Dreaming...lean burn manual taller transmission Civic sedan...or get an Insight
 

During the final days of driving Silver Aero I got into the 50s mpg with hypermiling. Automatic, no lean burn.

What if I were to sell my car, buy a manual 7th gen sedan, and have an HX engine & tranny swapped in?

My car with all the maintenance done to it could probably sell for close to $4000. There's a rusty HX with good engine and manual tranny for $600. Found a clean '03 manual civic sedan with bad engine for $900 obo. That would leave me close to $2500 to pay for the swap and any additional changeover & maintenance, plus whatever from if I could sell or scrap extra parts.

Would all the lean burn and necessary fixings swap over into a manual 7th gen sedan body? Or would it be better to just put $$ into the HX only? I prefer the 7th gen sedan over 6th gen coupe but whatever works. The HX has 317k miles

Not something I could do anytime soon; it wouldn't be until next year May at the earliest, but would something like this work? With manual, lean burn, and kill switch I'm sure 80+ mpg is possible with maximum hypermiling, and 60 mpg with regular driving.

Didn’t they make a 7th gen HX?

They did, but coupe only.

All the coupes in the area are rusty, and insurance is less for a sedan.

I've also read that HX motors are troublesome to maintain and lean burn is picky to engage; what if I were to get a CRX HF manual trans with the 2.95 final drive and swap it into a manual 7th gen sedan? Would it fit? And do taller transmissions hurt city FE? If so, would RE92 insight tires help?

EDIT: Looks like the CRX HF transmission is cable instead of hydraulic; what about a CX or VX transmission? Would it fit in a 7th gen civic body? Found some manual 7th gen civic sedans with bad trannys for $850-$1000. Or some shells (need both engine & tranny) for $250-$300.

What would be the best engine + transmission option that works for fuel economy in both city & highway driving that fits in a 7th gen sedan body style? Or 6th gen (possible consideration)?

From what I understand, the 7th gen Civic still uses a D series engine, so a CX/VX trans should bolt up to the engine, I’d build a high compression D16 and the tallest transmission I could run behind it... I’d go for lean burn but you may decide to skip on the more expensive O2 sensors

I'm stuck here on two options. Both are priced based on stuff I found tonight, but similar options are found everyday:

- 2000 Civic sedan Manual shell $300
- HX engine $400
- CX/VX transmission $300
- ECU tune $500
- RE92 165/65R14 tires $377
- Tire balance $80

Total: $1957
Labor: $2500
Cost: $4457
Sale: $4000
Final standing: -$457

Or

- 2001 Civic sedan manual bad trans - $900
- CX/VX trans $300
- Tire rebalance $80

Total: $1280
Labor: $1500
Total $2780
Final standing: +$1220

Obviously the first option is more fuel efficient due to having lean burn, but is significantly more expensive. Per ecomodder research a CX/VX transmission makes it difficult to engage lean burn at lower speeds, which is why I'd downsize the tires. That or tune the ECU for better lean burn + possibly bypass o2 sensor & cat.

Other option would leave me over a thousand in pocket, same car but manual for better efficiency plus kill switch capability, and taller transmission, which if I'm getting 60 city 56 highway hypermiling the crap out of my auto, should get me to 70+ city and mid 60s highway.

What do y'all think? Advice? Due date to have this all figured out by is May lol.

Edit: or what about a Honda civic hybrid and then bypass the battery when it does? Does it still have lean burn without the battery? If so does that make it comparable to an HD in terms of fuel economy? If so that would be much cheaper.

Why not seek out a VX hatch? It’s way older than your Gen7 but it’s proven to work

EDIT: there’s a HCH1 in the for sale section right now for $500... why not look for one of those?

These fantasy swaps are a fun game. The swap you are thinking of is interesting. But it might be more hassle and cost than you might really want. I like the HCH1 option. A 2003-2005 Civic Hybrid manual. If you sunk a fraction of the money you might spend on the seventh gen HX/LX conversion, you could have a fully refurbished traction battery and gearing taller than any HX had (6th or 7th gen). It is a sedan too.

