B17A1 Build plans: help (thoughts, opinions) needed

ASSISTANCE Hybrids & Advanced Aftermarket Engine Performance
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Yeah, I couldn’t actually put wheels like that on this car but I like to imagine I’m the kind of guy that could totally rock them for sheer camp value and be super cool with it. But yeah, aside from the fact that they are expensive and that color is ugly as sin, they are probably heavy as all get out. And, obviously, as Colin mentioned, the offset and width are definitely less than desirable. I’m thinking they could look pretty sweet on a corrado though. Ah. I had all but forgotten about that car. I almost bought one once. They look sweet (for a VW).

Correct me if I’m wrong, but the ARP rod bolts themselves are really only a small part of the cost of using them, right (considering the machine work that needs to be done?) Honda engineers definitely have cost constraints when designing an engine as well as considering drivability and fuel economy, but they aren’t idiots. If the bolts they chose are fine for the ITR, they are fine for me.

As far as the magniflow comment, I was just referring generally to the fact that almost all of the mufflers and resonators on his site were magniflow. I didn’t say it, but I did assume his cats were magniflow also. I didn’t realize he had them made in house. cool. Honestly, I probably won’t be able to justify the cost of a header from him when it comes down to it. The one benefit would be that it wouldn’t sit low at all and would hug the oil pan just like a stock manifold. So the likelyhood of bottoming out on it is pretty low. Plus, I will probably only drop down about 1.25" or so.

Good info about cats. I’ll keep that in mind when deciding on placement. I’m toying with the idea of just driving out to VA to get SMSP to do the exhaust themselves. I figure they know about quality welding. We’ll see how everything shapes up with our discussion. I did mention it in my original email, but he has been concentrating on figuring out how my oil pan is shaped. Did I mention I only had the car a couple weeks before I broke it? Don’t judge my filth!

Just out of curiosity, do the ebay knock-off tri-y headers bolt up to the stock exhaust, or are they longer like a true custom smsp or hy-tech header?

You know, looking at my pictures, I think my stock cat is gonna be just fine…:uhoh:

EDIT: And later, when I’m talking about powder-coating my front lower arms, you’ll know why. I’ve gotta sand down that rear crossmember too and make sure the rust from where the ABS unit leaked on it isn’t anything more than cosmetic.

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Filth I say… FILTH!! Hehe.

As far as the eBay tri-y I believe they are longer than the standard oem header… my eBay 4-1 is actually pretty close to the stock length.

The arp bolts do require more work being as the big-end of the rod will need to be resized/honed to make sure the extra clamping force doesn’t take the rod out of round. I would think that the type-r bolts would withstand abuse up to the stock redline… as long as they were new and not old/stretched. You’re right… thought and quality engineering were put into those parts so I would probably put my trust in them. But the extra security of ARPs wouldn’t be a bad thing either, more peace of mind, etc.

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I forget how much the labor was to install my ARP’s, but I think it wasn’t much. The stock ones will be plenty good though if they’re the same as the ITR’s. The only thing I don’t know is how strong they are as in lifespan.

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If indeed they are the same part/#, you would think that you could get 100k+ miles out of em.

Colin, what do you think about using the ITR redline on stock B16/B17 main bolts? I guess its only from 8200 to 8500 (or 8700 depending on what engine you’re talking about)… but your thoughts?

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You should EASILY get 100k+. My comment wasn’t meant to infer that they do wear out, simply that I have no idea if they do get old or not. It’s possible that under normal (non extreme) conditions, a part like that would be good nearly indefinitely.

I don’t know anything about the strength of the stock main bolts and what their limits are. I’d think they’re fine for the higher redline. It seems to me that a lot of these parts are plenty good from the factory for almost all NA setups. With those RPM you’re starting to hit the top end for the ITR cams and won’t really need to go any higher until you get something more aggressive.

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Yeah, there are two sizes of main bolt; the one that is the same size between the type R and the B17 is the same part number. I may actually go with ARP studs for the mains though. I do see an advantage to using studs over bolts which is why I’m also going with ARP over OEM on the head. My feeling is if I don’t get at least 150k miles out of this package before it really needs to be refreshed, then I fucked something up.

