-TJ and I have been working with GhettoDyne (GD) and EcuControl (EC) on some of his cars for a little while now. I had expressed my desire of getting electronic advance distributing on my EW motors to be able to run the same ECU’s that we had modified for GD and EC. We went down the path of looking at how to modify the appropriate distributor to make a hybrid, I kept coming up with problems that were costly to overcome (in my opinion – BTW Tom, that distributor is in its final resting place…). One day (I guess after using –TJ’s parts cleaner, because the answer should have been obvious from the start) we realized that the 1st generation Integra heads had the same bolt pattern as the EW blocks. I have been using 1st generation Integra head gaskets on my EW race motors for years and it took –TJ’s solvent to crack open the old gray matter. There is another reason for doing this – DOHC without having to change transmissions, knuckles, linkages, etc. So, this is how far we have come.
The block is built with stock rods fitted with ARP rod bolts, then resized. I chose the stronger rod bolts because they are $50 a set and I wanted the added insurance for the higher revs the motor will see with the new electronics. I used Total Seal rings on 86-87 Integra Pistons – they are a 1mm overbore and will yield about 9.2:1 CR. I stayed with the low CR (the 88-89 Integra piston will yield about 9.6:1 CR) because we plan on boosting the motor after we get the ECU programming under control. A word of caution about Total Seal rings, they use a different cross hatch pattern than the stock Honda rings for the hone and take longer to seat properly – they like more pressure on them during the seating process.
Even though the pistons sit out of the top of the bore by 0.25mm, there appears to be adequate clearance to prevent the piston and valve dance that is bad JUJU– about 2mm. The reason the piston sticks out is the fact the EW block has a shorter deck height than the D16, but it also helps get back some compression from the shorter stroke (86.5 vs. 90) and the large combustion chamber volume (33.7cc vs. 43.8). This was done with stock camshafts, but it appears that some reasonable regrind cams would work also.
I used the 89 Integra head (donated by –TJ, thank you!) to get the electronic advance and ECU programmability. You could use the 86-87 head and stay vacuum advance, but there is no way to reprogram the fuel curves that I know of…seemingly, you would get an engine that would just run lean and not make optimal power. I ported and polished the head as can be seen in the pictures. You can also see the EW headgasket sitting on top of the head – the only place that it is off is where the cylinder posts join together. This is easily solved by using the Integra head gasket…but hey, I had an old EW gasket to use for mocking this stuff up, so why not?
After doing the trial assembly, all the clearances were good and the motor turned over freely by hand. The head was pulled and I took the head gasket and measured the crush around the area where the cylinders are and I was impressed to see how even it was (you’ll understand why I did this when you read the problems…or maybe you won’t – just ask).
The plan is to use the stock IM/EM to get things up and running, then to go from there with a possible turbo build.
The problems I have encountered so far…
The center head bolt on the intake side has to be a long one because the Integra head has the oil feed for the second camshaft and it passes through that space. –TJ gave me a couple of bolts, the stock head bolt from an Integra that went there and a bottom end bolt that was longer yet from an Integra block. Problem is that they are 11x1.5 thread and the EW is 10x1.25 thread. So, drilling and taping that one location in the block is required. Since we have plans to turbo the motor we had some concerns about the threads we were making. Drilling out the old threads would still leave a small portion of them untouched and we would essentially be cross threading new threads through a potion of the threads, making them weaker. You can just use the Integra head bolt – it has about 15mm of thread engagement – but it is in the weaker threads. The other option is to drill deeper in the block and put threads down as far as the tap will reach – which is the solution for this block. Taking the longer main bolt and cutting it down by about 6mm was in order to get rid of some of the length. It turns out that the bolt bottomed out in the threads with about 3mm of clearance to the head…DAMN! The solution I am going to use is to put two additional hardened washers under the bolt head to keep the bolt from bottoming out.
The dip stick tube is block by the center stud for the EM. I used a pair of vise grips and grabbed the base of the tube and rotated it back and forth while pulling up on it. It is a light press fit and comes out with a little persuasion. I then reformed the tube to clear the stud, then applied a little Honda Bond and tapped it back into the hole in the block with a small hammer. If you look closely at the side view/close up of the tube, you can see the teeth marks from the vise grips. Just be careful not to crush the tube from being over zealous with the vise grips or while bending.
If you use the stock EM, the flange that is to bolt to the block is a little low because of the shorter deck height in the block. I used a die grinder and just slotted the hole to make it work. No picture yet, but I’ll get one eventually.
The IM bolts up fine, but the supports for it are in the wrong place – it wants to go through the oil filter. I am pretty sure I will have to make a custom bracket, if I do. The crank case breather tube does match the Integra IM – it looks as though it can be easily solved, but I have not got there yet. When I get the IM out of the hot tank I’ll take some pictures of the solution.
The timing belt is going to a problem…again that deck height issue. I am going to –TJ’s tonight to pick up an assortment of old belts to play around with. I believe the eventual solution will bit a spacer or tube that goes over the stock tensioner to make it a larger diameter. That should take up enough of the extra length in the belt that we don’t need.
Of course, there will be electrical issues in converting to the new ECU with all the sensors it needs…but that is for a later date.
Sorry for being so long winded and not taking enough pictures - I'll try and work on that for the second installment.
Kirk
Edited by gtpilot, 17 October 2005 - 11:53 AM.