Also... be careful about older engine into newer body swaps. Some states won't let them onto the roads (Cali, for one example) because of smog regs.

Not obdii compliant! Insurance as a 2 door hatch would be as bad as a coupe. There was a a halfway decent one locally but...

Batteries. That's why. And bypassing the battery throws a CEL which doesn't let lean burn engage, defeating the whole point of getting one.

Sigh. I was stagnant at mid 60s mpg for my last several weeks and I want to keep climbing!

Problem is that every so often it's another $2K to replace the battery, and bypassing it prevents lean burn so mpg won't be any better than my current setup.

What about buying a 7th gen sedan manual for about a thousand and having a cx tranny & kill switch installed?

The HX engine of both generations has maintenance issues or just one generation?

I do not understand the popularity of coupes. Cheaper? Sure. They look better? People have strange opinions regarding appearances. Even when I rarely have passengers, I have always preferred being able to access the back seats via doors.

How long would the cheaper insurance take to pay for the complicated swap?

The only HXes that I have seen lately are a 2002 with 156,000 miles, but only 46,000 on the engine for $3,000, and a 1997 corpse in Tucson for $800.

I personally wonder about--hear me out--a 6th generation HX engine swapped into--hold on--a 6th generation Civic HX.

I'm not certain that a CEL breaks lean burn in the HCH1. It certainly doesn't in the G1 Insight.

When the battery goes, you're looking at ~$1000 for a rebuilt one which would probably be good for a minimum of 4-5 years, or if it turns out the CEL doesn't break lean burn, you can just remove it entirely and save the weight. HCH1 is a fantastic car, whose only real weakness was the HV battery.

In fact, you could remove the entire hybrid system and do something similar to what I did in my car, which is to just hook the 3 phase wires from the HV motor to a rectifier and drop the 70-300v DC produced down to 14v. Costs about $120 in parts (just 2 parts, in fact) and you'll have what is effectively a far more efficient alternator.

Even without lean burn, an HCH1 will probably beat an HX in economy. HCH1s with dead batteries are common and cheap as dirt.

@Xist, the HCH2 is the one with serious battery issues. The HCH1's wasn't bad, they're all just old enough now that battery failure is common due to age. Early Priuses often need batteries by this point too.

A 7th gen sedan swapped with a CX transmission and a kill switch is also a reasonable idea. But a swap into the 7th Generation would be slightly more complex than one between 5th and 6th generation cars because of the electronics that were added to the 7th gen. There are guys have done it. And if you follow the link to my manual transmission specs thread in my signature below I believe I have a link in there under the 7th gen specs that will lead you to someone who attempted it.

But imagine a little bit more how you might drive the hybrid. It has final drive gearing in between where a VX transmission and a Sixth Gen HX. So even if you disable the Hybrid battery you'll have a car with really tall gearing even if not quite as tall as a 5th gen VX or CX. However, with the hybrid and the bypassed battery you have an engine that is much smaller than a standard 7th gen engine and it's even significantly smaller than the 5th gen 1.5 liter engines. That means that doing pulse and glide with your very tall Transmission and your very small engine, you should be able to get some really remarkable numbers with the kill switch installed.

Just an alternate suggestion.

Any reason why an Insight might not work for you? My insurance is really cheap...

EDIT: Yesterday I drove around 15 miles on the highway, and ~8 miles through town. To get this kind of economy in an Insight, I just set cruise control to 50 and watch the gauge slowly creep up toward 100mpg, no pulse and glide or drafting.

https://i.imgur.com/zaGkJTr.jpg

So, the Honda Insight was the prototype "L" series engine, which replaced the D-series in Honda's lineup. The Insight's engine is called an "ECA1", but it's really a 3 cylinder L engine, and is most similar to the engine in the HCH1 (L13) and Fit (L15). The most recent L15B engine is in the turbo Civic and delivers 200HP while capable of 60+ mpg in the hands of a capable driver - ask Balto about his time with one. The "L" engines have some major advantages over the D series. Read about it here:

