Ecomodding an automatic '04 Civic Sedan

[Daschicken]

Originally Posted by mpg_numbers_guy

Those are some sweet RPMs though! My tach only works sporadically (and I haven't gotten a gauge yet for that) so idk exactly what my RPMs are, but I can safely guess they're higher due to the civic being a smaller vehicle. I know it seems to hit 4th gear around 41-43 MPH (or so it feels like) and on that 52 mpg trip I was going around low 40s since there wasn't much traffic, so something must be right there. And of course having 6 gears on your Accord beats the 4 on my auto!

Your civic is at 1621 RPM at 45 MPH, or 2522 RPM at 70 MPH, not bad at all! I didn't check EX vs LX auto gearing, but the EX gearing is shorter on manuals of this civic generation.

Originally Posted by mpg_numbers_guy

That's kinda the thing with me though, I'm not very patient to wait for things to pay themselves off which probably explains my hesitation to buy a Scangauge or Ultragauge.

If you plan on keeping the car...Get stuff now so you can start enjoying the savings right away, the longer you wait, the less savings you will get.

[mpg_numbers_guy]

Originally Posted by Daschicken

Your civic is at 1621 RPM at 45 MPH, or 2522 RPM at 70 MPH, not bad at all! I didn't check EX vs LX auto gearing, but the EX gearing is shorter on manuals of this civic generation.

Where did you get this information?? I've been looking all over for a way to find out RPMS at various speeds in my car since the tach doesn't work and I can't find it anywhere, tell me your secret source!

I think I remember reading somewhere that the manual gets slightly better MPG in city due to the gearing and the auto gets slightly better MPG on the highway due to a lower gear ratio in the highest gear, but that obviously doesn't take into consideration the manual's better ability in hypermiling.

Originally Posted by Daschicken

If you plan on keeping the car...Get stuff now so you can start enjoying the savings right away, the longer you wait, the less savings you will get.

Yes, true, but of course my favorite mods are going to be the free ones, like pumping tires up currently mine are at 40 PSI, or were, they might be down by 1 or so due to the cold weather we've been having. I do think I will eventually start implementing some subtle things such as a block heater, but I will be having the timing belt changed this spring so I'll probably wait until after then so it doesn't hurt the pocketbook as much.

[Xist]

I avoid automatics whenever possible, but my car was $1,050 less than this one: https://phoenix.craigslist.org/wvl/c...479733847.html

with 60% as many miles. That is enough to pay for 85% of the gas that I have used in sixteen months.

Sometimes plans come together for me. The rest of the time I see squirrels at just the worst moments.

[Daschicken]

Originally Posted by mpg_numbers_guy

Where did you get this information?? I've been looking all over for a way to find out RPMS at various speeds in my car since the tach doesn't work and I can't find it anywhere, tell me your secret source!

http://owners.honda.com/vehicles/information/2004/Civic-Sedan/specs#mid^ES2674MW

For that one, I used owners.honda.com. Select vehicle info in the top left corner, and you can get specs for each trim level. I usually use cars.com though. You can select research cars, pick the trim level and scroll down to specifications.

From there I use the Engine RPM calculator from CSGNetwork, scroll all the way down so you can use the calculator with four variables specified: Axle ratio, tire height, speed, and gear ratio. Once upon a time I did tire height calculations manually, but now I just use tiresize.com 's tire height calculator.

Now do me a favor and find me the secret source for figuring out motorcycle gear ratios!

Originally Posted by mpg_numbers_guy

True, a manual would definitely be better overall, but an auto with paddle shifters would have the benefit of if you ever had a day you didn't feel like driving a manual or if someone else were to drive the car, since few people nowadays know how to drive a manual.

That's why i'm teaching people, I have taught SIXTEEN people how to drive manual so far.

[Vman455]

You might be interested in this.

Too bad about the automatic; with a manual, you could wire in a fuel injector kill switch (someone else on the forum figured out which wire to cut on the 7th gen, and a few of us followed suit) and have some real fun.

[mpg_numbers_guy]

Originally Posted by Xist

I avoid automatics whenever possible, but my car was $1,050 less than this one: https://phoenix.craigslist.org/wvl/c...479733847.html

with 60% as many miles. That is enough to pay for 85% of the gas that I have used in sixteen months.

Sometimes plans come together for me. The rest of the time I see squirrels at just the worst moments.

So I hear from most hypermilers; manuals take the day. But I gotta deal with what I have.

[mpg_numbers_guy]

Originally Posted by Vman455

You might be interested in this.

Too bad about the automatic; with a manual, you could wire in a fuel injector kill switch (someone else on the forum figured out which wire to cut on the 7th gen, and a few of us followed suit) and have some real fun.

Very nice! Impressed with how decent the grille block looks! Did you end up ever temporarily removing part of the grille block during the summer? And how bad was the stock bumper modded to achieve this (thinking of resale value)? And you used sheet metal for this, right? Do you think the increased FE beat the cost of the mods? Sorry for all the questions!

Also the pictures on the post didn't show - showed some kind of "third party sharing disabled" thing had to go to your car's profile page to see it.

[mpg_numbers_guy]

Originally Posted by Daschicken

http://owners.honda.com/vehicles/information/2004/Civic-Sedan/specs#mid^ES2674MW

For that one, I used owners.honda.com. Select vehicle info in the top left corner, and you can get specs for each trim level. I usually use cars.com though. You can select research cars, pick the trim level and scroll down to specifications.

From there I use the Engine RPM calculator from CSGNetwork, scroll all the way down so you can use the calculator with four variables specified: Axle ratio, tire height, speed, and gear ratio. Once upon a time I did tire height calculations manually, but now I just use tiresize.com 's tire height calculator.

Now do me a favor and find me the secret source for figuring out motorcycle gear ratios!

Ah yes I used that but those tools don't seem to take into consideration gears...like you know how an automatic will shift from, say, 3rd gear to 4th at 40 MPH, so the RPMs are lower at 40 than 39...the tool just linearly increases the RPMs. Or am I just missing something here?

[19bonestock88]

Originally Posted by mpg_numbers_guy

Very nice! Impressed with how decent the grille block looks! Did you end up ever temporarily removing part of the grille block during the summer? And how bad was the stock bumper modded to achieve this (thinking of resale value)? And you used sheet metal for this, right? Do you think the increased FE beat the cost of the mods? Sorry for all the questions!

Also the pictures on the post didn't show - showed some kind of "third party sharing disabled" thing had to go to your car's profile page to see it.

Basically you need to calculate the return on investment (ROI) on your mods and decide on materials... obviously sheet metal and the like will cost more than coroplast or tape... I usually gather coroplast after big elections and use that for basically free, and it’s plenty strong enough for most aero mods...

My grille blocks stay on year round but I monitor engine temp with an UltraGauge...

[mpg_numbers_guy]

Originally Posted by 19bonestock88

Basically you need to calculate the return on investment (ROI) on your mods and decide on materials... obviously sheet metal and the like will cost more than coroplast or tape... I usually gather coroplast after big elections and use that for basically free, and it’s plenty strong enough for most aero mods...

My grille blocks stay on year round but I monitor engine temp with an UltraGauge...

Got several mods planned that'll cost under $40 in all, and should pay for themselves after ~5000. I may start an actual build thread when I begin them.

Hopefully I can get a bluetooth adapter hooked up soon so I can connect a phone to it and monitor temps and stats that way.

Going for mods that can be reversed easily back to stock appearance with no drilling, taping, gluing etc. And using the cheapest materials possible.