1st gen crx question (other carburetor options?)
 

so far I am enjoying my crx. the 1300 carbureted engine, with 133,000 miles, runs just fine. I realize though, that this is a 28 year old vehicle, with a complicated carburetor. when the carburetor starts giving me problems, I am wondering if a weber carb, and a low end torque header, would be the way to go ?

If you go with an after market carburetor you might as well swap out the head too, read up on the CVCC head and you will quickly see that the spark plug is not in the combustion chamber like it is on other engines, it's off to the side in a little pre-combustion chamber with it's own intake runner and intake valve going to the 3rd barrel on the carburetor, but I don't think there are any non CVCC heads that will fit the 1.3L engine, so your best bet might be to find an aftermarket fuel injection system that has an aux injector for the pre-combustion chamber.
Really tho, the carburetors on Honda Civic's are pretty solid, rebuild kits for them are cheap, rolls of vacuum line are cheap if you need to replace a single hose and the stock carburetor lets the engine run in more or less a lean burn mode with deceleration fuel cut off, you even have an o2 sensor on there that controls the carburetor for better fuel economy.

So my suggestion is to get some old repair manuals and a dealer shop manual for your car so you can learn how to keep your carburetor properly adjusted and every 10-20 years you might need to pull the top off, clean it and use a top end rebuild kit to replace the gaskets.

thanks, I have heard it is a really complicated carburetor, the previous owner just had this one rebuilt, and it seems to work good, so I won't worry about it.

You might not notice it in warm weather if it's missing, but your car also came stock with a warm air intake, it's a flexible piece of air duct that goes from the exhaust manifold to the air intake, they sometimes go missing because they get tattered and the car seems to run ok without it... for a while, but make sure it's there and the engine will see a constant supply of 100F air.

http://www.hondaautomotiveparts.com/...b201_e0302.png

It's part number 2 in the drawing, if it is missing auto part stores can get it if you ask for flexible heat duct.

yes, I noticed the warm air intake, and mine is intact, but thanks for the drawings.

The carburetor is actually two carbs in one. The prechamber circuit runs at a mixture of around 12 to 1 while the main portion of the carb is around 18 to 1. Any other carburetor will not have the capabilities of the original one and if it is running properly than I wouldn't touch it will a 100 foot pole.

regards
Mech