B-16's 5th gear.........WHY???????????

why in the world did honda make the 5th gear in a b16 tranny so sorry. everyone with a b16 tranny could relate to this on freeway driving. at 75 mph im like at 5 1/2 rpms going onto 6,000 doing only 75-80mph. im really starting to consider an ls 5th gear. anyone know where i can find one.?????

Yeh i know what u mean man. Its pretty damn short.

Oh but i still love it though:)

Originally posted by mellowboy
Oh but i still love it though:)

lol....you are tooo much

Originally posted by Redline_civic91
why in the world did honda make the 5th gear in a b16 tranny so sorry.


Because in Japan the open road speed limit is quite low, about 50mph I think. A tall 5th simply isnt needed.

Besids which what the hell are you doing "cruising" in a B16a powered car?
The EF9 is almost a road legal race car, the engine and g/box were never designed to be "cruised" at 75mph. :D

yeah, i know what you mean, and thats precisely why im taking all the internals from my S1 with a cracked case and putting it all, minus the 5th gearset, into an LS tranny. itll look like an LS tranny, itll have 5th gear like an LS tranny, but itll have that oh so wonderful Hype-R 1st-4th in it....

Originally posted by Moppie





Besids which what the hell are you doing "cruising" in a B16a powered car?
The EF9 is almost a road legal race car, the engine and g/box were never designed to be "cruised" at 75mph. :D

actually i cruise around in a b20 w/b16 tranny:flipa: and to get to work i usually got to go on the freeway, that is were im cruising at 75-80 mph.

What tranny do you have? I have a JDM S1 in my car and its crazy.. 5th gear on the highway I'm doing 120-130 km/h and the revs are at or above 5,000rpm.
Sometimes when I got to to Toronto and shit, its reving like that for like a 2 - 2.5 hour drive.. BUT the B16 just loves the revs. All day, every day.

I feel you ... the GSR tranny is the same way, one time me and york2600 went to sacramento in his 94 GSR and he didnt mob above 80 or else the VTEC would kick in and his gas mileage would turn to shit.

Melt- Gsr trans have longer gears. Just so u know:)

The reason i like the 5th gear is because it feels like u downshifted when ur at high speed. All u have to do is floor it and it picks up quick! I wonder if i should throw in a jdm type r final drive in? hmm....

Originally posted by mellowboy
Melt- Gsr trans have longer gears. Just so u know:)

Oh I know that .. cause the vtec kicks in at like 4700 or some shit like that, and he was keepin it at like 4500 going like 80 ... and redline said hes at 5500 goin 80 so yea.

damn i didnt know gsr were like that too. i was seriously consedering a gsr tranny but not know. i would really love an ls 5th gear, that would be perfect. but if i go turbo than im gonna have to go ls tranny. but yeah i know what you mean mellowboy, it gets up quick, but when im going 80 and someone tries to fuck with me i still downshift to 4th. and damn that feels good:D

i do a lot of freeway driving and it does suck sometimes...

so we can take the 5th gear from an LS and drop it in our gearbox? what years will work? i might have to do this...

S1s have different ratios to Y1s - I can cruise at 10km over the speed limit at 4100 rpm... at 110km/h it's doing 3800rpm. I figure that's a nice trade off - better than the S1 ratios anyway :)

Originally posted by CRX586
i do a lot of freeway driving and it does suck sometimes...

so we can take the 5th gear from an LS and drop it in our gearbox? what years will work? i might have to do this...

yeah you can do that. it have to be a cable ls tranny though. well worth the effort and money.

Originally posted by mellowboy
The reason i like the 5th gear is because it feels like u downshifted when ur at high speed. All u have to do is floor it and it picks up quick! I wonder if i should throw in a jdm type r final drive in? hmm....
I've heard that since the JDM Type R final drive (4.785) wont work in our transmissions cuz it's out of a hydro trans. that's according to www.jdmhondaparts.com.

what years and model can I take the 5th gear from, and what else do I need to do the switch?

Originally posted by Fishcat37

I've heard that since the JDM Type R final drive (4.785) wont work in our transmissions cuz it's out of a hydro trans. that's according to www.jdmhondaparts.com.


Yeh i gotta check that out.

yeah type r wont work. its gotta be a cable tranny. for the integra ls i think 88-92 are cable im not sure though.

Originally posted by Redline_civic91
yeah type r wont work. its gotta be a cable tranny. for the integra ls i think 88-92 are cable im not sure though.
88-89 integra uses the D16A1 motor. the 5th gear will not work out of that trans since its d series. the 90-93 b18a integra should work, and you need the 5th gear out of its S1 trans.

