CRVAlaska Official Build/Adventure Journal of our 2001 Honda CR-V

AdventureHare

Outfitting for Adv
Can the first gen CRV be lifted via subframe spacers, like on old subarus (and a few other AWDs)?

I'm a "B>>K" person as well, but figured the RT4WD wasn't up to the task (in any CR-V).
There are a surprising number of 1G CRVs available around Seattle, although not a large number with manual trans.
Any comments on towing with the 1G CRV? It's not large enough for what I need it to do without a bonus room.
 

CRVAlaska

New member
Can the first gen CRV be lifted via subframe spacers, like on old subarus (and a few other AWDs)?

I'm a "B>>K" person as well, but figured the RT4WD wasn't up to the task (in any CR-V).
There are a surprising number of 1G CRVs available around Seattle, although not a large number with manual trans.
Any comments on towing with the 1G CRV? It's not large enough for what I need it to do without a bonus room.

It's not as easy as giving a Subaru body lift but it can be done. The car does have long travel suspension compared to it's civic/integra counterparts. And the 2001 model had hard rubber bushings in new spot cus honda wanted to make It's lat yr a more off road worthy car. Added a torque box to the intake manifold for better low end pull. The gears do well with the power compared to my Cpts SR5 tercel's EL gear in 4x4 with less power. I've made it up real rutted and washed out hills in one shot that other real 4x4s needed to take 3 or 5 runs at it so enough said. It can trail hard enough to keep up w real 4x4s but not a crawler. With how the car is set up now i'm an 80mph car fully loaded 90mph down a hill with the wind at my back. I will be towing a camper trailer soon so i'll be putting together a Garrett gt25r turbo kit for low/mid range power and Tq gains down low for towing. The car now could really use the zip from a smaller turbo and will still keep it fairly fuel efficient. Looking to use just 450cc injectors and keep the power around 250-300hp for some towing power and hopefully I wound break much if I'm nice to it.
 

CRVAlaska

New member
Been away fishing for a couple of months, back at working on the V. Progress since I've been back includes a hidden snorkel w/ K&N filter set up, repurposed oem mid pipe resonator N1 style muffler with bent oem crv tip, 3000k HID projector fog lights. Did a tune up on it to get it ready to for this years trip. We will be leaving Kodiak and heading back to NY to drop our dog and car off with my parents. Then me and my wife go to Poland to have out first baby :)

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CRVAlaska

New member
Did a Monstaliner white piant job to toughen the CRV up a bit. I use a 2 gallon kit with extra roller and didn't re-roll the 2nd coat. I didn't want a lot of texture so it would be easy to clean and give a satin look. It took about a week to complete but i wanted to do it rite not a quickie job. It came out great after I razored off the little peaces roller and weird clear chuncks which i assume was chunks of the catalyst. Great stuff and great customer service.
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shenrie

^^^ hates cars
Very cool! Looked through every honda thread I could find but somehow missed this one. Cool to see someone using a crv in this application rather than just parking lot off-roading. What kept you from lifting it? Just got really bad angles on axles? Were they making noise?

I've been screwing with the crvs predecessor since around 02 and love these little cars. Have thought about going up to the crv but didn't want to gain the higher center of gravity, plus they still command big money around here. Since they stopped rallyx here though I've been thinking more and more about picking one up. Have always been a fan of the first gens. Always wanted an itr setup in one but that was in my racing days. Now the grunt of the 20 has me intrigued, especially combined with a little boost. Look forward to your updates!
 

CRVAlaska

New member
Thank you. I did make a set of shock spacers for a body lift but i mad them way to big and they weren't going to work it was obvious. I also had 31" AT2 tires on it but took them off for the road trip to alaska. So all the fender work and wheel well work was done for big tires. Now I'm going to take a 2nd go at lifting it after I come back from alaska from fishing for 3 months. I'll make some money and I'm going to build my own setup from scratch. No one really makes a real off ready set of for our cars so I'm gonna build a set up based on Bilstein shocks b6 4600 hd and Ironman springs and a bunch of other parts which is why no one really sells a good set up. I could build body spacers like subaru guys do but I want a reliable set up for long trips and many safe miles on the road. An air set up in the rear would be nice tho for dealing with load when we travel/move.
 

shenrie

^^^ hates cars
have you looked into k-sport coilovers? they offer a gravel setup for stage rally and the 3-4 people ive talked to that are running them are very happy with the setup. one guy I spoke with had 3 seasons of stage rally without any issues at all and he typically does 5-6 events per year. that's roughly 5-600 miles at wide open throttle on beatdown dirt roads up to 80mph on some stretches. imho, that's a serious coilover considering the roads these guys run on are absolute garbage by the end of an event. ill likely be going this route with our wagon when we go down that ave. theres no crv specific applications, but they offer for the 94+ integras which should be a direct bolt in. their site says that the setup will lift your vehicle right from the get go, but not sure that would be the case for the crv if what I read earlier in this thread that Honda lifts it a bit from the factory for the 01's is the case. either way, might be something to look into. the 4.5k spring rate might be enough to keep form having a saggy *** loaded up as well. no idea what the stock spring rate is for the crv's, but that's got to be considerably more than stock rates, lol.


as far as body lifting like the subys, not sure that's really an option for the Hondas. however, you should be able to lift as far as you feel comfortable doing so with suspension. my only concern would be axle angles as you mentioned earlier. camber is easily corrected with aftermarket options. if you do body lift, make sure you clock the rear trailing arm bushings. those don't last for **** as it is, having that extra stress would kill them even faster if you lift and don't clock it.
 

