Project IRX: CRX-Insight Renaissance Experiment
 

I'll try to keep this first post updated with recent information, and leave all the anecdotal stuff to later posts, so let me know if I'm not staying up to date or am straying off topic with it.

Goal: To get the full insight hybrid-electric system into my CRX in working order AND to have it get better mileage than my currect Civic VX d15z1 swap.

Progress:

08/24/09 - I have all or almost all of the parts in the garage, but haven't started gutting my car yet. The Insight manuals are either here or on order and I have most of what I need to complete the swap.

Costs:

Direct costs:
- Swap: $750

Secondary costs:
- New jack: $145

Current Issues:

- New project title? I find the current one a little lacking.

Holy crap!!! That's going to be awesome.:thumbup:

This story is a little bit belated, but it has to do with the first part of the swap, which deals with actually picking up the junk I would need for the swap.

It started with a 573 mile trip out to Toledo, OH. I filled up once on the way there, at something like 64 mpg. Wasn't the best but I don't think I'd been paying particular attention and I also broke my mpguino during the trip, which disabled lean-burn and one of the injectors.

Anyway, I got to Fabio's place at about 9 pm, then we got straight to work ripping apart the car, right through the night until we took a break at about 5am, during which I napped in my car for 2 hours. Waking up we did more work until about 10 pm that night, when I took off with all the junk in my car (except the exhaust which I stupidly forgot).

The way home was slightly less smooth. After having several "I'm still driving and not getting anywhere" nightmares on the side of the road, one of my new Insight wheels ended up breaking right off exit 185 on I80 in PA. Luckily, it was right by the exit since the next one was 8 miles up and the last one 14 miles back.

The little amish town I was stuck in had a gas station and a cafe, but nothing else. After chilling out there for about 6 years and eating really good pizza and sweet potato fries, wonderboy rescued me: http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...help-9776.html

After that I filled up a sweet 75.5 mpg: http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...-mpg-9819.html and finished my way home. Finally home at 4am, I slept in preparation for heading out to amec at 11 am the next day.

Good times. I think we're up to date now!

I hope so.

The plan is to complete the two in two steps. First will be ICE only, then when it's physically in and running, I'll go ahead and throw the IMA system in the back.

Call it "Honda CRZ"! Oh wait...

Zing!

Maybe I'll call it the Insight II :p

Wouldn't it be "Insight III"? I thought there was already an Insight II... this newer gen, I mean.

Maybe Insight Ii (1.5 :P)

So what are you doing w/ the Z1 once you're done swapping? I might be interested in making a deal w/ you, since I'm probably going to buy a DX tomorrow that's all rusty and in need of... well... me! :D

I'm just going to pretend like the actual Insight II doesn't exist.

I'd gladly deal with you on the vx, sir

Project CR-I... what you'll do if it doesn't work out. :) (Just kidding, and best of luck. It's a very forward thinking swap that you're working on, and if I can be of any assistance, feel free to call or txt/email/PM. I'll see what I can do.)

Oooo.. you gonna leave the HF trans with it?

You could always come help put the damn thing it.

You can have the HF tranny too, of course.

Unfortunately, I don't think my wife would go for that... LOL.

I'd have to bring her and the boy with me, and she'd be "bored" and complain the whole time, thus ruining what could otherwise be a great build day.

We'll put on some Mozart to placate her

Obviously, you haven't met my wife... that might work on my Son, for awhile. Wife, she "hates" classical music... by "hate" I mean: She's just not willing to actually listen to it, but doesn't know that I play it occasionally while she's sleeping to "tune" her into it.

She's also heard it in public and doesn't make snide comments about it anymore. :thumbup:

I'll talk to her at some point in the future, though, and see if there will be any chance of a day or two that I can come around and see if we can get some stuff done.

I'm sure you're lucky to have her, despite her dislike of classical!

Picture time!

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1251170999

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1251170999

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1251170999

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1251170999

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1251170999

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http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1251170999

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1251170999

Indeed.

Gonna begin work after lunch. I imagine it'll be a little boring at first since it'll just be stripping the car down, but I've realized I don't have anything to hold the car up with so that might be a bit of a pain.

Thoughts on what jack stands I can go buy before I start that are high quality but won't completely destroy my wallet?

Almost ready to drop the engine, just need to get the axles out, so it's time to take a break and head to the store for an axle nut socket and some energy food. I'll probably take out the dash before dropping the engine though so I can pull the wiring out of the way since it's all tangled up.

When I get home I'll take a little break and post pictures of the job thus far. The only real problem has been dropping a fender on my head and scratching it a little.

I think jackstands are jackstands. You're not even remotely close to approaching the weight capacity, so I couldn't even really cite safety as a factor.

I use the Harbor Freight ones and they work fine. Don't forget to block the tires if you're going to be pushing and pulling. I usually leave the jack under there as a backup if it can be done without it getting in the way.

I ended up getting the middle of the road jackstands, thinking they wouldn't be able to get the car high enough, when in fact the car is so damn low to the ground it was difficult to get them under on the lowest setting.

I'm not too worried about them, but once upon a time one buckled and killed one of my dad's friends (or something to that effect), so I've always been a little wary of them.

I should've got some at harbor freight considering how much I love the jack I got from them, but o well, hindsight and all that business :)

Just got home with my axle nut socket, gonna take a break and eat some food before I go rip the interior out of the car.

Lowe's, get treated 6x6 post and have them cut it down to several 2" sections for you. You can notch the tops of each piece, and they'll hold the car up fine.