Personally, I like my S1's 5th gear.
1). I am missing 4th gear... so going from 3rd to 5th you really cant feel a difference cuz the gears are so close... when going the speed limit that is.

2). It is nice when you are cruzing down the interstate at 80mph when someone wants to try you, all I do is smash the gas pedal to the floor and she picks up, with out down shifting (I wish I had a 4th gear!!!!!!). Although topping out at 115mph sucks... BAD (I need a chip!!!!!!).

This leads me to a question... How can I rebuild my JDM S1 transmisson???? Do I use the bearing set AND syncros for a 90-93 Integra 5 speed? Or do I just go and look for a used S1 tranny somewhere, and hope that all the gears and syncros are in realitively "good" condition (Good luck to me on this one!)? If anyone knows, it will help me out very much! :)

I recently discovered that are actualy two differnt S1 g/boxs.
With differnt gear sets.
The last of the 2g XSi integras (92 models) are fitted with the B16a2, and an S1 with a longer 5th gear. I can't remember the exact differnce but its about 300rpm at 100kph (60mph). It dosnt sound like a lot, but on a trip down to New Plymoth earlier in the year with a 92 and a 91 XSi the later car with the taller 5th used about a 1/4 of tank less gas.

My guess is the gear set from the later hydrolic clutch g/box is a straight swap in to the S1 caseing.



On the subject of rebuilding an S1 or Y1:
The bearings are all standard sizes, and if your not in the US will be avliable from any enginering supply shop. If your in the US you may have trouble as most bearings sold in the US are imperial sizes only (I know several companies here in NZ that have to send spare metric bearings with machinery sent to the US, as they are unavliable there) so you might have to source them directly from Honda.
But the orginal bearings are pretty damn tough and should never need replacing.

Snycrhos and gears however are another problem.
Many of them are no longer avliable as replacement parts from Japan, but some are the same as parts used in other g/boxs.
It will be a matter of getting to know your local honda parts manager buy him a beer or three and hope he can find some from somewhere in the world. He should if he pulls the right strings be able to get in contact with every Honda service center in the world, and have access to thier parts stock listings.

But the simplist option if to find another box, and from the two use the best bits you can, then keep all the rest as spares.

the integra 90-93 RS, LS, and GS all have the b18a - are all these years cable S1 trannys? I kept hearing people refering to the LS but not the RS or GS....

My guess is the gear set from the later hydrolic clutch g/box is a straight swap in to the S1 caseing.

do you mean to say that even though I have the cable S1 I should be able to pull the 5th gear from a hydro S1 and place that in my current S1 caseing?

and what's the difference between S1 and YS1?

thanks for the help.

Originally posted by CRX586

and what's the difference between S1 and YS1?

thanks for the help.

S1 was in the XSi Integra while the YS1 comes from the RSi Integra which is sort of the light weight harder sprung version. (I believe this is the same as the US spec GSR which is so rare and hard to find)
The YS1 is ment to be the g/box to have, as it has a close 1st-4th, but the same 5th as the Y1.

And the Y1 of course comes from the SiR Civic and CRX.

In 92 honda changed and updated the B16a (added 10hp) and added a hydrolic clutch to the g/box along with a new set of ratios. Its commonly called the J1, but there are several differnt versions of it.
In about 96 it was radiclay revised, with a design carried over from the Prelude and work done by Rover. The gear shafts were spaced further apart and larger stronger gears were used.


I believe that the 92 XSi and possible RSi integras recieved an S1 case to get the cable clutch, but with J1 internals to match the newer version of the B16a which they were also fitted with.
Hence its possible that the newer taller gear set from a J1 g/box most commonly found in the EG SiR Civic will fit into a Y1 or S1 casing.
But they are a poor set of ratios, all far to tall for the peaky B16a, and designed more for being lazy and tooling around town then the fast driving the B16a was designed for, and Im sure everyone here is aiming for. Although getting just the 5th gear ratio out of one of them would be nice.
On that note I think 5th is actualy fixed to out put shaft, along with 2nd, 3rd, and 4th. From memory 1st is the only gear you can change both cogs. (I could be wrong of course)
(looking at a pic I have of the internals of my G/box it looks like its fixed to the output, and only 1st is replaceable on both shafts.)


I have no idea what g/box was fitted to the LS(Lxi) and GSR(VTi/VTiR) Integra, but I assume its a relative of the J1, so its possible the gear sets will fit into a Y1 or S1 casing.
Of course I doubt the gear ratios will match up well to the B16a's power curve.