Honda Civic

HT did a couple of tech pieces recently on AEM's Landspeed Civic, only the second Civic we know of to challenge for a title at the Bonneville Salt Flats (the other belongs to the Progress Group). To most Honda guys, Bonneville seems about as interesting as the Isuzu Stylus. Everybody likes to know what a car can run in the quarter mile, but no one gets too excited about top-speed runs in the desert, even if it is a Civic.

That's OK. For a core group of enthusiasts, pushing a Honda motor to its absolute limits is good recreation. "Easy" being a relative term, it's fairly easy to build a Honda motor stout enough to handle eight or nine seconds of quarter-mile abuse. But multiply those stresses by a factor of five and you step into the realm of guys like John Romero and John Concialdi, engineers at AEM who see Bonneville as a whole new ground, a wide, flat, salty bed upon which to test their skills as engine builders and engineers. As Romero, whom we spoke to for this interview, says, driving is the easiest part of the 200-mph challenge. -- DF

Honda Tuning: John, the last time we checked in with you, you were on the first of a proposed three-stage buildup for this car that included sleeving a B16A down to 1.5 liters, so as not to compete for the same records as your compadres at the Progress Group. Where are you now with the Civic?
John Romero: The photos you have were taken during the first stage, with the 1.5-liter naturally aspirated, plus nitrous. That's what we did in August. The [new] engine is going back together now. We're test fitting everything. We're going with a turbo, flat-top pistons, no radiator, and running a water tank and dry sump oiling system.
We learned in August that sustained, really high rpm, holding it past 10,000 for 45 seconds at a time, that there's nothing you can do on the factory oiling system that's gonna make it live. You can turn up the pressure, but the pump can't do it. You can do it for little bursts. But we did eight runs. That's like 300 seconds over 10,000 rpm and it ain't gonna work. Each run is about 45 seconds. That's the amount of time you're at full throttle. Once you're at the one-mile marker, you're on it. You're at about 8500 rpm and you're not coming down for the next two miles. You end up over nine, then over 10. Only when you get over 10 does it hit the aero limit. You pretty much hit terminal velocity. The car is accelerating, just not very much. So it's just sitting there at 10,000, 10,400 etc., for 25 seconds.
The [oil] pressure that you need to sustain 10,000 rpm should be more than 100 psi. There's no reliable way of doing it short of a dry sump. We're working with Z10 [Motorsports] and we're gonna be putting a dry sump on it in a month or so.

HT: How'll that help give you the pressure you need?
JR: Dry sumps are positive displacement pumps. You can run 130 psi if you want. And you have the ability to evacuate the block of pressured oil, so you don't have any of the windage losses.
You'll actually make more power and deliver higher oil pressure. That higher oil pressure will keep the thing alive. When you're turning that high rpm and if you're making serious power--which we're gonna be doing on the turbo--you can really pound the bearings out of it in nothing flat.