Yes, I'd usually do that and borrow some from my dad but I'm not going to be under the car really so I figured I'd go with jackstands just to say time.

Anyone got any tricks from popping the LCA ball joints out of the knuckle? I've done it a bunch of times but it's not working for me now and the last thing I want to do is get violent and mess the whole thing up.

Ball joints out of the knuckle, yes. This is going to probably sound bad, but it works great and it doesn't cause any problems I have ever encountered.

Loosen, but do not remove the nut on the joint. Take a heavy sledge hammer, swing it as hard as you can and hit the side of the ball joint solidly. It usually takes 2-3 really heavy hits and then it decompresses just enough to let if fall loose.

Keep your personal knuckles out of the way.

So hit the joint and not the LCA?

Stick a 3' bar between the LCA and the radius rod, so that it goes over the LCA, then under the radius rod, from the back of the wheel. Hang a good amount of weight on it while you're hammering the sh!t out of the flat on the LCA (the spot you're already hitting). Also, if you have a propane torch and plan on replacing at least the boot, if not the ball joint, just go ahead and heat up the joint a bit, then hammer it.

PB blaster works well also.

I popped it last year, I'm not sure why it's being such a pain in the butt. We'll see in the morning.

In other news, tomorrow I'm buying a fairly new ford escape hybrid nimh battery pack! :)

:O:O:O:O:O Lukky Baztid... :O:O:O:O:O

What's that gonna burn you for, if you don't mind me asking?

Hundred bucks!

You suck. :P

What's the Ah rating on that pack?

Damned if I know, to be honest. It'll prolly sit around for a while until I figure out what to do with it

Dude... get a few bikes, make yourself a recumbent tadpole, put a small E-motor on it (like an alt conversion) and use that pack to power it.

Else do an E-Cycle.

I'm not really sure how big it is, and whether you can break it open and reconfigure the pack to a diff shape...

Remember, shape is a limiting factor... then again, I guess weight is, as well.

It's made up of D cells so I imagine I can reshape it easily enough. I was thinking of using it to trickle charge the IMA pack while driving but plugging it in at home for a PHEV conversion!

Man, I love NiMH packs... they're never made of anything bigger than conventional batteries, because of "patent" issues with the technology.

(Toyota got sued for using Ni-MH in their RAV4-EV, which is why they've stopped producing them.. Ed Begley Jr. has one, I think.)

Lots of times, you can find the "weird" battery sizes in stores, and if you break them open, you find that they're just made of a stack of smaller cells, often button cells.

Well, I like the name IRX.

Are you going with the Insight's instrument cluster, body wire harness, fuel tank, and fuel pump? And did you like the Insight seats as much as I do?

Versus 0.9KWh, 120 cells, 22kg for the Insight's pack. So it's twice the size. However, the Ford's pack is made of 5.5Ah Sanyo cells, versus 6.5Ah Panasonics in the Honda.

I can think of several nifty but impractical ways to use that battery pack or its cells in an Insight or IRX, but realistically, it's probably better used in a separate project.

I don't have the tank and fuel pump. I know the evap system is a bit more hardcore but I don't think it'll be an issue, really

At least I hope not.

Nice seats indeed, but I like the crx buckets a bit more.

I know mike dabrowski has used an additional pack to trickle charge the IMA pack and act as PHEV and I was kind of hoping I could go in that direction with it, but that's a project for after I finish the main junk.

O yeah, insight cluster. Not sure about the body harness. I need to crack the wiring diagrams. I'm really hoping to take it one step at a time, so the first step is to get the gasoline motor running and then go from there.

Pictures will be uploaded soon!

250 D-cell batteries... wow.

I'm thinking that the battery packs, if broken down into smaller sets of cells, would fit nicely behind the plastic panels in the back of the IRX, between the outer shell and the inner structure.

Probably not the best place for accident avoidance, but they're Ni-MH, so it's not such a big deal if they get crushed, I guess.

You can come help me mess with it when you pick up the d15z1 swap :p

I guess I gotta get a CRX, first... I just turned down the other one, because:

1. I'm broke
2. I'd have no way to pick it up, and I'd have to get an "In Transit" plate to flat tow it.

I might just wait around and get one from some ricer moron that molested it until it wouldn't run... We'll see.

Here are some pictures from the day's work:

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1251258977

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1251258977

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1251258977

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http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1251258977

Those gloves are probably the best $20 I've spent on a car thing in a long time. Really makes working on the car a lot more pleasant :)

Dude - you can leave the whole bumper assembly together if you just take out the turn signals... the bolts are easily accessible from right there.

It's either 2 or 4 bolts hodling the bumper support to the mounts, and 2 screws in each side holding the edges of the bumper cover to the plastic things on the fenders, then the snaps/clips/screws for the air diffuser/belly pan, and the whole bumper cover/foam/bumper all comes off at once.

You're way more into taking things off your car than I ever was... I'd pull the hood, disconnect the wiring harness from the chassis connectors, unbolt the engine mount and the 7-10 transmission bolts, remove the front engine pulley in some cases, then get a friend to grab one end of a 2x4 with a chain around it to help pull it out.

If there wasn't a friend around, grab a step stool and a tow strap, hook the strap to the engine, squat on the stool, wrap it around my neck and over my shoulders, and stand up.

They're light, aren't they? LOL.

Your car looks really clean, by the way. Wish I could find one that clean for... like... free!