jstrzinc

i'm 16 and my dad just bought me a 96 civic ex.. we're working on a bunch of stuff to bring it back up to stock because the last owner was not a good one.. i don't know a lot about cars and i'd like to race it and put it in shows.. but i don't know a whole lot i can do with it. help please? keep in mind i have low income due to school still and no job as of yet.
thanks.

Omniscient

That might be a little hard then with school and no income. Unless you put a double cam engine in there, there is no efficient solution for speed other than turboing the single cam. Then you could always do your suspension to lower the center of gravity. That can run from 300$-1000$ depending on what you want to get. You could put a high flow cat convertor and a catback if you want to. It can be relatively cheap but you won't even notice a difference in speed. Get lighter wheels 15" or 16" with a good tire. I don't know it all costs money. What are you and your father willing to spend on it?

jstrzinc

i plan to keep it around for quite a while, so i'll be making money the entire time i have it. no choice really, but i will have a job this summer making pretty good money and i'll probly get one before then if at all possible. we're using the $500 i've already got to return it to stock. after that, it's whatever i make that goes into it. my dad won't spend anything on it. i just wanna get fast enough to beat the cars around my area for now. i'll work on big races and stuff later. i also want to keep some money for a lightweight body kit and neons later...

CaliDELSOL93si

NOOOOOO BODY KIT. Keep your original body and NO NEONS. don't do anything to the car until you have the money to do it. when you have money, then come back and tell us exactly what you want to do and we will help u out

Omniscient

You're going through the same thing I did. I bought a 80$ intake, a 200$ header, 150$ catback, spend like 80$ on plugs and wires. And it didn't even SLIGHTLY compare to my stock ass b16. I would say save up 500-1000$ and get a b18b motor. It's non-vtec (not that it in all actuallity matters) but it makes good torque, pretty good hp, and handles boost like the motor was meant to be a stock turbo'd motor. From there you have a world of options to do stuff. Just by adding that extra cam in the b series engines makes a world of difference.

2gr84u

by "beat the other cars in your area" im gonna hope you dont mean street racing. I can tell you now, if you street race your going to either loser your life, or your car and its really not worth it. Also whats this "light weight body kit" Your factory front bumper, sideskirts and rear bumper are all plastic, your not dropping any pounds adding a body kit, but your gonna lose alot of drivability due to the risk that the kit will be destroyed after a mishap with a pot hole. Also if your REALLY interested in knowing what you can do to your car, then use the search function, this topic has been covered atleast 8 times in the last 2 weeks