Out of curiosity, what did you guys do about the FITV? Chunk it out the window at speed? I assume since the hondata s300 lists “water temperature compensation” as a feature that if properly tuned, the FITV would be completely unnecessary, right?

Also, do either of you (or anyone else) know if the ITR IM bracket bolts to the B16/B17 block and works properly? I know it isn’t absolutely necessary to have a bracket there, but if a stock one works (or is close enough to easily make work) then I may as well include it.

I think it goes without saying, but I appreciate you guys having this dialog with me. I know I’m flip flopping back and forth on random and petty things, but it is really helpful to be able to hash out these details. I wish I had a good experienced engine builder who was willing to discuss these details with me.

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Oh, and whatever hardware I use, it will be new. Those bolts (in general) do stretch because of the heat cycling on the aluminum components around them and I’ve learned my lesson about trying to reuse old bolts. :horny:

(There isn’t a blushing emoticon so I decided to use the most inappropriate one I could find instead.)

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I got rid of my B18a style throttlebody and used one that just has the inlet/outlet for coolant to pass through… no fit valve etc. I’m not using Hondata, but the FITV isn’t really needed one way or the other. My ride fires up and idles like a champ right off the bat. I believe the IACV is much more important to have than the FITV. Ditch it if you have the means to pick up a 94+ throttlebody… if not, it doesn’t hurt anything to keep it installed.

Head and main studs are a good idea, as I said earlier, they’re pretty cheap insurance.

I believe the b16/b17 IM bracket fits the R manifold… I actually left it off of my motor so I can’t say for sure that it bolts up… but I would bet that it fits… at the most you may have to use washers or something to take up any gaps between the manifold and the bracket, but I’m sure bolt-placement is the same.

Did you ever look more into a catch-can setup? The reason I ask is if you decided to use one, the time to delete it is when the block is at the machine shop. They take the black breather-box off the block, and put in (what looks like) a freeze-plug in the big hole, and a allen-key plug in the smaller hole. Then weld in an A/N fitting to the valve cover and run your catch can hose.

It sounds like a pain, and frankly, I wasn’t even going to do it… but after talking to the guy who assembled my motor I ran with it. He explained that what is shoved through the breather and PCV system is nasty exhaust fumes and oil gasses… “do you really want that stuff pushed into your freshly built and tuned motor?” He asks me… lol… I kind of was coersed into getting it, but the princible makes sense.

When does your R manifold arrive? I’m betting you’re stoked on that :slight_smile:

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The manifold actually arrived Monday. It was a little anticlimactic since I already knew the IACV had been busted during packaging and then to see it was just shoved in a large box with peanuts just made me sigh. The nipple for the brake booster vacuum line is all bent up so I’ve got to try to bend that back without putting a crack in it. I’ve never done any pipe soldering before, so maybe this will be my chance. I added the pics to the same album I linked to before. I actually have an old B18A IM sitting around, I think I’m going to see how hard it is to heat up the aluminum around that fitting and swiveling it 90 degrees so it doesn’t stick straight up but instead points towards the brake booster. I assume it is just press fit in there and not screwed in, but I’ll figure it out on the practice IM.

I actually started looking into the catch can thing and then got sidetracked. I assume with the setup you have that there is still a line that goes into your IM though right, just that a catch can filters a lot better than the stock breather?

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The manifold actually arrived Monday. It was a little anticlimactic since I already knew the IACV had been busted during packaging and then to see it was just shoved in a large box with peanuts just made me sigh. The nipple for the brake booster vacuum line is all bent up so I’ve got to try to bend that back without putting a crack in it. I’ve never done any pipe soldering before, so maybe this will be my chance. I added the pics to the same album I linked to before. I actually have an old B18A IM sitting around, I think I’m going to see how hard it is to heat up the aluminum around that fitting and swiveling it 90 degrees so it doesn’t stick straight up but instead points towards the brake booster. I assume it is just press fit in there and not screwed in, but I’ll figure it out on the practice IM. He is going to send me another IACV.

I’ll just have to figure out the bracket thing when the engine comes out.