The Truly Amazing Honda Fit/Jazz

Some highlights:

-10% weight over D series
Smaller dimensions
Smaller angle combustion chamber -> better combustion
Camshafts have roller bearings where the rocker arms contact -> lower friction
Molydebnum coated piston skirts -> lower friction
Crankshaft offset -> more torque, lower friction, longer engine life (this is huge!)
Time chain never needs replacement, lower friction
Plastic/resin intake, reduces weight
Higher compression ratio -> more efficient
Some L-series have dual spark plugs

I'm not sure, I just remember reading earlier that engines with lean burn had issues as they aged if not meticulously cared for. Due to the lean burn, not the engine build.

I wanted a sedan even before discovering that its insurance would be cheaper lol.

None really because it would be all covered by the sale of my current car.

This article talks about it a little bit, and there were a couple others but I can't find them yet - should've bookmarked them.

I'd either get one with an already dead battery, or a cheapo one and then sell the battery. I'd rather deal with a conventional gasoline engine than something that'll require a $1000+ replacement every few years. Just doesn't make sense in terms of ROI.

It can be wired up in such a way that I can delete the alternator without having to use a deep cycle battery or grid charging?

Honestly that would be great; would you mind me paying you a visit next spring to help me wire this out?

This is why it's appealing to me more than doing an engine and/or tranny swap in a regular Civic.

An alternate suggestion and I like it a lot. Now to find me the best of the available HCH1 cheapos.

2 passenger, less cargo space, and most important, impossible to find. One with a bypassed battery was ~$3000, decent ones are $4000-$6000, or they're $1000 autotragics with bad transmissions...cvts....

So it is the HCH1 engine an L-series then, or a D-series?

ALSO, FuelEconomy.gov indicated that there were two manual HCH1s - one with lean burn and one without. How would I tell the difference when inspecting a car?

I vote civic hybrid. 1.3L with moderately tall gearing should be pretty awesome for mileage. You should be able to find one for $2000 or less, and even if you factor in that $2000 battery, you have spent $4000 on a car, not much really. The battery should last 8-10 years, maybe more if grid charged when it sits for any extended amount of time.

Civic hybrid RPMs:

70 mph: 2488
45 mph: 1599

I'll explain it right now! :D

Honda hybrids use a 3 phase alternating current (AC) motor in all of their hybrids, which is far more efficient than any alternator. In any IMA vehicle there will be three orange cables which run to the battery box from the engine bay. These carry 70-300v 3 phase alternating current (voltage dependent on engine RPM). Here's a picture of these three orange cables:

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/09...63497706013280

Step one is to connect these three orange cables to one of these rectifiers. What this does is convert alternating current to direct current:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Amico-SQL-1...72.m2749.l2649

You'll then have 70-300v DC coming from the rectifier. You need to step this down to 14v. I opted to use this:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

You take two output wires (carrying DC current) from the rectifier and connect them to the input on the Meanwell power supply. On the other side of the Meanwell you can connect whatever you want and get 12-14v (adjustable). There will be an always-hot cable running from the same battery box to the 12v battery up front - just connect this to the Meanwell, and you're set. Higher efficiency than an alternator, no belt losses, you can adjust the voltage and get as big or as small a power supply as you want. The motor up front can probably support up to ~15,000w. Turn the power supply off and you have virtually zero drag from the HV motor.

Here's what my config looks like:

https://i.imgur.com/JNss1De.jpg


The 7th gen Civic are all D series, except for the hybrid which is an L series.


California's version does not have lean burn to my knowledge. I'm unsure how you could tell without looking up the VIN, but there aren't too many California cars in my neck of the woods.

~

As far as Insight vs HCH, a sedan wouldn't work well for me because you can't stick a sheet of plywood or a 12ft 4x4 post in the trunk of a sedan. It's nice to be able to put literally everything I own in the back of my 70+ mpg car. I can move a full size dresser or book case.

