New here! '93 Honda Del sol, 1st "mods"
 

Hello everybody. I've been working on the "performance" side of things with my car. Some quick specs:

-1993 Honda Del So Si
-JDM Integra GSR (B18C1) engine swap
-Comptech Ice-box Intake
-Comptech 4-2-1 exhaust manifold
-Custom 2.25" exhaust
-Eibach Prokit Lowering Springs
-Tokico Blues shocks/struts
-Current mpg 27-29

The car is a quick and comfortable daily driver, but as I get older, and expenses start to pile up, I realized the "performance" aspect of car culture is a big money pit. So I decided to find other ways to play with my car (and help the environment as well).

Currently I am toying around with this thing called Water4gas or Hydrogen-on-demand (if it turns out to be a scam, don't worry, I didn't pay for the manual, I was lucky enough to find it posted on the internet where I downloaded it for free). So far, it is giving me positive results with 1,000 miles used and averaging about 32mpg.

Then I stumbled upon this site with all of the amazing information provided by that "Firefly" Geo Metro. After spending days reading everything on this forum, I decided to make a quick "trial" aero mods on my car (made out of cardboard, packing tape, and 10min of my time =P).

Welcome to the site. Nice grill block. :)

Thanks! I realized that installing it might tamper with the tests I currently am doing with the water4gas setup, so i removed it. But I will make a better version using coroplast in the future.

jedi_sol -

Welcome to EM! Your handle makes me think you know of the famous Star Wars Del Sol that putters along around here in SoCal. It's not a good template for aero-mods (because it's designed for the vacuum of space, ;) ).

For hydrogen stuff, you'll get a lot of skepticism on this forum. It's best to join a forum that is devoted to hydrogen like this one :

HHOINFO - The OPEN SOURCE Builders Network.

But for the majority of other mods, this is the place to be. I think the Del Sol is a great platform for MPG.

CarloSW2

Welcome!

The Yoda of efficiency-minded del Sol owners was/is krousdb. He was pulling ridiculous numbers from his before he sold it - in the 50's mpg (US) if I recall. (Sorry if I'm selling you short there, Dan.)

His mods were:

- 0W-20 synth in the engine & transmission
- LRR tires, same as Honda Insight (Bridgestone RE 92?)
- grille block
- warm air intake
- block heater

And most importantly:

- SuperMID fuel economy instrumentation (similar to MPGuino) so he could fine tune his driving. Dan's a master behind the wheel.

And probably more stuff I'm forgetting. (Belly pan on that one? Hmmm...)

But he doesn't post much any more. Graduated to a VX when we were still hanging around GasSavers, then took over his wife's Prius. Modded the Prius as far as he's going to, then dropped off the face of the earth! (I guess once you achieve efficiency satori, it's OK to disappear. :D)

Thanks MetroMPG, believe me, I have read and saved every post krousdb did in this forum. He is my inspiration for the things I'm planning on doing with my car (coroplast, here i come!).

However, I doubt I will ever reach his 50mpg goals as I have a performance-tuned (Acura Integra GSR motor) engine swapped into my car and I dont plan on swapping it out for the puny VX motor (sorry guys =P)

I think we were pretty close to getting Dan to add a Kammback to his del Sol, hint hint! It's an ideal car to do it to: given where the roof ends, you've got more room for taper. I think it'd look cool too.

Don't forget to start a fuel log! You can't manage what you don't measure.

I remember reading a blurb about that on one of his threads. Somebody also mentioned something about an 11* taper would be the most efficient, but that it would end at aprox 3" above the end of the trunk.

I made a quick MS Paint mockup, does this look about right?

I also installed a new vacuum gauge over the weekend. What a difference it makes! I always thought I had a pretty sensitive right foot, until NOW.

Do you have any plans to sell the b18? That would really do the most, and save the most money. :)

Why, are you looking to acquire one? :)

Anywho, I plan on keeping the motor because eventually I want to keep the car balanced as fun-to-drive-when-i-want-to and yet still economical.

Before when I was modding the car for performance, I wanted it to be fun-to-drive yet comfortable. So i installed a set of TEIN coilover's, sure the car was quick through the corners and freeway interchanges, but on crappy So Cal roads, boy let me tell you, those stiff springs/shocks were KILLER on my lower back. Hence, that's why I replaced them with a softer Eibach/tokico setup.

Put that Kammback and rear skirts on it, and people will think it's a convertible Insight or a CRX! I LOVE the look!

