1987 Honda Accord LX-i

You mean like a good speechless or a bad speechless?

Swapped out my headlights and marker lights for some LEDs. It’s awesome.

[quote=”CanDo807″ post=171517]Nice looking Gen 3 Accord!

Been thinking about some mods to my Gen 3 to make it a sleeper. However, no idea where to start.

Thought I might up grade rear drums to discs and a dude told me I’d need new knuckles.

Then not sure I understand what you are doing to get more power out of the A2OA3 engine? How does the cam effect output? What change does the cat back exhaust add? Can you turbo these engines?

Kinda wondered if dumping the 2.0L for a 2.4 VTEC might make some sense? (does my ignorance show?)

I plan on rebuilding my long dead AC, will do the R134A upgrade unless I can figure out how to do that new stuff, Opteon 1234YF.[/quote]

Hey, thanks for checking it out. I’ll try to answer your questions as best I can.

-Only the SE-i came with rear discs. If you can find a donor, you can pull the setup from it, but they’re very hard to come across.

-The cam affects valve lift duration, allowing the engine to suck in and blow out more air at once, which equates to more fuel being burned and more power produced. If you go for a really aggressive regrind, you’ll need to retune it.

-The exhaust just allows less airflow restriction, freer flowing air = more power.

-People have turbocharged these engines before. Pretty much everything is going to need to be custom fabricated though. I actually know a guy who’s working on a draw-through turbo on his A20A1 (the carb’d version).

-I don’t know of anyone who’s put a K24 in one of these yet. HOWEVER, a company called Innovative makes mounts to put a B-series engine into one of these. Something like a B18C1 would be rather ridiculous.

-These cars came with two types of AC compressors, manufactured by Keihin and Denso. Denso compressor = R134, Keihin compressor ≠ R134. The Denso compressor is pretty huge and barrel shaped; the Keihin is kinda small and has rectangular protrusions.

Hope I helped. And here’s that turbo A20A1:

[quote=”CanDo807″ post=171754]Wow! Thanks for all of that! Now I have some thinking to do!

Any idea what the cam, catback and intake mods did for your HP & torque? I think the A20A3 is good up to about 120 HP? [/quote]

120HP is around what a stock late-model A20A3 puts out. The mods didn’t add huge gains, but it definitely woke it up a bit. A guy I know with similar mods had his dyno’d at around 135.

As far as the brakes go, I looked around and it looks like knuckles from the SEi can be had for 50-75 from the online junk yard places. I am guessing that a lot of the maintenance parts are still around for those rear disc brakes as OEM or resellers (RA etc) parts?

I haven’t looked myself, but I don’t see why not. In my opinion though, unless you’re really pushing it hard, your money could be better spent elsewhere, especially if you’re having to buy new or remanufactured parts.

One thing I would recommend looking at: The ’88-’89 model year LXIs had bigger front brakes; if you have an ’86-’87, you could swap those over. That, some nice pads, and new rotors (I personally recommend Brembo Blanks), and you should be set.

Got to thinking about ABS too. I think I read somewhere one would need to buy a “simpler” system (Gen 1 style?) that works on a separate computer? Or am I just inviting trouble? More go needs more Whoa! Right?

That would be astronomically expensive and require all kinds of custom work.

Yeah +40% boost in HP with a B18C1 would be nice! LOL! Once can dream….

Not to mention having a much better (read:existing) aftermarket.