Here's a shed I stuffed in my "trunk":

https://i.imgur.com/hf0vAqn.jpg


Sixteen tires plus my laundry:

https://i.imgur.com/fCFVBox.jpg


A 3x12ft long piece of foam insulation, with the hatch closed:

https://i.imgur.com/CYm6MPh.jpg


Of course, YMMV. Our needs are probably not the same. ;)

That's an idea which occurred to me before, simplistically, a sixth gen Civic sedan with HX drivetrain and a set of coilovers to lower it.

Having seen that the lean burn stuff can be a bit finicky, I moved on from the idea, but if a cheap VX or HX trans comes along, or a set of coilovers, I would contemplate that. The D-series is such a torqueless wonder, though, that taller gearing may not really suit the car too well.

Problem is, I don't want a hybrid. Car will be sitting too much during the winter while I'm at college, and the battery will go bad fast.

Those RPMs look sweet.

Whaat, so you're saying I can't visit you? :p

Ok so the three orange wires hook up to the rectifier, then the rectifier hooks up to the power supply and its set at 14 volts?

Slightly confused here - the orange wires are sending the 300 volts directly from the engine, right? If so, how does the electricity get transferred from the power supply to the actual battery? What needs to be hooked up there?

Tbh right now an Insight would be perfect for me, but I don't know about down the road, and once I do something like this, it's going to be something I plan on driving for years to come.

Neither option can have a battery though - I either buy one with a bad battery or I sell the battery. I'd rather buy one with a bad battery just in case I can't sell the battery or the battery turns out to be weak (and yet the selling price didn't reflect it). This is because the car will be sitting for too long while in college, which is bad for hybrid batteries.

HCH1 hybrids with bad batteries are a dime a dozen, so to speak. Insights are either autotragic or have "good" batteries and are $2500-$6000. I can't find any manual Insights with bad batteries. I'm torn. I know as of know this spring I'll be doing the manual HCH1 w/ battery bypass but I really want an Insight..

It's got more mid-range torque than a Toyota Sienna! My dad drove me down to college in our family minivan with a luggage carrier on top - about a 4 MPG penalty. Trying to go 75 MPH with that it constantly downshifted to 3rd gear @ 4500 RPMs because it didn't have the torque - while my Civic has never downshifted on any hill below 75 MPH. It did once on a steep hill going 78 (not me driving, I promise!!!). Van got around 22.5 until he got so mad he slowed down to 60-65 lol and finished off at 23.6. Speed really does kill!

The hybrid box (behind the rear seats) has another wire that runs up to the 12v battery, because it's normally what's charging the 12v battery. You just hook this line to the power supply instead, and can toss 150+lbs of battery and electronics.


Makes a lot of sense. One thing that really sold the Insight for me is that it's aluminum, and thus practically impervious to road salt...

Do you have a picture of this part of the setup?

Yes that's another thing that makes me want an Insight...if only the Gen 1 insight came as a 4 door without too much of an MPG hit. And no I'm not talking about the terrible Gen 2 lol. How much better MPG could I get with a bypassed Insight stock engine than a bypassed Civic Hybrid stock engine?

Not for an HCH, but it's essentially the same as the Insight. I marked each step in the wiring a different color. Green is motor to rectifier, blue is rectifier to PSU, red is PSU to the front of the car to the 12v battery.

There's basically just a long 8 gauge wire from the 12v battery to the back of the car already, makes this all very easy.

https://i.imgur.com/IQEfd04.jpg



Probably around 33%. I'd say 70mpg is a realistic but non-trivial goal in an HCH1, while 90mpg is a realistic but non-trivial goal in an Insight (for a full tank). You can reach either with a completely stock car and consistently careful driving.

Of course, points in the HCH1's favor are that MPG is not a very good metric. 70mpg is 3.3L/100km, while 90mpg is 2.6L/100km. In an absolute sense, it's the same amount of fuel saved as going from 25mpg (9.4L/100km) to 27mpg (8.7L/100km), because both cars already use so little.

