

I have had a discussion with someone else about rear rads. Im my Mini van I was thinking of putting a small rad on each side just in front of the rear wheel arch. Plus I though it would look kind of cool. A combination of an intake and Naca duct system. Then flush the air out the bottom somehow. One rad fan on each and I think the system would be a treat.

The space constraints with a Honda swap are greater in a Mini than a CRX. The Honda guy I was conversing with said that the oem water pump might not carry the load for the distance it had to run the water. He thought our water pumps were on the weak side. One other possibility is to blank off the oem water pump area and use a Meziere electric pump or even two somehow. Maybe none now that I look at the cost ($400+). Maybe you could just reverse engineer this system and build your own! Comes with a blanking kit so that you can use oem timing belt but no internal pump. I would be interested to know what kind of electric motor/impeller is utilized?


Some of the promotion schlock from another site. JS

INTENSE™ is proud to be the first company anywhere to carry the 3800 specific Meziere Electric Water Pump! The Meziere Electric Water Pump will increase horsepower and increase your ability to cool your engine at low speeds and between rounds at the track. Easy installation and dependable operation makes this a natural for the 3800! Initial tests wth a 180° thermostat show a consistent 185° system teperature on a 100°+ day with the air conditioning on full while running wide open throttle!*

Meziere uses their popular, proven and ultra-reliable custom electric motor with a 3200+ hour life expectancy as the foundation for this water pump. The Meziere Electric Water Pump utilizes a custom designed purpose-built fully CNC machined body and impeller. Engineered for 35+ gallons per minute of optimum flow, Meziere didn't just copy a stock water pump body and impeller; they designed this pump to vastly outflow stock! All of the OEM mounting hardware is retained making installation of this pump a snap! The Meziere Electric Water Pump is finished off in your choice of polished aluminum, black, or red anodized finishes and includes the correct gasket and a weather pack wiring harness with a 20A fuse.
Video Promo

[zakats]

Imo, the stock pump should do just fine as long as your tubing is a sufficient size, yes you are pushing a lot more fluid but I wouldn't think that you would get cooling issues if the tubing running the length of the car is a good 1/4" dia. bigger.
on the subject of engine placement, I encourage you to reconsider- fitting an h22 with its massive transmission will require almost as much frame work as mounting it in the rear... only no where near as beneficial



besides, that was the coolest part of the rexrod project. I want to see it done... so I can copy it later

[firstgencrx]

IF you dont feel comfortable with it, pick up a aftermarket pan like a Morosso. I dont know the theory behind it, but IMO you just want the oil to stay in the sump.

Brandon,

I did find something interesting on the Moroso site, they have a sort of "universal" oil pan kit you can buy to modify your own pan. It has 5 trap doors and some baffles. Might be an option to consider.

I also did some research on the link from an earlier post by you on the balance shaft deletes. Turns out the kit you pointed me to requires a full disassembly of the engine. Some holes need to be drilled and tapped in some oil paths, and it's required to throughly clean the bock when done. I still feel convinced the idea is worth it, and it can be done without taking the motor completely apart. I will keep working on the idea.

David,
You are right. I am an internet junkie but in a good way. Research saves your bacon a lot of the time.

I have had a discussion with someone else about rear rads. Im my Mini van I was thinking of putting a small rad on each side just in front of the rear wheel arch. Plus I though it would look kind of cool. A combination of an intake and Naca duct system. Then flush the air out the bottom somehow. One rad fan on each and I think the system would be a treat.

The space constraints with a Honda swap are greater in a Mini than a CRX. The Honda guy I was conversing with said that the oem water pump might not carry the load for the distance it had to run the water. He thought our water pumps were on the weak side. One other possibility is to blank off the oem water pump area and use a Meziere electric pump or even two somehow. Maybe none now that I look at the cost ($400+). Maybe you could just reverse engineer this system and build your own! Comes with a blanking kit so that you can use oem timing belt but no internal pump. I would be interested to know what kind of electric motor/impeller is utilized?

Jerry,

I have seen the electric pumps before as well, mostly for the American Iron motors. You are right about the price. Way too high for what you get. I think with large enough water feed and return lines, I can over come the extra restriction from the longer flow path. Did you know if I where to use say 16 feet of 2" diameter by 0.065 wall aluminum tubing for those feed and return lines (completely reasonable), that it would add up to three extra gallons of water the the system, and almost 30 pounds of weight to the car? Water is not light.

