This Modified Civic Is the Best Argument for Naturally Aspirated Engines

From Road & Track

The 1.5-liter turbo Honda offers in the new Civic makes a nice, meaty 167 lb.-ft. of torque when paired with the manual transmission, but it doesn't have quite the same character of older, naturally aspirated Honda engines. Sure, you can tune a turbocharged engine pretty easily, but as the Civic in The Smoking Tire's latest One Take reminds us, NA engines still have tons of potential.

This particular car pairs a K20 head with a K24 block and makes 260 horsepower at the wheels. It revs all the way up to 8000 RPM, and as Matt Farah can attest, it's an absolute blast to drive. With the rest of the mods the owner made, it's pretty much what a U.S.-spec Civic Type R could have been.

We're big fans of what Honda has done with the new Civic, and compared to the previous generation, it's much more fun to drive. We're also definitely looking forward to the upcoming Civic Si and Type R. But we sure are going to miss having a naturally aspirated engine screaming away under the hood.

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