I think if you've reached the point of considering a motor swap, it's time for a different chassis.

I'm guessing any Evo engine swaps are more for show than performance. The type of thing that lands you on Instagram feeds and magazine covers.

The one exception would be RS Motors' ongoing 4B11T into CT9A swap. I'm eagerly following that build.

 

And doing a 4b11 swap, I see the only thing making that worth the time and the investment being the reduced weight of the engine. The 4b11 is a better engine. But I don't think it's better enough to for all that work,

IIRC someone put a K series Honda in an Evo at some point also.

 

I have considered building a 2.2 4b11 for the next motor going in my car just because its a lighter option. But thats a lot of money and effort for 30-40lbs.

 

Added bonus of better WD with the turbo being on the firewall side. Certainly lots of effort but at some point it almost makes sense.

 

I doubt it's ever really worth it unless you happen to already have a CT9A shell and a 4B11T motor and trans. And a lot of free time. I like it anyway though.

This might be heresy around here, but I'm most interested in the SST trans. A 4B11T with built SST in a CT9A would be great, IMO. You'd lose most of the power and weight savings to the heavy SST trans, but you'd have a dual-clutch Evo.

 

I agree. The SST isn't that much more of a power suck. Where a full bolt on GSR makes ~340whp on pump gas, an MR will make 320-325. It only uses up an extra 15-20hp. (drivetrain loss is not a percentage)

 

Why not just lighten the CZ4A chassis?

Having owned both chassis... I'll take the CZ4A on track any day of the week.

 

I can get my car down to under 850lbs per front tire, with the 4b11 and manual I could be low 800s and potentially high 7xx with some more aggressive moves. That’ll never happen in an X

 

I think for the time involved, and hassle of fitting a 4b11, I would just buy a billet 4g block. if you wanted to lose the weight. The bullet block is $10k, and bolts right in. Put a mivec head on it, and call it done. No hassle of retro fitting a different engine/trans/tcase, with the turbo on the other side, etc. So you wouldn't be buying a new turbo kit, stuff like that. For those of us that already have build engines, just building a buying 4b11 to what we have would set us back more than just swapping in the billet block during an off season refresh. I think the billet block would end up being lower cost vs a getting a 4b11 swap up to where most of our current setups are.

And the bullet is available in 4g64 deck height, has 4 bolt mains, can be bored to 87mm, can be resleeved. And it saves 44lbs.

 

I go by $/lb on the front end and right now $150/lb is doable with Ti hardware. 10k/35lbs = $285/lb isnt pretty appealing. Could be less if the current engine/turbo is still good but its a far cry from an easy win.

 

I'm not saying it's an easy win. Was only comparing the billet 4g block to 4b11 swap. Seems like you def still have some other lower hanging fruit you can address first. Can you do subframes with factory suspension pivots points in SM?

I also wouldn't consider a block change unless the motor was already coming out of the car.

 

Heh, my motor came out this winter (just went back in this weekend actually) and I did nothing I couldn't do in the car. But with T-case and trans out it just seemed right to pull it the rest of the way.

Billet blocks are cool, but not legal in SM. The new XS class will allow it though. Same with subframe changes. XS will also allow bumper beam removal and I would be able to finally do a front SLA setup if I wanted.

Another thought is the cost of the 2nd block if you kill one. A replacement 4B isn't too bad once you have all the other things.

 

In B4 the people that wanted the XS class are crying that the open class they wanted because they didn't want to have a rule book for their modded street car resulted in a few people with big wallets and highly modded cars mopping up every event in class.

 

Thats the fear everyone has but CAM has been successful regardless. And if you talk to people with local classes similar to XS, theyre all wildly popular. And I dont care what the other hardcore guys say, people just dont like hoosiers these days when street tires last longer and are way more consistent.