Starter Mods, good place to start.

[MugenEJ6AutoX]

**Under Construction**

-Mugen

[8695Beaters]

Three corrections/ additions:

1) The bend in the header does not create the power (well it kind of does, but the bends are there mostly to clear the rest of the engine bay). It's the length that does. A header is basically a tuned pipe. Imagine you are playing a clarinet. If it is out of tune, you adjust the length to bring it back in tune (by pulling out the mouthpiece a hair. The length adjusts the note and therefore the tune). The same idea applies to your engine. Certain harmonics will cause air to flow out of your engine faster at certain RPMs. Nearly all headers are tuned to create peak power in a 500 RPM band. Where that band is depends on how you drive the car and the engine.

2) Dramatic is a relative term here. Think like 15-20 horsepower on a regular four-cylinder. However that ends up being about 15% depending on the engine.

3) As for brands, just open up any good car magazine (my favorite is Sport Compact Car) and look at the ads. Anyone with at least one full page will probably help your car, not hurt it.

[MugenEJ6AutoX]

Yes i agree with the headers, I was trying to make it simple. Different pipes do different things, depends on the application.

P.S.- I can't find a SCC in my entire town.

[8695Beaters]

Simple is ok, but correct is more important.

As for SCC- SUBSCRIBE!!! Saves money and you never have to look for it!

[TJ213]

I know you were trying to do a basic outline, but there are a few important facts about intake and exhaust systems that are missing.

Intakes:
Short ram intakes can cause a heat soak issue when you are moving from a stop, although I feel this is often exaggerated it can be an issue. However, you will not see this problem on dyno charts as the car is usually sitting there with the hood open and fans blowing onto the intake.

Cold air intakes are more prone to a hydrolock situation, where water may be sucked into the engine, and can cause problems as water does not compress like air does. I have noticed some people having problems with the filter getting wet in heavy rain and the car not running well or stalling out.

There are several types of aftermarket replacement filters available, and you must be careful when choosing one. The K&N filter comes to mind. Although a great marketing success, many people still question how well it actually filters out particulates in the air. There is also the problem of getting the right amount of oil on the filter.

One thing of note on stock intakes is that depending on your car the stock system may actually be much better than the current after market systems. The current generation Civic Si (FG2 and FA5) has a cold air intake system on it from the factory. This system is not prone to hydrolock, and some may argue that the plastic intake design may actually be less prone to heat soak than a metal intake pipe. However I have not seen any evidence to prove that so at this point I believe it is just conjecture.

Here is Honda's diagram of the k20z3 motor with the intake shown on the right.


It is also worth noting the level of complexity of the above stock intake. I have not yet seen, other than the incredible expensive Mugen intake, an intake system on the FG2 or FA5 that is capable of increasing power across the rev band, almost always they show a drop of power in the lower revs, which is an area where our smaller displacement cars need power, and the part of the rev band you will be in most often for daily driving.

It is definitely worth pointing out that on the FG2/FA5 it has been noticed that using a throttle body spacer and performing a throttle body coolant bypass has provided essentially the same increase in HP (about 10hp) as using a CAI according to the dyno.



On exhaust one thing worth noting is that many headers that are sold for our cars are "race headers" which remove the cat. Although this does free up a lot of restrictions, it is illegal, really can make your car smell like a junker, and is immoral for reasons of pollution. I agree with your view of leaving the cat in there.

One thing of note is that it has been proven on the dyno that headers such as Comptech's shorty headers do increase top end horsepower, but at the same time sacrifice a bit of low end torque.




Its not a bad article, and I probably went more in depth than what you were looking for, but I think that people often overlook the level of work Honda's engineers do in order to maintain both peak horsepower and decent torque for daily drivability.

[8695Beaters]

^^^^^I could not have put it any better myself. Today's OEMs (not just Honda) lave a lot less on the table in terms of performance. In some cases (the R34 GT-R, S2000, and Mazdaspeed3 come to mind) something like an intake can actually cause a los of power or even throw and engine code. The turn of the millenium has made a lot of changes, mostly for the good. But the days of 30 hp gains from simple parts are long gone. Remember that when you being to modify a new car. Also remember that an old car will always have to catch up to a newer car in technology and advances (this would be why AE86 Corollas are not very popular race cars anymore. The designing dates back to the 1970s. Today's Civic Si can run circles around the old clunker).

[93HondaSI]

If you plan on a big sound system, chrome rims, and a ugly body kit; stop reading.

LMAO nice

[MugenEJ6AutoX]

Ok, I wanted this article to be extremly basic. Alot of kids come on with little to no knowledge and I tried to explain it as simply as possible. Also the people who fall into that cato are usually on their first or second car, this meaning that its 'most likely' a pre-2001, which makes many of these mods useful. I didn't finish this article for this exact reason, Im a criminal justice major who intern's at a shop. I'm not an expert. Please add on to this article, I know when I started out I had no idea to even the basic functions of the engine. I want to help out the other members, I'm not afraid of critism.

So to all the moderators- Critque, repair, and add to this article. Lets help out the new members who are kinda lost. No one wants to admit it, but we all were lost at some point in our tuning career's.

*I added something to the first paragraph I think you may approve of.

[TJ213]

You've got a good point there, I always go a bit overboard on details.



woah, it disappeared

[MugenEJ6AutoX]

Well I put up my "Under Construction" sign, when the article is finished you guys should expect it in your PM box, for critque.