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Introducing myself, New CRX in Tacoma

2K views 7 replies 7 participants last post by  whiteyfu 
#1 ·
Introducing myself, New KRX in Seattle

Introducing myself and my car to the Honda community. I'm not new to cars and racing, but I'm a just baptized fan of the Honda community. I'm campaigning a K20 equipped CRX in this year's Washington State SCCA time trials, but before this year I have pretty much avoided the Honda community. I've always been turned off by the stance life and the living my life a quarter mile at a time nonsense, so as an unfortunate consequence I've kept away from some fantastic road racing machines.

A Racetrack Epiphany

What changed me was a track outing at the Ridge Motorsports park last year in my BMW 335i where my 450hp car with r-compound tires got smoked by a tiny B-series equipped CRX. I was having trouble catching some 911s on the track, but this CRX not only caught me like I was nothing, but caught the 911s. Long story short, a month later I sold the BMW and got my CRX.
Rebuilding

I didn't want to waste the time building the car, and just wanted something turn key to start driving it, so I bought a CRX a K-swap already completed. Unfortunately that plan lasted only as far as halfway home with the car. While the motor build was top notch, I started to notice how neglected the suspension and braking systems were. I noticed the car start to get very unstable at anything above 120mph where it would sway noticeably left and right. Looking under the car, I found many of the bushings almost torn in half from age related wear. Braking was awful too. Threshold braking from 100 to 50 just once would fry the brakes. The last major problem was the radiator. It was a standard capacity unit that worked fine street driven, or on the occasional drag run, but the car would over heat at only 10 minutes of track driving. I had bought a car that required a complete overhaul.
I spent the next 6 months trying to find the right parts to repair, upgrade, and tune the braking, suspension, and cooling systems for track duty. You'd think getting a Honda would make something like that easy since tons of research and parts are available for such a large community. Unfortunately the size of the community means a lot of mis-information exists. What actually works, and what doesn't is are rare pieces of information. Why? It seems that the people with real experience to make worthy contribution are vastly outnumbered by forum trolls.

Slow Start, Fast Car

Everything eventually got replaced. Aside from the chassis, body and interior, the entire car is brand new. Every rotted bushing has replaced. Even the nuts and bolts holding the suspension together were replaced with new OEM bolts. The brake system is all new with a Willwood front kit with and a disc conversion in the back. The steering rack is taken from a SI version of the CRX. The suspension is a beautiful GC coilover instead of the generic street springs it came with. There's tons more but you can see the total list in the specs below.

Conclusion

It took a couple months to get a baseline done, but this car's first stage of becoming road worthy is complete. It's very controlled and capable. The K20 gives the little 1900lb CRX a very brutal and raw acceleration feel. It will outrun many cars costing 3-5 times a much. For the class that it is currently running in the club trails, it is very competitive. It's also a joy to drive on the weekends in the mountains or even just mundane trips to the grocery. It's really a car that can do it all. Now that it's complete not only do I drive it around regularly, I enjoy the genuine compliments from other enthusiast. I never experienced that kind of interaction from the BMW enthusiasts.

So all of this is a long winded way to say I'm hooked, I love my CRX, and so glad I got smoked that one track day almost a year ago today.

Specs

My engine configuration:
1988 Honda CRX HF
Honda K20Z3 (dynapack 232whp ~270bhp corrected)
Stock Internals
Kpro PNF-A04
3in cold air intake
Skunk2 70mm Throttle
Skunk2 Intake Manifold
Skunk2 Megapower Header
2.5in exhaust pipe
Magnaflow N1 muffler
RC Engineering 440 Injectors
Walbro 255lph Fuel pump
OEM NGK Iridium Plugs
OEM coil packs
BDL fuel Rail
AEM fuel pressure regulator
VW Rabbit single core radiator
Enhanced air flow front bumper
6 speed transmission w/ LSD 4 final
Base RSX axles w/CRX Si hubs
Unknown lightweight flywheel
XTD Stage 1 pressure plate and disc
Suja1 Cable to Hydro clutch line conversion

My chassis configuration:
Grouncontrol coilovers W/ extended top hats
Koni single adjustable sport dampers
OEM HF front sway bar
ST rear sway bar
Hard race bushings
SPC Rear toe link
SPC Front camber ball joint
Skunk2 Rear camber link
Konig Dial-in Wheels 15x7 (front & rear)
BFG Rivals 205/55/15 (front & rear)
Wilwood 11" brake kit w/ EBC Blue pads
Rear 10" Scarebird disc conversion w/ EBC yellow pads
Russel stainless steel brake lines
1.5in brake air ducts
CRX Si rear LCA

Suspension Alignment settings:
Springs 550f - 450r
Front dampers 1/2 turn from full soft
Rear dampers full soft
Front toe 0deg
Rear toe 0deg
Front Camber 2.25
Rear Camber 1.75
Rear sway bar setting 3of9
Front cold tire pressure 26psi
Rear cold tire pressure 26psi

Lap Times:
Ridge Motorsports Park 2m:02s
Pacific Raceways 1m:41s

1988 K20 Honda CRX with Wilwood Brakes









 
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#4 ·
Welcome, glad you chose a crx as your first honda! Most people only notice the stanced and riced ones and keep telling themselves all hondas are like that. They're amazing machines when modded properly, as I'm sure you've already noticed

Sent from my SGH-T399 using Tapatalk
 
#6 ·
Very cool! I don't believe I've ever heard of, in my nearly 20 years being into these cars (before I could drive even) of somebody going from a BMW (let alone a 335i and not just a run of the mill leased 328 you see everywhere), to a CRX. It's usually the other way around! Pretty cool you were very objective about it and realized the merits of a great, small platform with a nice powerplant in it. Of course, like you said, there is an overwhelmingly huge ricer community that has given Honda enthusiasts a bad name. And the F&F movies back in the day didn't help.

Awesome car though. It looks to be in great shape. Your car should be capable of running a 12 flat in the quarter, or darn near close!
 
#8 ·
I absolutely love what you're doing with this car. A lot of people turn their noses up when they see these at track days, especially when you're around a lot of newer, and more expensive cars, but I've surprised a few people with how competent the car is around pacific raceways. I still haven't driven on the ridge yet. (Let a friend drive it there though).

I'm running a similar suspension and brake setup, but I only have a b16 in my car. Still fun though.

Keep up the great work, and maybe I'll see you at one of the local track days!
 
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