Is it really just that simple?

Does the HCH/Insight have an alternator that needs to be disconnected/deleted? This then solves the issue of needing to be between 1500 & 3800 RPMs for charging the battery?

I say "simple" although I've never really done any wiring stuff on cars before; however I enjoy learning new stuff and a few youtube tutorials should get me going along with your diagram once I get an HCH...or an Insight...I'm still debating...

Wowsers. I'd say 50-55 MPG would be a "realistic but non-trivial" goal for my car, although by extreme hypermiling I can get 60-70. That'd be a 33% in and of itself over my current car with the HCH and 75% better with the Insight. Would that be with/without battery and ecomods?

Me want...but what about impracticality!

If I can find a good Insight next spring and I don't see a super tempting HCH...I just might go with the Insight.

A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. That's the only thing keeping me from selling the Prius and getting an Insight I or 86 (I vacillate day to day), or dropping a manual-transmission powertrain into the Prius shell (2014+ Corolla Eco 2ZR with 6-speed should drop right in). That might happen someday.

Yes, but will it blend?

Really that simple. Neither car has alternator or power steering pump. The only belt accessory is air conditioning.

In the case of 12v charging, you're replacing a very-good-for-a-15 year-old design with a better, new design with wider input voltage tolerances. It will keep the 12v system charged and happy as well or better than an alternator with higher efficiency.

Power steering is also electric on both cars, and both very efficient and reliable. Owners have seen zero improvement in economy from disabling this system. However, while the Insight's EPS is light and playful, I found the HCH1's to be quite heavy. Higher tire pressure would probably help, but if there's one gripe I have with the HCH1, it's the weight of the steering. It's honestly a great car overall.

I can't speak for the HCH, I've only ever driven one with a good battery, but 50-60mpg was laughably easy with zero modification. I have no idea if it will keep lean burn without the hybrid system, but I'm inclined to think it will.

Some other items worth mentioning:

The Insight has a ready-made solution for turning off the CEL with the hybrid system removed, which costs less than $15 to assemble. This could probably be done for the HCH as well, but there isn't the same community support so you'd be mostly on your own in figuring it out - if that's important to you at all.

Also, the G1 Insight has a flaw in the transmission which causes most of them to develop a gear grind when downshifting into 2nd from a higher gear. This developed in mine around 200,000 miles. A shifting technique called double clutching lets you shift into this gear anyway without grinding and isn't hard to learn, but again, worth noting. It's possible to permanently fix this (for free) by opening up the transmission. There are good how-to guides both on here and on InsightCentral, but I don't have easy access to drop my transmission so I just double clutch around it. Aside from that and the batteries, both cars are silly reliable. One member on IC has something like 400,000 miles on his Insight engine... with a turbocharger.

Why not both? ;)

My Insight will soon be receiving a 200+ hp engine from an Acura TSX. Hoping to keep 60+ mpg, with a <4 second 0-60.

Electrical noob question...why set the PSU to 14 volts when the battery is designed to run at 12 volts?

Steering feel really doesn't mean that much to me...as long as I can still take turns at 20 MPH like I can in my current Civic (yah know, conserving momentum and not downshifting below 3rd gear :D)

I'd probably remove AC on the "new" car anyway. There's an '03 manual with 180K miles a good battery for sale for $1500 bc the AC compressor is seized, but if I remove it, it wouldn't matter anyway. I could probably sell the battery for $500 if it's any good. And heck, I've driven with the AC disconnected (but not removed) and no AC blower fan for the past month or so now and been fine.

That sounds delightful. I hope I can keep decent MPGs without a battery.

Where can I find info on that CEL-fix system? Do you use it in your Insight? I'm inclined to think this is how you keep lean burn without a battery since I keep reading that lean burn won't engage if you have a CEL.

Double clutching - is that shifting into neutral and then shifting into your lower gear instead of doing it as one fluid motion? Pardon my current ignorance about manual transmissions..

