How good is the factory b17 crank shaft compared to the b16?
what do you mean? all honda bseries crankshafts are super high quality. are you talking about why everyone wants the b17 crank so badly? The following is how it was explained to me. It is so highly sought after b/c you can put it into an 84mm block with some longer rods and you have yourself an engine that revs to 10000 rpm and is still 1.8 liters. Can’t do that with a b16. Think of a crotch rocket. Say a CBR 1000. Ever seen one rev? It’s a combo for what some say is the ultimate all motor engine. It’ll rev really fast, realyl high, and have a HUGE power band.
Yes I am asking about the benefit of the 1.7 crank. I also noticed that the new civic’s are D17.
10000!! holy crap!! so one could use a b20 block and 1.7 gsr crank? would they have to be custom rods or are there some stock rods that would work for that set up?
Well tuning and overall package has to be considered. Custom rods for sure, I don’t know of any stock rods long enough. You’d need some HUGE cams and a bulletproof valvetrain. Something like JUN state3 or the biggest Toda’s you can find. It would be a race engine for certain.
Interesting very interesting, Ice. This makes me wonder: if the B17 crank is badass, why didn’t Honda of Japan use it in larger quantities and limited it to just the US for that matter?
There’s a lot more to factor in than the crank, remember, we’re talking about an entire motor, not just one component. Not to mention all of the other factors not even related to the actual pieces of the engine.
With the b17a Honda tried something very strange - a low compression vtec motor. I’m not sure what their motives were here. They took a b16a and increased displacement but then decreased compression ratio. This could have been due to a ton of different factors. Maybe they were trying to give the US and Canadian markets a vtec motor but be safer on lower octane fuels? Maybe they thought the US market wanted more torque than the b16a… the possible reasons behind their logic are endless.
Either way, the eventually decided that it wasn’t an ideal setup. More displacement and a higher compression ratio brought them to build the b18c1.
I personally think the b17a is a great motor, but it’s weak link is the compression ratio. These motors respond wonderfully to a bump in compression.
As stated already the b17a crank is going to be the same as the b16a crank - build wise that is. If the reason for your question is durability or strength of the engine you’re building you’ll probably want to look more at the other components and possibly rod/stroke ratio as well.