porting intake manifold?

Hey guys, it's your favorite newbie here! Just got through reading the Honda Performance FAQ all the way through! Damn it's loooong! She-ite!!

Anyway, one thing that caught my eye was a part about porting the intake manifold. The guy explained it real well, and I'm wondering if I need to do this. My lone performance mod is a DAC DC Sports short ram intake. My cousin hooked it up for me, and I had the resonator removed. Should I also get this porting done? I mean, it makes sense to have a smoother transition from intake to manifold, right? If I do need it, how much will it cost and how much power should it give me? Am I losing power by not doing it? Do you see how ignorant I am? lol, I am just looking to not damage my car, really.

Thanks for any help you can give :)

a port or polish job will more and likely give you something if correctly done even though your close to stock but the true purpose is to give an increase in the amount of air you can flow. its usually very helpfull when you become moderatly to seriously modded, like turbo or supercharger or cam's and all the fixins in all honesty with the gains it depends on the quality of the work and the mods that exist. as for pricing it can vary greatly depending on where you are or go. best bet is to start calling machine shops.

You can do the job yourself with a dremel tool, some sandpaper, and a little bit of patience. Actually it's not hard at all, just a bit tedious. You can save alot of money, and if you don't alread have a Dremel tool, get one because it has a million other uses. It won't make a tremendous difference in your performance right now...but as you begin to add more mods to your engine, the increased airflow will pay huge dividends to the overall power of your vehicle.

why not use an after market manifold?

Originally posted by jimmyfunk
You can do the job yourself with a dremel tool, some sandpaper, and a little bit of patience. Actually it's not hard at all, just a bit tedious. You can save alot of money, and if you don't alread have a Dremel tool, get one because it has a million other uses. It won't make a tremendous difference in your performance right now...but as you begin to add more mods to your engine, the increased airflow will pay huge dividends to the overall power of your vehicle.


i consider myself to know a decent amount about cars but one thing i would never do is port my own head or anyone elses i liked for that matter. i would port match things together but as for going into the head itself hell no. there is actually a decent thread over in the tech section about this and as moppie over there said about it, its a black art. you can really do a lot of damage if you dont know what your doing.

Porting (& polishing) a head and porting/port-matching the intake manifold are two different things!
Porting the intake manifold does hardly much if you don't have an oversized/aftermarket throttle body. It's like installing an adjustable cam gear... It's more helpful with an aftermarket cam.

However, a p&p job would improve your engine's performance. Of course, when you do the ports from the I.M. you will need to match them to the ports leading to the cylinder head.

wow, such varying opinions!! Although some of you do not quite understand what I am saying it seems. I am talking about reshaping the end of the INTAKE MANIFOLD where the Short Ram Intake I have connects. This will increase air flow a little, I am just wondering how important it would be for a lightly modded car and how much it would cost. Now, I have a dremel tool (I've got every had tool there is :)) but I am too scared to go drilling around in there. I'm not a mechanic yet, I'm just the average newbie who is just trying to make sure he's getting the most out of what he's got. I'm not gonna go out and spend alot of cash to buy a new manifold either.

Sorry for any confusion on what I was talking about.

I thought it goes...
intake > throttle body > intake manifold

It would be better to complement the shaved intake manifold with a more open throttle body. It wouldn't really do anything without the other.
Anyway, I say, "Every little bit helps!" http://forums.off-topic.net/images/smilies/biggthumpup.gif

the part the short ram connects to is commonly refferd to as the throttle body. im not sure i understand what the hell your trying to enlarge or port or whatever since the intake should be lined up with it allready.

by the way the amount of air your engine flows is primarily because of the cam, or f/i method. i seriously dont see any need to enlarge anything or port anything unless your flow has increased to beyond the parts ability to operate efficiently. unless youve changed the amount of air you ingest in one form or another the results will be negligable unless its a known factory weakness like a huge casting mark the foils the flow or what not. and on a civic i really havent seen anything so great in flaw that would have me ripping apart shit to port it or enlarge it in hopes of much of a hp gain on a non cam'd , non f/i engine. so basically from what i can understand about what your saying it would probably be worthless in the first place if not somewhat damaging if you dont know what your doing.

Sorry, indeed you are correct, the throttle body comes first. Sorry.

I guess it really isn't that important because none of you really think its worth it!! So, I guess you answered my question, thanks :)