If you EOC to stops this shouldn't be an issue though right?

I get lean burn without a battery, and this is normal for an Insight. If you leave a failed battery in, it can cause lean burn to shut off (depending on the code), but flipping the switch on the IMA system or unplugging it entirely leaves lean burn intact. There isn't a lot of reason to shut off the CEL other than for passing state inspection.

Mudder over at IC posted a video on how to set it up. Basically you cut some connectors from the IMA wire harness, then connect them to an arduino. Flash the code Mudder wrote, plug it in, and you're good to go. Mudder's code disables lean burn on a small number of Insights (maybe those with older ECUs?), but I found a workaround and can have my cake and eat it too.

How to Completely Remove Your IMA Battery - Insight Central: Honda Insight Forum

As for double clutching, yes, you let the clutch out in neutral, then press it again before putting it into gear. There's one more step - when it's in neutral, you give it some gas to roughly match revs. Basically if the engine will be at 2000rpm in the new gear, rev the engine to 2000rpm in neutral before pressing clutch and dropping it into gear.

The reason this works is that the synchros in the Insight have a design flaw. They normally match internal transmission speed to engine speed when you drop it into gear. They malfunction, so the speeds don't match and the gears grind instead of coming together smoothly. If you roughly match revs when dropping from 3rd to 2nd (just blip throttle in neutral) it goes into gear smoothly because you're doing the work the synchros would otherwise be doing. And, it's only the down-synchro in 2nd (and sometimes 1st), not the up synchros or any of the higher gears.

EOC to a stop can be an issue *sometimes* with this problem. If you shut off your engine while rolling to a stop, but the light turns green and you're still moving a few mph, you can't blip the throttle to match revs and it'll grind when you try to put it in gear because the engine will be turning slower (0rpm) than the gear (more than 0rpm, since the car is still moving). My workaround is to drop it into 3rd and bump start the engine, tap the throttle, then drop it into 2nd (or 1st). If I come fully to a stop I just use my starter.

For what it's worth, I'll be fixing this flaw permanently in my transmission and selling it when I take it out of my car. One could in theory buy a fixed transmission, swap it for theirs, then fix theirs and sell it. Many Insights have had this issue fixed already too, and some don't develop it, but it's common.

EDIT: I sometimes see decent looking Insights going up for sale on IC, on Facebook groups, or on Craigslist. I'm sure something will come by if that's the route you take. I would not feel bad at all about an HCH though, they're quite solid.

Here's a 65k mile 2000 Insight (best year IMO) for sale for $2200:

https://newyork.craigslist.org/brx/c...669258639.html

Ad doesn't specify but the battery is probably good. It would likely have ~150k miles of operation before the transmission needed any fix. You might also have another 6+ years out of the battery, or could sell it for $6-800.

Forgot to answer this. A 12v battery is less than 50% charge at 12v, and they don't like being at low charge. At full charge it's higher than 12.8v, and in order to charge it, you need to supply the battery higher voltage than it currently has. I suppose you could probably run the system as low as ~13v and everything would work fine, but it's standard for alternators to provide between 13.8 and 14.2v.

In my ebikes, a "72v" battery is actually around 84-85v when fully charged, and in the 60's when close to empty.

To bring up the early parts of this thread,

The internals of the crx hf trans swap direct into the 92-95 trans and will allow you to keep the hydraulic slave cylinder.

I have a federal crx HF trans (2.95 final drive) laying around if you are interested.

That should mean the internals would swap into any D-series trans--certainly 6th gen but maybe 7th, too.

I'll bet it would fit in a 7th gen trans. Hondas are Legos, after all :)

So maybe what I'm seeing is no lean burn with a bad battery still hooked up. I'd think the Insight and HCH would have their batteries hooked up the same way.

Ok so how would you recommend doing EOC in an Insight or HCH, with and also without the battery? With a manual, of course, step by step.

Nahhh, I want an Insight now lol. Go big or go home.