I actually started looking into the catch can thing and then got sidetracked. While I see the benefit in not sending atomized oil to the IM, I would still want to get the gases there eventually. I think a lot of catch cans allow for this setup though. I’ll have to do some more research into it and see if the catch cans out there are true oil/air separators, of if they just rely on a cheap filter to catch some of the oil before dumping it into the atmosphere.

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Yes the vacuum booster nipple and the pcv nipple should both be press-in units… I took the pcv nipple out and tapped it and plugged it with an allen pipe-screw since I used a catch can.

Speaking of, the catch can system I used has one inlet hose, that connects to the valve cover. The top of the can has a filter, and the bottom as a fitting on it that screws open and closed… you check it every once-in-a-while and drain any oil that has been captured it it. There’s no return line back to the motor, its strictly for catching oil and blow-by gasses. Mine is the 1qt Morosso can setup. For the price I paid the filter better be decent! Lol. My brother runs the same can and his b16 spins to 9,500rpm and the filter has never spit any fluids anywhere… and it does the job of catching oil that would have been sucked into the IM. It may not be totally necessary on NA motors, but on boost I would consider it a need. And on NA, I figure it wouldn’t hurt.

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So…does your crankcase not have a way to vent? I thought you said something about an AN fitting. Maybe I’m just missing something.

I think I will probably get a true oil/air separator that still makes use of the PCV system and also returns oil back to the crankcase. That way vacuum from the manifold will still draw excess gasses out of the crankcase. Obviously there won’t be quite as much O2 in my air mixture, but it shouldn’t be that much different. As long as actual oil isn’t getting fed into the IM and reducing my effective octane, I’m happy to combust those gasses. I mean, you might not care about the environment, but I do. (i am totally messing with you)

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Wave your GoGreen! Flag somewhere else you dirty hippie!!!

But seriously… the AN fitting is welded to the valve cover, then the hose goes from the fitting to the catch can. Then you delete the hose that is supposed to go from the valve cover to the intake tube. So the only crank case ventilation is the AN fitting going to the catch can… but the hole/fitting is big enough for your index finger to fit in (its a -12AN fitting) so it is plenty big enough. it was just explained to me as those gasses will throw off your tune if they’re sucked into your intake system… impurities etc. Maybe its not all that bad, but i’d rather not put the stuff into my $5,000 motor you know? Maybe some reading up on it would be useful… but that was just my understanding

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I don’t wave a flag, I wave my 1911. I’m all about environmentalism BY FORCE! :gunright:

ha ha.

Yeah. I’ve gotta look into it some more and figure out a little more about it before I make any hard and fast decisions. I was paroosing the helms (I find it a little sad how often I do that) and realized that my comment about crankcase pressure was actually a little silly since obviously the oil passage from head to crankcase allows pressure equalization.

Huh. This website explains the system pretty well and makes sense. I think with the system like we have, if you have a good running NA engine with minimal blow-by, the amount of hydrocarbons getting into the system would be pretty low and relatively contaminant free and I would guess have a minimal impact on O2 mixture. Plus, when vacuum is present in the IM, you would be actively ventilating the engine and supposedly keeping your oil from absorbing too many of those hydrocarbons. For others studying those pictures, our engines are the “Open ventilation” model but instead of a vented oil cap we have that tube that sucks air from before the TB into the valve cover. But yeah, I bet the breather chamber (especially a 18 year old one) doesn’t do a steller job of seperating out the oil (which is one reason the inside of that ITR manifold I bought is nasty).

Good stuff.

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Yea the whole idea of it is pretty interesting… Ok, Im a nerd lol.

I actually stopped by my brothers shop and talked with him about it… He said that when he was looking into the whole catch-can thing that upon surfing the web and various sites that he found people were actually gaining power from running an external can setup in comparison to the stock setup. He said he even recalled some domestic cars (Mustangs/Camaros) picking up like 20-30whp simply from the catch can setup.

He said that if you dont have a crankcase ventilation, or if its not adequate, then the backpressure from the gasses can put pressure on your crank and rotating assembly, making the engine work harder… When there is adequate ventilation it ‘frees up’ power in a sense. Im kind of rambling in a hurry as I dont have much time on the pc at the moment, but I see that you’re doing your own homework so I’m sure you’ll come to an educated conclusion before you make the choice of which route to take.

