For many young enthusiasts, the college years can be a difficult stretch of life. For students like Walter Franco, who is enrolled at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, Calif., 1,100 miles from home, it means extended separation from his most valued possession: an '89 CRX Si. We've been there. It sucks.
Back in Seattle, Franco's Rex awaits the next recess when car and driver can rip around the Beacon Hill suburbs. Franco bought his Si for $3,000 in 1998 and has since poured another 10-large into building a bulletproof powerplant and a hatchback with impeccable Japanese street credentials. Coming up with the dough, however, meant working a lot of side jobs and doing most of the labor himself. Luckily, he had some skilled help.
"My dad used [the opportunity] to turn this into a father-and-son project," Franco explains. "It was sort of a bonding experience."
A car dude himself, Franco's father used to fix up early '70s Mitsubishi Lancers in the Philippines (see sidebar). He's still turning wrenches, most recently on a '69 Gallant project in which he plans to drop in a 2-liter 4G63 (native to the EVO and first- and second-gen Eclipse). The CRX was the first Honda swap either father or son had ever done.
Like many ambitious youngsters, Franco first planned to build an all-out drag car, but soon realized that he was still in high school and that this was his first car. "Making it street was more realistic," he says, although his focus was still on "making it quick, a sleeper."
Since motor mount kits were still expensive in the late '90s, Franco re-welded the mounting points for a JDM B16A himself. It was the hardest part of the swap, compounded by his and his father's inexperience.
"We had never welded anything before, and my dad bought the welder specifically for the occasion," he says.
Franco later took the Rex to Pacific Raceways, the area dragstrip formerly known as Seattle International Raceway, and ran a 15-second quarter-mile on the bone-stock B16A. It wasn't what he'd hoped for.
"I was hurting for more power and wanted a turbo kit, but my dad said, 'Use all the power in the engine first and stay naturally [aspirated]. Then if you're dissatisfied, go turbo.'"
On Dad's advice, Franco had some head work done, swapped in Type R cams and added the basic bolt-on package. Then one night he loaned his brother the hatch, a routine decision that forever altered the course of the project.
"On the way home he was racing a single-cam turbo Civic coupe and blew my engine," Franco recalls. He laid into his bro, but in the end all was forgiven. "He's a good brother. He paid for everything."
With a blown engine, Franco placed a call to Vancouver's A&J Racing and ordered a Spoon B18C5 bottom end-unheard of in Seattle at the time. Trusting A&J's expertise to help him choose assembly block and head internals, Franco opted for Spoon components at a time when the Japanese company was just starting to make a name for itself. He later enlisted Wayde Segawa and Lawrence Ojas at Intec Racing in nearby Kent to prep the head.