Imo, the stock pump should do just fine as long as your tubing is a sufficient size, yes you are pushing a lot more fluid but I wouldn't think that you would get cooling issues if the tubing running the length of the car is a good 1/4" dia. bigger.
on the subject of engine placement, I encourage you to reconsider- fitting an h22 with its massive transmission will require almost as much frame work as mounting it in the rear... only no where near as beneficial

besides, that was the coolest part of the rexrod project. I want to see it done... so I can copy it later

Zak,

I would love to run the H in back. I was just trying to make the project easier for me to complete. Once I get the motor back together, I will play around with it up front with mock-ups and see what's going to be in the way. If it turns out to be a lot of trouble, I will definitely reconsider the idea of moving it behind the front seats. It would solve a lot of problems. I still think it will fit. I could be wrong.


Hopefully I can get the H22 put back together here in the next couple of weeks. I am trying to do some preventative maintenance like a timing belt, rear oil seal, manual tensioner, and water pump while it's out and hanging on the stand. I would really like to try and figure out the whole balance shaft removal thing as well as modifying the oil pan. Painting the motor while still on the stand is also a must. Another thing I am going to do is take close measurements of both the intake and exhaust ports in case I end up making custom headers and a new intake manifold for it.

All good ideas.

I will try and make some more posts soon of my progress with the motor. Assembly will be a little slow as I wait on parts and try to find some weight to remove from the H22 at the same time, just in case it ends up going in the front.

Take care all!

David

[strudel]

[quote]I have seen the electric pumps before as well, mostly for the American Iron motors. You are right about the price. Way too high for what you get. I think with large enough water feed and return lines, I can over come the extra restriction from the longer flow path. Did you know if I where to use say 16 feet of 2" diameter by 0.065 wall aluminum tubing for those feed and return lines (completely reasonable), that it would add up to three extra gallons of water the the system, and almost 30 pounds of weight to the car? Water is not light.
/quote]
David,

Clue me in on the need for 2" tubing? I do realize that it will be a bit of a nightmare to run a loop to 2 small rads for my Mini. It's mostly the bling factor for me as it's not a race car. I'm just thinking about the water line that comes into my house and it is 1" pipe which provides a ton of flow but.... the pressure it comes in at will be greater than the flow of an electric pump. Does it have to match the rad hose size to work well for this application? Do remember that the existing hose will run to the rear and can subtract that amount that will go missing in the front. Small gain there!

My existing rad hose is 1.45" OD and the hoses to the interior core are 1" OD. I once had to use clear plastic hose to the heater core to see if all was functioning properly and the water seems to run quite well through them. A Meziere runs at optimum 35 gal/min. That sounds like pretty good volume to me for our cars. My house hose bibs can't fill a 5 gal bucket that quickly! Food for though. Where are the engineering guys to guide us on the right path?? JS

[zakats]

35gal/min seems too much to me

[firstgencrx]

Clue me in on the need for 2" tubing?

It was just a size I picked because it was common and easy to buy. No real engineering behind it.

I do realize that it will be a bit of a nightmare to run a loop to 2 small rads for my Mini. It's mostly the bling factor for me as it's not a race car. I'm just thinking about the water line that comes into my house and it is 1" pipe which provides a ton of flow but.... the pressure it comes in at will be greater than the flow of an electric pump. Does it have to match the rad hose size to work well for this application? Do remember that the existing hose will run to the rear and can subtract that amount that will go missing in the front. Small gain there!

I am in no way up on fluid dynamics, but I do know the distance the water would travel is going to be something like 8 times the distance if the radiator is up front. I figured the larger the feed lines the better to help deal with the extra friction of flow in the system. I guess if the electric pump has a high enough head pressure, it could overcome the resistance and work just fine. I do know the pressure is supposed to be low in the system, so if the pump is super strong, and capable of creating higher pressures due to the resistance in the system, that might be a bad thing?

My existing rad hose is 1.45" OD and the hoses to the interior core are 1" OD. I once had to use clear plastic hose to the heater core to see if all was functioning properly and the water seems to run quite well through them. A Meziere runs at optimum 35 gal/min. That sounds like pretty good volume to me for our cars. My house hose bibs can't fill a 5 gal bucket that quickly! Food for though. Where are the engineering guys to guide us on the right path??

I agree with you that the 35 gal/min seems high, but those pumps are probably made for the bigger V8's. I do know if the water travels too fast through the radiator, the water doesn't get a chance to cool down enough to do it's job. That's why you can buy these restrictor plates from the racing engine shops that go in place of the thermostat to help slow down the water flow in the system. The racers can get them in different diameter openings to play with until they find the one that works best. Of course we run thermostats, but the idea is still there that you don't want the flow to be too high.