I WANT. But I won't be able to get one until May next year. :(

Honestly I'm to the point where like, screw it, I'll get an Insight with a functional battery. If it lasts 5-8 years, good; most people replace cars sooner than that, and I'd just be spending $2000 every 5-8 years for a 100 MPG car.

And if I need to transport people, well they can get their own ride. I only have one seat in my Civic anyway.

How would I store the hybrid battery during my "off months" so that it doesn't get ruined sooner?

Makes sense, thank you!!

Oooooohhhhh.....but....I wanna Insight now :o:o:o

Wouldn't it still be more difficult to install anyway?

If you wanted the really tall final drive, you’d get a manual Gen7 civic and his CRX trans and have a transmission shop swap the guts into the Gen7 case(of course as part of a rebuild)...

I’m with you though, just grab an Insight or HCH1 with a decent battery... drive until the battery fails and then decide what to do... I’m sure the battery would store fine with a grid charger... you know, have somebody trustworthy plug the thing in once a month or so to keep it topped off...

You could delete the battery when it fails or you could replace it... personally I’m curious as to what could happen if you replaced them with a lithium pack of some sort(Headway cells perhaps?) and done an aftermarket AC motor controller, and used an Arduino to die it all in with the IMA system...

Right on with that, but what you said:

Current plan this May:

- Sell my Civic first
- Buy a 1st Gen Insight w/ good battery for $2500 or less (I know of 3 now for that price or lower) manual transmission of course
- Learn how to drive manual.. :o:o
- Keep battery
- Wire up kill switch
- Wire up lean burn LED indicator
- Manually adjustable grille block
- I think an air dam hurts MPG due to semi-smooth underbody?
- Improve underbody aero
- Tail extension; maybe a mini-boattail
- Wire up a fake brake light switch to flash people with when I'm EOC and people are creeping up without paying attention
- Semi truck horn <<< seriously!!! :D
- AC delete
- Passenger seat delete
- Delete as much weight as possible
- Tires @ 60 PSI if RE92s, 70 PSI if cheapo tires
- Rear wiper delete

Goals:

Beat 100 MPG consistently by the end of summer
Beat 60 MPG doing pizza delivery (if I resume my job next summer)

It’s all about how much you could get for your car in its current state, could you sell your Civic and have enough leftover to grab an Insight? It could be cheaper to just mod what you have... not trying to discourage you from getting an Insight or HCH1 though... either would smash your current FE records handily...

I missed the double clutch question. Double clutch gets so much less fun when it is your living I am a trucker...three-pedal trucks are exclusively unsynchronized. Automatics are simply automated manuals and have little minions in the gearbox do the work for you).

There's two ways to do it. True double clutching goes like this:

Say you are driving down the road at a steady speed. In 5th gear you are running 2000 rpm. If you ran the same speed in 4th gear, you would be at 2500 rpm.

Downshifting from 5th to 4th would have you clutch out of gear, go to neutral, let out the clutch. As you do so, blip the throttle to about 2500rpm, then clutch in again and shift to fourth, then let out.

Trust me, it takes time. The fact that I could drive stick when learning to drive trucks actually hindered me a bit. It was six months of full-time, doing-it-for-a-living driving before I actually got anywhere near comfortable living with an unsynchronized box.

But once you get it, the world is your oyster. There's variations on it like floating your shifts, both up and down, heel-toe shifting, etc. Rev-matching (a bit different from real double-clutching) can make you a master of smooth shifts and save clutch war.

Not that this is terribly relevant to driving anything made in the last 80 years save for 18-wheelers, but I find that as I drive both my rig and my car, both vehicles help inform me a little bit on how to drive the other one better.

KBB values my car at slightly over $4000. I bought it for $2900 and replaced timing belt, all fluids, new brakes, general tune up maintenance, etc., basically fixing everything that got me a good deal on the car, and only put 6000 miles on it. Should be able to sell for $3500-$4000. Enough to buy an Insight and have $1000 left over, hopefully.

An extra $1000, cheaper insurance, and 100 MPG, what could be wrong there?