This thread bums me out! $1500 plus 30mpg beaters that will smog without $500+ in repairs and under 200k just don't seem to exist in the Atlanta area. I've been looking for months
Now we don't have rust issues down here so cars stay viable for a long time.
I am being a bit selective and want something fun to drive. I'd like a coupe like a civic hatch or simular that I can put some suspension tweets under it for the North Ga twisties but will still be decent form my frequent 180mil round trips to get my kid on the weekends. Been hoping to find Unmolested CRX DX or SI, they just don't exist at that price range around here with out half butt cut springs lowering jobs, junk speed parts, half a** motor swaps. That's a lot of my problem. The cars I'm interested in are also the same ones that tend to get hot rodded. In my area. I did find manual insight's pop up from time to time that could be hand with done batteries. That's seems to be not uncommon. But battiere are stupid expensive. Thats got me doing research on batteries and possible repowering if I can figure out how to get it smogged with say a 150hp civic motor so still get mid 40's or better mpg for about what the batteries would set me back.
This is what got me thinking a repower. 89-91CRX is 2200 ish lb. First gen Insight is 1800ish lb and lower drag co. This guy in FL jammed a 200+hp K20 series engine in one and gets 46hwy.
Honda K Powered Insight - Environmental Blasphemy - Honda Tuning Magazine