[MonoMorph]

So, as the title suggests, i need some directions for what N/A performance mods exactly can I do to my CR-Z, newer cars always were an enigma to me in terms of this kind of stuff.
As my first intention was to get an CRX(B16A1), was pretty easy figuring out what i could do to it to squeez some more performance, better ignition, ECU, camshafts, cam gears, lighter flywheel, hc pistons, stiffer springs, etc.
But for CR-Z i have completly no idea what can i do to it while staying N/A, besides air filter and better exhaust.
As for horsepower, i'm aiming something like 150-160.

And no, i don't want to do a swap as, where i live is simply not an option to remain street legal without wasting tons of money.

 

[Spdbump]

There are literally 100s of threads on adding to this car without a swap most involve forced induction and different intakes and exhaust, upgraded internals etc. All very expensive.To be honest I personally think the car is well balanced as it is and most changes are more for sound and just to say you have modified than anything else and a waste of money. What does your CR-Z not do that you want it to do? This is an economy car with sporty tendencies and aspirations. You may want to consider selling it and getting something that is more modifiable legally and less expensively. I am the exception I knew what i was buying and made my choice with my eyes wide open.

 

[MonoMorph]

Well, you see, i too made my decision knowing what i would get into/with the eyes wide open. I knew it wouldn't be an easy task, money are not really a problem either as i have a stable job and the the things i will buy will be along the way.

I don't want a more powerful car, if i wanted that, i would go agains anything i stood for and buy a german diesel car and i would call it a day, but i want this car, and what i want to do, i will do to this car.

If you can't help me thats fine, but that won't turn me from still wanting to do what i want to do and i will search for someone who can help me somewhere else instead.

 

[PeterPerkins]

I your car is a Nimh model you can hack the IMA and fit Lithium batteries.

 

[MonoMorph]

I your car is a Nimh model you can hack the IMA and fit Lithium batteries.

How do i check what version i have?

 

[Spdbump]

I am not trying to discourage you just be realistic. There is not much that has been done without forced induction. You mentioned more horsepower which means you want a more powerful car. Have fun do what makes you happy and go read the 100s of other threads on this forum with similar ideas most have gone the forced induction route or intakes and exhausts. Many just want the sound. I prefer reliability and something that can just be driven and does not need constant tinkering. You want to change your car it is yours do what what you want but do your research plan your budget ad a percentage for supporting things you need to do and have fun.

if pre 2013 it is NIMH if after it is LI-ON.

Well, you see, i too made my decision knowing what i would get into/with the eyes wide open. I knew it wouldn't be an easy task, money are not really a problem either as i have a stable job and the the things i will buy will be along the way.

I don't want a more powerful car, if i wanted that, i would go agains anything i stood for and buy a german diesel car and i would call it a day, but i want this car, and what i want to do, i will do to this car.

If you can't help me thats fine, but that won't turn me from still wanting to do what i want to do and i will search for someone who can help me somewhere else instead.

 

[MonoMorph]

I am not trying to discourage you just be realistic. There is not much that has been done without forced induction. You mentioned more horsepower which means you want a more powerful car. Have fun do what makes you happy and go read the 100s of other threads on this forum with similar ideas most have gone the forced induction route or intakes and exhausts. Many just want the sound. I prefer reliability and something that can just be driven and does not need constant tinkering. You want to change your car it is yours do what what you want but do your research plan your budget ad a percentage for supporting things you need to do and have fun.

if pre 2013 it is NIMH if after it is LI-ON.

Are there some noteable threads you can direct me to, as most of what i seen talk about rims, superchargers, intake and exhaust(as you mentioned).
Also about exhaust, i am part of the crowd that actually want a quiet exhaust with an loud intake sound/engine.

Is there an exhaust that fits this criteria and still gives some power, or?

 

[Spdbump]

As I like my car as is so all I can tell you is do a search. Many come on this forum with lots of big ideas but not many actually do the research and most just throw parts at the car randomly if they do anything. To get more power you need to give something up. Usually removing restrictions in the exhaust makes it louder. There is nothing I have read that meets your stated goals. Most of what people add on ( the intakes, heads. etc )are hype. Do you have the mechanical skills needed for engine modification? Do you know how to setup a new cam and other engine parts for more power ( very difficult to learn how to do on a fully computer controlled car like a CR-Z). There is very little aftermarket or factory support for this car. It is getting less and less as time goes on. You will need a tuner and probably an HDS for trouble shooting your changes. You will also need access to someone very skilled with this car or plan on spending a lot of time and money having to fix the issues.

What do you really want to change and why? Once you answer that question, check your laws, check your budget and do more searching.

As this was a low volume niche car based on an economy platform there is not much. There is less now that the car has been discontinued.

