SUSpect EG Civic Hatch

First of all, Kelvin Ornelas is a friend of mine & an awesome fella…

Second of all, he’s a damn liar! Never believe a word Kelvin Ornelas says. Because no matter how much power he tells you this AWD EG Civic hatch makes, he’s lying! Like a damn street racing politician lying straight through his teeth with a friendly smile! He’s told me 500hp. His cousin Jose slipped-up & said 750 the other day… but that’s most likely a lie too. Today Kelvin said 650 “officially”. I don’t even think they know anymore. But… I’ve seen this swapped Honda walk on a 900+hp C7 Z06. I seent it! And Jose tends to wear a helmet in the passenger seat when they go street racing outside of Atlanta… not Georgia but a little suburb in Mexico. He does that for a reason.

Anyway – the previous-previous owner of this car (2 owners ago) was a buddy of Kelvin’s. Follow me here: That guy sold the Civic to the previous owner… who did NOT PASS GO and went directly to jail. And when he went to jail, someone broke into his house and stole his Honda.

…Not like he was using it.

The police recovered the Honda hatch as a stripped shell, and a relative of the jailbird sold-off that shell to some dude who owned a shop. Kelvin strolled into that shop one day, saw the bare-bones Si Honda shell sitting in the corner, and bought it for $300.

It was probably $300 too much…

There was no title, barely a wire left in it. Not to mention it was previously stolen & probably really bad joo-joo… total junk.

Kelvin already had a donor car though, so the plan was just to switch-n’-stitch everything over to this Si shell. Then along the way, his buddy (the previous-previous 1st owner) realized it was coincidentally his old-old car that Kelvin bought… and he still had the title for it. So he gave the title over to Kelvin, and although the car was still a disaster… there was a LEGAL pathway to hatchback Honda glory & resurrection. Although for a long time, Kelvin was scared to take it to meets, just because of the car’s “rich” history of ownership.

This EG Honda hatch has had many different engines…

H22s, Bs, Ks… turbos, NAs, ITBs, nitrous, etc. Kelvin gets excited & likes to change things up on a whim. But that’s part of what I love about Kelvin, nothing slows him down or gets him down. The 2 cousins do all the work around Kelvin’s house. And THAT’S why nobody really knows exactly what this thing’s got lolol. They keep it secret… while distracting you with bomb beer & tacos. But currently, we do know that the car is a very interesting TURBO K24 WITH ALL-WHEEL-DRIVE SETUP.

All-Wheel-Drive EG Civic hatch…

I don’t know all the ins & outs of AWD swapping a FD EG Hatch… because I haven’t done it (yet). But the trusty Honda aftermarket has kits to make it pretty plug-&-play. It’s overall a lot more costly than it is time consuming. Kelvin says you can knock out the install in a weekend once you’ve got all the parts. The big components of the AWD swap is centered around:

1. The AWD Wagon drivetrain (or 98-06 AWD CRV/Element)

2. The AWD CRV/Element transmission/bell-housing

3. An aftermarket rear differential mount kit + trailing arm kit. Check out FCS Race & Hub City Performance for products & options.

Text by Wooley Photos by Jorge Reyes

Here’s the modlist; it’s probably all lies! 🙂

AWD EG Civic Hatch with K24a2 block

CSS Cylinder Support System guard

Wiseco 11.1 pistons

Manley rods

Supertech valvetrain

IPS cams

Sheepey turbo manifold

Precision 6266 turbo

60mm Tial wastegate

Excessive manifold

90mm throttle body

PPG gearbox

FCS AWD rear diff mount (~$750)

Hub City Performance AWD trailing arms ($1,500)

Wagovan AWD drivetrain

Dual 5-gallon fuel cell

Magnafuel 750 fuel pump

Let’s just saaaaay…. 700hp lol

The purple EK hatch belongs to Erica Dale…

Erica is Kelvin’s better half, and she holds her own around these crazy b^stards. Erica’s got this k-swapped EK hatch PLUS a big-power SRT Grand Cherokee to commute in. The EK is super rowdy, sitting in the 500whp range. I got the chance to ride in this car with Kelvin one night, and it had me smilin’ for the better part of a week. The experience is so raw from the passenger seat. Flames blowing over my side of the windshield, vtec drilling into my ears, tires fighting for traction at highways speeds. AND – this swap has over 200k miles! Still taking beatings & loving every second of it!