amirza786
Senior Member
- First Name
- A
- Joined
- Oct 4, 2018
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- Location
- Northern California
- Vehicle(s)
- 2022 Polestar 2, 2010 Lexus IS 350 Sport
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Many of you have seen the recent threads on blown engines, thrown rods etc. and some of you are asking this question: Is my engine going to blow? Is the L15B7 reliable? The short answer is...yes, it's reliable. Even though it has been turbocharged, and even though it is GDI.
This engine was developed by Honda in 2016 for the Civic platform (and Accord), to include the Civic turbo, Civic Si, Honda CR-V, and the Honda Accord. Although it is tuned differently for the different platforms, all the Civics except the 2019 Sport share this engine. The Civic Si they added a few things like forged pistons,sodium valves etc for additional cooling and a higher lower compression ratio. You can read more information on this here: https://hondanews.com/en-US/releases/honda-civic-si-powertrain
In the majority of threads where the engine was blown or a rod thrown, you will find a similar pattern: the quest for more power. We are not talking Ktuner and an intake. We are talking about full bolt-on's, ethanol and meth injection, custom tunes that in some cases took the power beyond 300 WHP. On stock internals.We are talking torque that leaves anything but the most powerful V8's in the dust. In some cases there were warning signs such as engine sputtering at WOT, fuel trims that were way off, and codes being thrown. In some cases it just went boom without warning.
Now I want to make it clear that I am not putting down any of these people. The purpose of this thread is to not pass judgement on anyone. In fact I admire people willing to take a risk. Also, I am not discussing or advocating any type of tuning or abstaining from tuning in this thread. I don't want to pit the pro tuning and the anti-tuning members, each has his or her reasons for tuning or not tuning, an each side should respect the other.
The 1.5L engine has been around for awhile, both in the NA versions as well as some turbocharged versions in some form. So it has a long history, and a long history of reliability. When Honda reconfigured this engine for the 10th gen Civic, Accord and CR-V, Honda did extensive testing on this engine, you can find articles on this on the internet (Google is your friend here). By their own words, Honda tuned this engine "to last hundreds of thousands of miles". Yes, some issues did pop up such as the oil dilution issue that affected vehicles in cold climates, but Honda addressed it quickly. And in areas with mild climate like beautiful California (insert shameless plug here ), oil analysis showed that the oil dilution issue is a nothing burger.
What I am saying here is that your Civic, Civic Sports Hatch, LX, EX, Si etc have a well made economy engine, and I have to emphasize economy, one that was built to last. So trying to get 300 WHP out this engine with stock internals is risky, especially if you don't know what you are doing or you go to far. There is no evidence to suggest that a minor tune such as TSP's stage 1 tune or Ktuner base tunes on a stock engine would do any damage, but that is an argument for another day when more data becomes available or we start seeing failed engines on these tunes.
So other than the freak failure or the 1 out of a million engines that may have a factory defect, I think it's safe to say that if you take care of your car, maintain your engine, you will get years of enjoyment out of it and it won't blow up on you
This engine was developed by Honda in 2016 for the Civic platform (and Accord), to include the Civic turbo, Civic Si, Honda CR-V, and the Honda Accord. Although it is tuned differently for the different platforms, all the Civics except the 2019 Sport share this engine. The Civic Si they added a few things like forged pistons,
In the majority of threads where the engine was blown or a rod thrown, you will find a similar pattern: the quest for more power. We are not talking Ktuner and an intake. We are talking about full bolt-on's, ethanol and meth injection, custom tunes that in some cases took the power beyond 300 WHP. On stock internals.We are talking torque that leaves anything but the most powerful V8's in the dust. In some cases there were warning signs such as engine sputtering at WOT, fuel trims that were way off, and codes being thrown. In some cases it just went boom without warning.
Now I want to make it clear that I am not putting down any of these people. The purpose of this thread is to not pass judgement on anyone. In fact I admire people willing to take a risk. Also, I am not discussing or advocating any type of tuning or abstaining from tuning in this thread. I don't want to pit the pro tuning and the anti-tuning members, each has his or her reasons for tuning or not tuning, an each side should respect the other.
The 1.5L engine has been around for awhile, both in the NA versions as well as some turbocharged versions in some form. So it has a long history, and a long history of reliability. When Honda reconfigured this engine for the 10th gen Civic, Accord and CR-V, Honda did extensive testing on this engine, you can find articles on this on the internet (Google is your friend here). By their own words, Honda tuned this engine "to last hundreds of thousands of miles". Yes, some issues did pop up such as the oil dilution issue that affected vehicles in cold climates, but Honda addressed it quickly. And in areas with mild climate like beautiful California (insert shameless plug here ), oil analysis showed that the oil dilution issue is a nothing burger.
What I am saying here is that your Civic, Civic Sports Hatch, LX, EX, Si etc have a well made economy engine, and I have to emphasize economy, one that was built to last. So trying to get 300 WHP out this engine with stock internals is risky, especially if you don't know what you are doing or you go to far. There is no evidence to suggest that a minor tune such as TSP's stage 1 tune or Ktuner base tunes on a stock engine would do any damage, but that is an argument for another day when more data becomes available or we start seeing failed engines on these tunes.
So other than the freak failure or the 1 out of a million engines that may have a factory defect, I think it's safe to say that if you take care of your car, maintain your engine, you will get years of enjoyment out of it and it won't blow up on you
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