hi everybody. me and my friends did our first motor swap this weekend in my backyard to my 1992 honda civic si hatchback. the motor we swapped in is a B18C1 from an Acura Integra GSR. so here is a build up of it. the swap was done in the shed behind my house. i didn't take too many pictures because we were all rushing and running around trying to finish it by sunday because i needed to get back to college today for classes and exams. i wish now that i had taken more pictures but i guess i had so much on my mind, as did everybody else, while doing this that it just slipped our minds.
I bought the motor from an auction dealer. The car it came from was crashed in the rear and he bought it at an auction in New York and had it shipped here to Massachusetts. It's a 1997 Acura Integra GSR with 70,000 miles and a title to prove. I have the title of salvage as well as the receipts from the auction. I had talked to the guy on the phone and he wanted $2600 for the complete motor swap (everything under the hood including the ecu) and when i went to go look at it i honestly had no intention of buying it unless he would come down at least $700 on his price, but when i got there and i saw the car and motor i knew i couldn't pass it up. The motor was completely mint, probably the cleanest looking usdm b series motor i've ever seen. and the front of the car was mint too. everything was completely stock there wasn't one modification done to the car. The previous owner of the car was a middle aged man that used it as a commuter car for work. It was a green integra with tan interior. He said the lowest he'd go was $2400 so we settled on that. I paid him $500 down and installments of $250 every sunday at 1:00 for the following couple months. My brother bought the front end and interior for his green ls/vtec integra so everything worked out good i guess. I will say though that he was a real honest guy, very nice and understanding and it's good to know for peace of mind that people you are doing business with are honest people.
anyway, here's a picture of the motor while it was still in the integra. this picture was taken back in january when i first bought it. i don't know why i didn't take a picture of the whole car.
two months later i had the motor paid off. Friday we decided to take the d16 out of the civic. I was getting the gsr motor the next day so we wanted to be able to put it in right away. (my other jdm gsr hatch, the red dx, in the background)
my friend dave (91sib16 on here) backing the hatch into the shed, and arthur i don't know what he's doing
i guess dave was the last one to drive the hatch with a single cam
my friend steve working on taking out the axel. the axel nut was giving us a real hard time.
we got the motor out around 1:00 in the morning. we were taking breaks and taking our time and s**t that's why it was so late when we got it out. but special thanks goes out to steve for helping me all night with it. everybody else went home at like 10 and i was stuck there by myself and he came back to help. and i couldn't afford an engine lift so we took it out without one by just dropping the motor with jacks. real men dont use engine lifts.
dave, me, joey, and pete saturday morning
so me, dave, and pete went to the guy's house to pull the motor out of the integra. we had to pull it out ourselves in the pouring rain and it was freezing out and it sucked i'll tell you that. dave and pete were the only ones that would help take it out in the rain so if it weren't for them it would not have happened. the guy's dad owned a junkyard down the street so we unbolted everything and when the motor was ready to be pulled from the car the guy's dad came with a forklift to pull it out. i dont know why but i didn't take any pictures when we were taking it out. my brother came with his truck and took the motor back to my house.
we got the motor in without an engine lift as well. we just put it under the car and jacked it up into the bay. thats steve's method of swapping motors. who needs an engine lift anyway?
with only 2 mounts in place and really nothing connected it started right up with the first turn of the key! i got the shift linkage and rear mount bolted in, dave cut the exhaust and connected it because there was a 6 inch gap between the end of the header and the cat, arthur put the axels in, wayne put the radiator and hoses in and helped with the vacuum lines, and everyone connected s**t back together. the cv boot on one of the axels was broken but wayne fixed it with some good ol' coat hanger. good job wayne
i was out getting parts but steve and leighton pulled it out of the shed into the street.
terrible picture but you get the idea. we didn't spend much time cleaning the bay because we just wanted to get the motor in the car and running and driving. i'll do that later when i have time.
the suspension is offset here because i just adjusted it real quick in the front to compensate for the weight difference with the gsr motor. the suspension is ground control coilovers with kyb agx shocks.
arthur and mike
here's the shed after it was all said and done
hybrid motor swap completed in less than 2 days. the car runs and drives awesome. it pulls very strong and is a blast to drive. everybody says gsr tranny is a lot longer than the b16 but the gears feel just as short as a b16 to me i love it. it starts every time and idles perflectly. we're using a p28 ecu right which shouldn't be a problem until we get the obd1 p72 ecu. i have the obd2 p72 ecu from the 97 integra if anybody wants to buy it, its of no use to me. the vtec seems to be kicking in too. the only thing that needs to be done, as far as i know, is for the IAB's to be wired in and i think i'm gonna have the shop do that for me. hopefully that will make the car pull even stronger at lower rpms. also i got rid of the power steering, power steering sucks anyway
i just want to thank everybody very much for helping with this. dave, steve, arthur, leighton, joey, pete, mike, wayne, drew, my parents, and bickfords for late night dinners (and anyone else i may be forgetting). especially dave and pete for helping take that motor out in the rain and steve for helping us shimmy the motor in with no lift. it was a team effort and it's not my gsr hatch it's our gsr hatch. its just as much all of yours as it is mine.