I wish you luck in your quest but before spending any money do more research and soul searching and decide if it is the idea or something you really want and can do.

I am done with this thread you seem like you are determined to do the best N/A CR-Z on the planet without major modifications. You want a unicorn . More power to you if you actually accomplish anything but I think you just do not know enough about what you have or how to get where you think you can get to. You need to do more research!

As I said I like The Speed Bump as it is and if I wanted more power ( I owned a more powerful car in the past) I would either buy one or do more research and not just on a forum like this. These cars being rare are very hard to do any modifications on and are very well engineered from the factory. I doubt any single person without a lot of money and skills can improve upon it as it is. Prove me wrong make all the changes you want to make and then keep the car longer than 2 years. Most posters here who have modified their cars never end up keeping them long the more they modify the less time they are here. Usually if they stay on the forum the CR-Z becomes a weekend car and they end up using it very little. I own one vehicle at a time and I keep my cars a very long time. I value reliability and length of ownership over every thing else. Heavy modifications runs counter to this.

Good Luck but I will leave you the the other members to help you decide what you need to get to your goals after you fully define them.

Are there some noteable threads you can direct me to, as most of what i seen talk about rims, superchargers, intake and exhaust(as you mentioned).
Also about exhaust, i am part of the crowd that actually want a quiet exhaust with an loud intake sound/engine.

Is there an exhaust that fits this criteria and still gives some power, or?

 

[MonoMorph]

I mentioned before what my goals are, 150-160 hp, the car already has 112, so that number isn't, "chasing illusions" .
As for reliability, i love reliability as much as the next guy who cares about the stuff he owns.

I don't know what type of person you think i am but, this car is my daily driver and i will own it more than 5 years and if i end up getting another car, i still wouldn't sell this one.

I don't want to do anything crazy like you are assuming, but in the same time i want something a little more than it's stock form.

 

[Spdbump]

This is my real last entry in this thread. If you don't want to do forced induction. a cam ,an intake or any of the other items then it will be near impossible to gain what you think you can get but again I have no interest in any of that and you seem a bit clueless as to what does what. The power has to come from somewhere and any changes you make can affect the drive ability and reliability and as I said most who modify don't keep them as their daily driver and or only car.

Many come in here thinking they can just buy a tuner and magically get horsepower. It simply does not work that way others think Noise = Horsepower which is the concept on most "Cold Air Intakes" which are not really cold air. Gains from intakes are minimal. Other remove cats etc which adds some horsepower but makes it louder. Without "crazy" changes ( engine intake, cam, exhaust, cold air intake (Minimal), forced induction etc) there is no way to gain any horsepower. What magical way do you think you will be able to do this without hard parts changes? What makes you any different than all of the other posters here. The engineers designed the car to get what it gets based on what compromises they had to make to make it reliable and serviceable and able to run in all conditions and be within the budget they set for people to actually buy it. With application of money and engineering any hing is possible but is it "worth" it. There are real companies that have spent thousands of dollars to add horsepower to CR-Zs but all involve at minimum forced induction. There is one from I think Bizmoto that has been built and sold many tines but it was a proof of concept and is a concept car for I think SEMA. these kinds of cars are not daily drivers they were built to prove it could be done not as a usable daily driver.

Ok, if i misinterpreted you what do you really want?

What changes are you willing to make and how much are you willing to spend to get there? What compromises are you personally willing to make for this supposed gain? What will it do to make the car any better than it already is?

Again what mechanical skills and knowledge about engines and cars do you have?

PeterPerkins threads are the only real proof of concept work I have seen on here that adds power without a cam or forced induction. He is working on increasing available energy from the IMA system using additional batteries and or a different technology battery.

Everything else I have seen on this forum other than forced induction ( or K-swap but those all apparently cause errors in the car even when IMA system is removed) is hype or minimal increases in real usable horsepower .

Sorry to rain on your parade but there are real engineers and many others who have tried to improve an existing car beyond its original design but there are more failures and abandoned projects than real actual gains. Chasing horsepower is a great hobby but counter to having a reliable, serviceable vehicle.

All of this is my opinion from owning many cars and reading many articles and watching all kinds of automotive and other programs. What you say now and reality are probably different. I have been on this forum a long time and have seen many members come and go and many had what you call 'crazy" ideas or plans and very very few actually got what they wanted from the changes or made any changes. Many cars sold ,destroyed or members simply gone.

As I said prove me wrong, do you your research, make a plan ,make a build thread, document how you did something different than all these other members and companies. You seem a bit defensive. Usually that means I hit a nerve or upset the person. I live in the real world and am a bit more than skeptical and I rub many the wrong way. I apologize.

