Of all the capabilities instilled in the human mind, creativity is perhaps the most potent. Remember those little building block sets that you had as a kid? With just a few snaps of multi-colored plastic bricks, you could create a replica house, car, plane or knife. That is, if your mind was that sick when you were a kid.
Demented antics aside, those made-in-China toys were brilliant for one reason and one reason alone; that they let you make whatever the hell you wanted. The ability to pick up a handful of blocks and create something that only you could see as real is a lesson learned early in life.
But early life lessons only get stronger and built upon as one gets older. Take the Honda camp for example. By digging through the deep storage bin of Honda engineering, you can build a car limited only by your imagination. With a little bit of monkey grease, you can have a Honda Accord with a Prelude engine, a Civic with a RSX Type-S motor or a CR-V with the heart of an Integra Type R. Try doing that with little pieces of plastic.
When Eric So of Fairfax, Va., went looking for a new project car, he knew it had to be a Honda. The perfect combination of aftermarket support, crossover interchangeability and low-buck performance existed only in the realm of the H badge. The search began and soon ended with the purchase of this 1992 Honda Civic hatchback.
Produced from 1992-1995, the EG-chassis code Honda Civic is regarded quite highly for its combination of low weight and structural rigidity. The only problem with many older front-drive Honda platforms is the powerplant, or to be more precise, the lack of power. In peak running form, a stock D15 1.5L motor out of a Civic DX makes only 102hp and a barely felt 98 lb-ft of torque. Not exactly what you'd call a neck-snapping power monster.
So's solution to his Civics lack of propulsion was to pull the D15 motor and replace it with a B18C1 engine out of a 1996 Integra GSR. Held in place by rock solid Hasport billet aluminum engine mounts, the GSR engine was then boosted with the aid of an inlinePro turbocharger kit.
Skipping the urge to even try his hand at naturally aspirated tuning, So kept the GSR internally stock, right down to the camshafts and valve springs. The only time the cylinder head was ever removed from the car was to install the inlinePro 3mm head gasket. Based around a T3/T4 hybrid turbocharger, the inlinePro kit uses a stainless-steel exhaust manifold with a fitting for a TIAL 38mm external wastegate. Blowing out of a custom 2.5-inch downpipe, the scorching hot exhaust gases flow through an inlinePro 3-inch exhaust system.
To cool the heated and boosted air charge, a Precision TE front-mount intercooler was used, with polished inlinePro hard piping and a fitting for a GReddy Type-S blow-off valve. With the addition of boost, there was no way that a dinky DX fuel system was going to keep up. So uses a Walbro 255lph in-tank fuel pump, which feeds an inlinePro fuel rail using Russell -6AN stainless braided lines. A Russell aluminum fuel filter keeps the octane'd juice pure before entering the RC Engineering 550cc/min fuel injectors. Hondata's S200 system and GM 3-bar MAP sensor, a combination proven on hundreds of boost-fed Hondas, handles the engine management for this EG hatch.