'02 Civic Sir tuning advice

[wrb61]

I recently bought an '02 Civic SiR and I'm looking to upgrade it a bit to get a some more power and performance out of it. The previous own had already installed a carbon fibre air intake chamber, a custom exhaust with a magnaflow muffler, slotted rotors, and few minor things that were fairly non-performance related.

The car is already decently quick as it but obviously I'm looking for a bit more out of it, lol. I just wanted to see if anyone had any recommendations as to what else I can upgrade on it? Also, despite wanting better performance, I also need to use this car as a daily driver so I need to keep it road worthy, but possibly track capable.

Any advice will be greatly appreciated.

-thanks
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[T9 man]

I would look into having the car ECU remapped for performance. You have an induction kit and custom exhaust system which is a good start.
I think you should get a few more horses this way, cannot recommend anyone to you personally as I am based in the UK but Google will be your friend here. Also before you have the car remapped it is always a good idea to have the car serviced first, especially the sparkplugs.

 

[wrb61]

Also, any recommendations on what grade gas I should run? I was told not to run anything above 89 because I run the risk of blowing a piston. Can anyone vouch for the truth of that advice?

 

[T9 man]

I would have to see what the difference is between the fuel you use in Canada and the stuff we have available in Europe.

 

[pgarner]

i would say whoever told you that go actually go read up on petrol (gas). although we use different grades to you honda spec that you really shouldnt be using anything under 99 over here. think thats around the same as your 95 possibly.

the higher the number the more resistant it is to pre det / pinking. this is worth noting in high compression engines such as the k20. granted modern engines have knock sensors that will retard the timing but then you will be losing power.
by running low ron you are risking wreaking the engine as the knock sensors wont pick up until the predet starts. if the fuel/ air mix is then trying to burn to early it will be trying to turn the engine the other way which im sure youll understand isnt good

 

[wrb61]

95 is very hard to come across. I think the three local gas stations around me carry 91, possibly 93 at the highest.

 

[pgarner]

had a little google to work out what the differences between the US and UK figures were.

here in the UK we only use the RON - Research Octane Number
in the US you use the average or the RON and MON ( Motor Octane Number )

from figures that i could find ideally you want to around the 91 mark minimum. the top 99 RON fuels in the uk that i could find figures for worked out as around 92 - 93 mark in the US way of reading.
The similar fuels in the states worked out as 91.5- 92

hope this is of some help

 

[bboynumero3]

Okay, I have the exact same car, and I also know alot about fuel. DO NOT run anything more than 87 octane(regular). pgarner was right and wrong. Higher octane makes the fuel more difficult to ignite, so it's needed in high performance engines where there is much more heat, so that it does not ignite before it's supposed to. But to make it more difficult to ignite, they have to put additives in it, which actually cause it to burn colder, and contain less energy, despite what everybody thinks, octane does not equals power. So whoever told you that by running premium you will burn a hole in your piston, is horribly misled. Run regular, 87 octane. It's all that they need, and that's what will run the best. Our K20A3 doesn't produce enough heat to pre-ignite the fuel. And even if it did, the knock sensor would catch it and retard the timing. But you would still be making more power than you would be running 91 or 93, whatever premium is where you are. Also, the knock sensor works within milliseconds, one or two pre-detonations is not going to hurt anything