I think you'd be fine with a Kammback that came down to the back end of the trunk. The angle would be a little steep, but not too bad. It would be easier to make, for sure.

Are those tires wide and sticky? They're hurting your mileage. Narrower (closer to stock) tires and low Rolling Resistance tires will help. Higher pressure will also help. I recommend the sidewall max (or more).

Hm...interesting... me likey. :)

I guess they are pretty wide, 205-50-R15's. Once these run low, I can put on some 195's (smallest tire for my rim size).

Always :thumbup:

I like it!

You can ultimately go steeper than that if you use an arc. It's the sudden transitions that are a problem.

Have a look in this thread at the "teardrop" template that Phil (aerohead) espouses. (You can get away with steeper angles than the teardrop, but then you also need to have aggressive taper in plan view to keep flow attached)

http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...sion-3518.html

I like the Kammback'ed Del Sol idea.
Welcome to EM!

Hello jedi_sol and welcome on-board.

Rear wheel skirts are easy to do with cardboard or coroplast.

You didn't talked about your driving style. Since I pulse & glide (in neutral, engine on) I improved a lot: the secret is to wait, wait, wait...

I installed coroplast rear wheel skirts at the beginning of the current tank and I can feel the car coasting longer. I also feel it more nervous and my "fast accelerations" habits are coming back :o but I will beat my records :)

I'm dreaming about a kammback, but I'm afraid tape will not be enough to keep it securely attached.

Have fun,

Denis.

Thank you everybody for all of your input.

One question I have is with any future mod i decide to do, since i do not have a scangauge to give me real time results, are there another testing methods I could use to see if the mod is helping/hurting?

You probably saw that krousdb used a SuperMID MPG computer in his car. You can buy or build yourself an equivalent: check the MPGuino subforum & wiki here on EM.

You could try some coast-down tests. They'll show you the aerodynamic benefit. How much that affects your mileage is still a question, but an aero improvement almost guarantees a mileage improvement.

I can use my butt-o-meter on my daily commute ;) if you know well a portion of road you can see how the comportment is different. On a couple of small down slopes my car was slowing down and now it's accelerating. Also on a bigger down slope when I leave the top at a given speed, I arrive at a bigger speed at the bottom with the rear skirts than without.

As Pale said, coast down testing is a possibility. You may use the calc on IWillTry.org (see "Measure the drag coefficient of your car") if you want to calc your Cd.

I have also the idea to test the recording of the signal from a gps receiver while doing coast down and measure an average slow down in m/s/s with & without the mod. Currently time is missing :( not the ideas...

Denis.

Back from the dead! New ideas...
 

Ok, so project Kammback was killed by the girlfriend :(

Other ideas that I'm currently planning/working on:
1)Installed alternator disable switch
2)Build custom solar panel and stick it on my trunk (there is turbulence in that area anyways so it shouldn't hurt with aerodynamics. And since project kammback was killed, this is my replacement). In the mail waiting for arrival.
3)Deep cycle battery in the trunk

*Should i use only the deep cycle? or wire it in parallel to the main starting battery?

4)(maybe) Alternator delete
5)Power steering delete
6)Rear wheel skirts
7)Front grille block
8)Underbelly Tray
9)skinnier LRR tires

http://i101.photobucket.com/albums/m...e/IMG_0208.jpg
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Another Del Sol on here cool!!! I love the paint/pic of the Kamm back you posted. I'm going to do one for sure I just need to finish the final tuning on the engine.

The attachment for the Kamm back is the hardest part for me. Still haven't' came up with a good idea?

My kammback idea is dead, it did not pass the girlfriend approval test. :mad:

The only idea i had to attach the kamm was to drill or double stick tape a low profile hinge on the roof, to allow the kamm to swing up and rest on the roof, that way i still have access to the trunk.

Depends on whether your deep cycle alone, or deep cycle + starting battery will get you where you're going (range).

One advantage of being able to switch between two batteries is this:

A) you drive with the alternator OFF on one of the two batteries
B) let's say you're not going to make it to your destination, so
C) you switch over to the "reserve" (fully charged) battery, and switch the alternator back on
D) then you recharge the deep cycle battery from the grid when you get to your destination

That scenario avoids switching the alternator back on part way through a drive, and taking the massive MPG hit of both running the vehicle plus recharging the batteries at the same time.

I like the idea of the solar cells on your rear deck. You're right - no aero harm in placing them there.

This is what I was thinking.

Assuming I am using 2 deep cycle batteries, are you talking about an ACTUAL switch I would need to wire up? Or would one drain all its power, then the other one takes over?