I bought the motor from an auction dealer. The car it came from was crashed in the rear and he bought it at an auction in New York and had it shipped here to Massachusetts. It's a 1997 Acura Integra GSR with 70,000 miles and a title to prove. I have the title of salvage as well as the receipts from the auction. I had talked to the guy on the phone and he wanted $2600 for the complete motor swap (everything under the hood including the ecu) and when i went to go look at it i honestly had no intention of buying it unless he would come down at least $700 on his price, but when i got there and i saw the car and motor i knew i couldn't pass it up. The motor was completely mint, probably the cleanest looking usdm b series motor i've ever seen. and the front of the car was mint too. everything was completely stock there wasn't one modification done to the car. The previous owner of the car was a middle aged man that used it as a commuter car for work. It was a green integra with tan interior. He said the lowest he'd go was $2400 so we settled on that. I paid him $500 down and installments of $250 every sunday at 1:00 for the following couple months. My brother bought the front end and interior for his green ls/vtec integra so everything worked out good i guess. I will say though that he was a real honest guy, very nice and understanding and it's good to know for peace of mind that people you are doing business with are honest people.
anyway, here's a picture of the motor while it was still in the integra. this picture was taken back in january when i first bought it. i don't know why i didn't take a picture of the whole car.
two months later i had the motor paid off. Friday we decided to take the d16 out of the civic. I was getting the gsr motor the next day so we wanted to be able to put it in right away. (my other jdm gsr hatch, the red dx, in the background)
my friend dave (91sib16 on here) backing the hatch into the shed, and arthur i don't know what he's doing
i guess dave was the last one to drive the hatch with a single cam
my friend steve working on taking out the axel. the axel nut was giving us a real hard time.
we got the motor out around 1:00 in the morning. we were taking breaks and taking our time and s**t that's why it was so late when we got it out. but special thanks goes out to steve for helping me all night with it. everybody else went home at like 10 and i was stuck there by myself and he came back to help. and i couldn't afford an engine lift so we took it out without one by just dropping the motor with jacks. real men dont use engine lifts.
dave, me, joey, and pete saturday morning
so me, dave, and pete went to the guy's house to pull the motor out of the integra. we had to pull it out ourselves in the pouring rain and it was freezing out and it sucked i'll tell you that. dave and pete were the only ones that would help take it out in the rain so if it weren't for them it would not have happened. the guy's dad owned a junkyard down the street so we unbolted everything and when the motor was ready to be pulled from the car the guy's dad came with a forklift to pull it out. i dont know why but i didn't take any pictures when we were taking it out. my brother came with his truck and took the motor back to my house.
we got the motor in without an engine lift as well. we just put it under the car and jacked it up into the bay. thats steve's method of swapping motors. who needs an engine lift anyway?
with only 2 mounts in place and really nothing connected it started right up with the first turn of the key! i got the shift linkage and rear mount bolted in, dave cut the exhaust and connected it because there was a 6 inch gap between the end of the header and the cat, arthur put the axels in, wayne put the radiator and hoses in and helped with the vacuum lines, and everyone connected s**t back together. the cv boot on one of the axels was broken but wayne fixed it with some good ol' coat hanger. good job waynei was out getting parts but steve and leighton pulled it out of the shed into the street.
terrible picture but you get the idea. we didn't spend much time cleaning the bay because we just wanted to get the motor in the car and running and driving. i'll do that later when i have time.
the suspension is offset here because i just adjusted it real quick in the front to compensate for the weight difference with the gsr motor. the suspension is ground control coilovers with kyb agx shocks.
arthur and mike
here's the shed after it was all said and done
hybrid motor swap completed in less than 2 days. the car runs and drives awesome. it pulls very strong and is a blast to drive. everybody says gsr tranny is a lot longer than the b16 but the gears feel just as short as a b16 to me i love it. it starts every time and idles perflectly. we're using a p28 ecu right which shouldn't be a problem until we get the obd1 p72 ecu. i have the obd2 p72 ecu from the 97 integra if anybody wants to buy it, its of no use to me. the vtec seems to be kicking in too. the only thing that needs to be done, as far as i know, is for the IAB's to be wired in and i think i'm gonna have the shop do that for me. hopefully that will make the car pull even stronger at lower rpms. also i got rid of the power steering, power steering sucks anyway
i just want to thank everybody very much for helping with this. dave, steve, arthur, leighton, joey, pete, mike, wayne, drew, my parents, and bickfords for late night dinners (and anyone else i may be forgetting). especially dave and pete for helping take that motor out in the rain and steve for helping us shimmy the motor in with no lift. it was a team effort and it's not my gsr hatch it's our gsr hatch. its just as much all of yours as it is mine.