Another thought popped into my head, where would you put the expansion tank in a system where the radiator was so far away from the motor? I'm going to guess somewhere close to the radiator, or where the cap is placed.

I think your idea of running two coolers would be cool! Ha! I made a funny. I wonder if you could just run a couple of larger oil coolers instead of radiators? They might be too restrictive with their little fluid lines and all. Just a thought.

I have a friend here in town that owns a radiator business. He can get me almost any size aluminum core they make, so I'll be fabbing up my own custom radiator for this project. It won't be the first one I've built.

Take care,

David

[firstgencrx]

Update 4/28/08: So how much weight can an H22 lose, easily!

I don't want to rip into this thing too far, but there seems to be a fair amount of weight to be lost from just being a little creative. Well, a little more than that I guess.

So I am going to make this the "H22 Actual Weight Loss" post. I will maintain and update what has worked and what hasn't for real savings. It will take several posts to describe the whole process, but this is where you will go to get all the hard data in one shot.

This is what I have so far:

H22 Actual Weight Loss

Item Description **** Old Weight ***** minus *** New Weight ***** equals *** Weight Loss

Front Motor Mount *** 04lbs 1.00oz *** minus *** 0.0lbs 0.00oz *** equals *** 4.0lbs 1.00oz (this is just the block half of the original H22 mount)
Alternator H22/EW *** 11lbs 10.4oz *** minus *** 8.0lbs 7.00oz *** equals *** 3.0lbs 3.40oz
Flywheel ************** 18lbs 11.4oz *** minus *** 9.0lbs 9.60oz *** equals *** 9.0lbs 1.80oz
Half-Shaft ************* 06lbs 10.2oz *** minus *** 5.0lbs 9.10oz *** equals *** 1.0lbs 1.10oz
VSS Swap ************ 01lbs 04.9oz *** minus *** 00lbs 03.9oz *** equals *** 1.0lbs 1.00oz
Crank Pulley********** 05lbs 9.70oz *** minus *** ????
Alternator Bracket *** 07lbs 2.40oz *** minus *** 00lbs 0.00oz *** equals *** 07lbs 2.40oz (this is now part of the drivers side mount)
Ballance Shafts ****** 14lbs 1.20oz *** minus *** 04lbs 3.40oz *** equals *** 09lbs 13.8oz (I had to put back some parts for the manual tensioner)
Intake Manifold ******* 22lbs 12.0oz *** minus *** ????
Driver side MM....
Pass side MM...
Rear MM...
Lower cross member....

*************************************************************** Grand Weight Loss Total So Far: 35lbs 8.4oz

I started to make a table in html for the above data, and it started to get way too complicated, so I just used the "*" symbol as a place holder. I hope it's not too irritating.

So far this is what I got. I will add to and complete this list as I go. Most of it at this point doesn't even have a "new weight" assignment because I am not finished figuring it out. It will be in posts following this one where I'll show how I get these numbers.

Take care,

David

[zakats]

Last I checked, the H22 transmission is about 7lbs heavier than B series, engine is close to 30lbs which you are already close to getting there... so the real question of weight isn't as much about the quantity, but where it is located in relation to the front axle line.

[firstgencrx]

The H22A. Honda made a ton of these motors. There is a pretty good aftermarket for parts, and they are easy and cheap to find. So why don't more racers run these motors? It's because the most you can ever hope for out of an H22 is about 700 horses. Compare that to B motors out there pumping out more than a 1000 hp.

Still, the "H" is a great motor for the budget minded. You get a lot for the buck!

I stared the stripping process. I wanted to get the thing down far enough for maintenance and to get a good enough look at it before I used it.

Exhaust side:


Intake side:


End view:


Now the Honda Motor Company likes to go to all this trouble to make well engineered motors that make almost 100hp per liter from the factory. Then the engine engineers must hand off to the car division, who then likes to hang tons of cast iron form everything. That brings up the very first and easiest weight loss item, this damn cast iron from mounting bracket:


No need for that big piece of cast iron junk! ** Minus 4lbs 1oz, Ka-ching! ** We are on our way:


I plan to use the original front drivers side mount on the frame. Honda put it there for a reason, so I am going to use it:


The H has a ton of ready made holes to fab up a great front mount in the location of the stock one on the front left side of the motor. 12 to be exact:


Maybe these four holes:


I thought it would be cool to make the front motor mount out of aluminum, and have it be the alternator mount as well. Sort of dual purpose. I can't post any more here, but looking at the idea of using the EW alternator for weight savings (thanks Brandon for the idea!) will be covered in the next post.

Take care all!

David