But here is a picture of my brothers setup, for the sake of just getting the idea across:

AN fitting in the front of the valve cover going to the catch can, that you can barely see lol. Good times.

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wow, tons to catch up on…

  1. The b17a IM bracket does NOT work with the ITR manifold. I just decided not to use a bracket, others seem to do it w/o any problems so I figured it should be OK. But then again my IM hardware is also brand new so that’s probably extra assurance. I forget exactly why the b17 bracket didn’t fit. I also fabbed a small bracket to hold my wiring harness since the IM bracket has a small piece on it designed to hold the wiring.

  2. No FITV for me. My understanding is that you can just tune it to run a bit higher idle when cold so that it’s not trying to stall. After the car’s warmed up it’s basically only the IACV which deals w/ the idle.

  3. The various nipples on the IM are all pressed in, the brake booster one usually rotates very easily. Removing them however can pose a complete PITA. I chose to remove/add a couple vacuum nipples on my manifold to make for a cleaner install and so that it would look stock and still function properly regarding my smog equipment. If you’re interested I have pics of some of this stuff, pretty sure I’ve posted it all before.

  4. I haven’t looked into catch can setups much because I don’t really see the necessity of such a setup on mildly built motors. If figure my engine is basically an ITR engine but slightly smaller, so the stock PCV will be more than adequate.

It is true that you can gain power from adding one, I’m not sure what power level you need to be at for there to be a benefit, it’s gotta be way more than I’m making.

And for me I don’t see the necessity of adding more “stuff” to the engine bay. If I decided to run a catch can I’d try to figure out a way to do it that didn’t add all sorts of large hoses all over the place, probably work with the stock setup as much as possible but just make some improvements maybe. Just an idea. Plus I want my bay to be as legal as possible. True, my header, intake, fuel rail, and fuel pressure gauge aren’t legal, but that’s minor stuff and stuff that’s easily removed. With a carb legal intake and header I’d likely not even get hassled at all if a cop or smog shop checked out the engine bay. With a catch can setup it’d be a HUGE red flag.

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Gotta love Cali emission and inspection laws. The day a cop here asks me to pop my hood on a routine stop I think I’ll have a heart attack. Very uncommon here.

Buymysoul has a point though… Have you looked at the inside of your intake manifold after a few thousand miles? The inside can get pretty nasty and grimy due to the oil being sucked into it. Having those fumes and oils going elsewhere is a good thing. Not only is it going to keep your motor cleaner, its going to keep your octane rating up and prevent pre-detonation.

Overall I think its a good idea. Is it an absolute necessity? No… But like I said, after spending 4-5grand on a motor, another hundred bucks is really a drop in the bucket. At 8,000rpm you’d probably be surprised at the amount of oil being flung around inside the head… I rest comfortably knowing that the oil is being caught and not combusted. My 2 cents anyway :dance:

What intake are you considering for this build? As Colin pointed out, a nice 3" piece can yeild some good results. I myself am still using the stock airbox with removed resonator… stupid battery takes up too much space lol.

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I don’t mind the emissions, it’s the modification rules I hate. I’m all for strict emissions standards, but think you should be able to do whatever you want in mods as long as you can pass the sniffer. Screw all that CARB stuff!

I’m aware of the residue the manifold can accumulate, although my experience is that it’s not that much even on 150k motors. And in my situation this engine will never see that many miles, it’d be lucky to get 2k per year for the next 5-10yrs, after that who knows. I guess that for my situation I see no real world benefit, and the big negatives of looks and added components.

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That’s a valid point and I now understand where you’re comin from… when my DA is back on the road I’m more than likely gonna be putting some decent mileage on it… and after deleting the AC/PS/Cruise Control and a few other things, I have a decent amount of room at the front of the engine, so a can really isn’t a huge drawback for me. But I could see how, in a engine bay with all of those things still installed, putting a catch can in there would be a tight squeeze.

Grrrrrr I want my damn car finished! Lol, sorry for the sidetrack… just thinking outloud.

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It’s not a space problem, it’s aesthetics. My bay is stripped down too, I’ve spent a lot of time getting rid of stuff and the addition of something like a catch can is just adding clutter (imo).