CRVAlaska

New member
Those coilovers look good for a rally project down the road when i have space and a place to build again. I Drove from AK to NY to go to Poland to have our baby but my wife's green card never showed up in time, so we are at my parents house for a few months. I was planning on building a rally car to compete in some of the cheaper Poland rally class racing. I have adjustable rear camber kit but swapped them for washers to space the rear camber arms out cus they kept coming loose on dirt roads in alaska. Not a good thing to be stuck in AK. I have my wife,baby, and dog in the car when we travel so I like to over build my cars to take the beating and keep things safe. Those Bilstine shocks are top in class and better then most cheaper coilover companies. I'm gonna do a whole poly or hard rubber bushing kit when i do the suspension later this yr. Maybe i'll even get to the engine and turbo it this yr if i have time. We spend months in Poland, AK and Ny so its hard to find the time to do long projects, and projects that require some R&D to make things work. In AK i couldn't even have a snorkel shipped to me i'd have to have it freighted up on a ship. Couldn't get a Monstaliner kit shipped ether. So since i'm back down here in NY I'm trying to take care of as much as i can. I really don't want to go through the head ache of building a body lift, I'd rather beg a few companies to send me free parts and advertize for them. I'm already advertising with AVS, gonna call up Monstaliner and see if i can work something out with them also. then free parts :D Maybe. It's just more fun driving this thing over a real heavy 4x4. Its fun to get up in the rpms blow by people making all kinds of noise lol. I love my Hondas.
 

shenrie

^^^ hates cars
just missed a nice white mt 00 ex by one day dammit...gotta call back today and see if the chick who put down a deposit was able to get her loan.

I had a set of those bilsteins a while back. no complaints, but wanted something a little softer for the dd and got the adjustable gr2's. they worked great for about 4 seasons of rallyx but the constant plunging on the rears with the combo of soft spring rates overheated them and blew them out. fronts are still working fine. will likely get another set of rears and higher rate springs or splurge for the ksports. after watching a full on stage rally and the abuse those cars take, im really blown away those ksports don't just fall to pieces. plus since they are adjustable I can go as high as they will let me but still allow me to adjust in case the axles start making noise or I cant get it aligned. definitely agree most coilover systems are garbage though.

youll like the poly kit. makes a huge difference, but don't do the torque or engine mounts. either fill air gap in them with windshield urethane or get the inserts. otherwise youll vibrate the thing to pieces.

really like the monstaliner coating. looking into that for our van and possibly the wagon. ordered some samples yesterday.
 

CRVAlaska

New member
Thanks guys. Trying to make the most of my off season with just having our new born arrive. Time is sparse. The only thing that i don't like about coilovers is I might lose suspension travel. I get into some real crappy spots i should go but it's there and i must conquer all obstacles lol. I need as much flex and drop as I can get cus my diffs really don't like wheels coming off the ground at low speeds, so I need to get some speed and a good line. That's always a fun time with people in the car. I've done rutted hill climbs that i did in one shot that took really 4x4 vehicles 2,3,4 shoots to get up. And I've got a but of extra weight in the car so I need those HD shocks and HD springs from Ironman. I guess :p Might also go with HARD RACE bushings cus they install like oem bushings and are harden rubber. OK baby is crying gtg.
 

CRVAlaska

New member
Installed new 3M tape on all the AVS wind gaurds.
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Installed the oil pan heater pad
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The plugs up front.
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Installed Show Chrome Digital 5-Function Volt/Clock/Temp Meter
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The outside temp sensor low up front.
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Installed bottle top popper on the fuel can holder.
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Mounted the flag on the back of the basket.
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Mounted the Overland Bound Emblems on the front fenders.
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shenrie

^^^ hates cars
is that heater pan designed to go on outside of pan? ive never seen a setup like that before, but then again, ive never given it much thought either, lol.

there has been at least one person figure out a lsd for the awd crv tranny, but ive never heard of anyone figuring out a rear lsd for it yet. you can use a d-series diff in the rt4wd wagon rear diff and quite a few folks are using wagon diffs on their crv for that reason, but i know that the gearing is different. so not sure how they got over that hurdle.

i had a buddy here years back shim the clutch pack in the rear diff on his crv so it would engage faster. i think he did a writeup on it somewhere. i could search for it if you were interested. he said it worked considerably better for very little effort.

as far as coilovers limiting droop, wouldnt a longer bodied setup allow more droop? either way, im interested to hear how you like the bilsteins once you get the setup dialed in. any idea on total cost to get them in and functional?

keep up the good work. i love seeing something different, especially with a honda!
 

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