I mentioned before what my goals are, 150-160 hp, the car already has 112, so that number isn't, "chasing illusions" .
As for reliability, i love reliability as much as the next guy who cares about the stuff he owns.

I don't know what type of person you think i am but, this car is my daily driver and i will own it more than 5 years and if i end up getting another car, i still wouldn't sell this one.

I don't want to do anything crazy like you are assuming, but in the same time i want something a little more than it's stock form.

 

[litz]

How do i check what version i have?

"Nihm" type IMA battery comes with the 2011-2012 model years, and 2013 and up come with Lithium battery (Peter's working on a mod that he mentioned to increase the IMA power on those 2011-2012 versions.) Worth looking into, but you can do some intake/exhaust for a mild increase in performance, and if you step up to a supercharger, you'll have to use hondata for the 2011-2012, and KTuner for the tuning of the ECU to get to the performance level you've seeking. So, let's start with your location and model year, to get to the place where we can rule some stuff out--mods that aren't suited for that model year.

 

[MonoMorph]

Ok so, first of all, i have to apologize for taking so long to respond, it was weekend and i hardly have any free time as my job is taking it almost all up.

Now lets get to what my thought process was when i made the decision to get this car.

I started looking to buy a car since last year. As i don't want anything german or diesel, a big portion of possible cars are out.

So i started looking at Toyota, Honda, Subaru and Mazda.

I am a pretty big fan of late 80's and 90's cars so naturally i startes looking through some of them.

Eventually i ended with a list something like: Honda CRX EE8, Toyota Celica T160, Subaru Impreza GL and Mazda RX7 or RX8.

With this list i started looking to them individually, specs, engines, parts, looks, mods, everything i could to have a basic understanding about them.

I dropped the idea of getting either of the RXs as it looked like dealing with them would be very complicated(not sure if it really is) as i would have to learn completly new and my town not having any rotary mechanics in case i mess something up, and the 30-40% fuel consumption scared the shit out of me.

I dropped the idea of getting an Impreza GL as i felt the car was underwhelming in it's NA form.

Toyota Celica T160 appealed a lot to me as it is very similar to the AE86 by being RWD, the engine and its looks.

Honda CRX felt a bit odd at first, after looking more at it i started liking the design, i was surprised by how little it weighted and the power it had, made me think of some kind of sleeper after which i already started making some plans in my mind as i usually do involuntarily(i like to think of it as an bless and curse in the same time).

After some more reading on what other people have done to it i had a pretty clear vision of what i would do to it myself.

Some time passes while i was still looking for CRXs to pop up, while i was looking trough sites i stumbled across the CRZ, i did not knew about it before, it looked similar to the CRX do i was instsntly intrigued, after looking a bit through the specs and stuff i finally thought i found a newer car i would like, so got it.

The car i got is a CRZ 2011 ZF1 6MT.

Now to get to what Spdbump said.
I will do almost any kind of mod that isn't force induction or engine swap, so, naturally cams, intake, exhaust, ecu mod, etc if are the only ways, i will do them.
Now, if im interested mainly in power, that doesn't mean i won't do some other mods to the car that improves drive ability for example, so naturally i will get better suspension and better brakes on my car, as an example.

I mentioned above what changes i would be willing to do, as for what i would spend, as an example, i will just say that i was prepared to spend more than 12K on the CRX i would have got instead of the CRZ but went with the CRZ.
As for compromises, i don't know exactly.

As for what mechanical skills and knowledge i have, i read a lot of stuff on engines and modding in my free time, i do maintenence work myself as i am kind of skeptical on some mechanics in my town, i am certified electromechanic(certified as in this is what it says on my diploma).
In a worst case scenario i think i would ask my father for help as he has more experience in some parts than me.

It is ok to be skeptical, i don't blame you, it is a forum after all and people can say whatever they want, true or untrue.

 

[litz]

...

The car i got is a CRZ 2011 ZF1 6MT.

...

I would say you're a perfect candidate to look into the IMA mods that Peter's doing:
Converting my Nimh CRZ to Lithium and boosting IMA performance... | Page 12 | Honda CR-Z Hybrid Car Forums (crzforum.com)

I say this, because there's not much extra to get out of the engine, unless you supercharge it, but since that's not something you want to do, see how the IMA mod works out. Only trouble I see with that, is that you'd have to experiment on the weekends and get it back up and running for the work-week commute. Just drive it around for six months or so as it is, and let some ideas mull around in your head for a while before you buy anything--and keep in mind that you will have to invest in a hondata unit to get a proper tune for any engine mods you do (the CRX, for instance, is a lot easier to tune and to get engine mods for, since it's of an earlier generation of cars, but you'll be happy with the CR-Z too.)