Stock motor upgrades.

[bhazard]

If you want cheap, quick & simple upgrades for the B3, I would suggest the following. Assuming your B3 is in good mechanical condition, this will make sure you get the max HP you still have available:

1) Do a complete tune-up w/quality parts (i.e. plugs, wires, cap, rotor,
fuel filter, throttle body cleaned, advance the timing slightly).
2) Install a K&N filter (they do make them to fit the EFI models).
3) drill holes in the air filter box as TominMO suggested.

Another mod you could do would be a header* (if you can find one), delete the cat and install a good aftermarket muffler. I would suggest staying with stock diameter or 2" max exhaust pipe and a turbo style muffler. I would not "hollow out" the factory cat because the large volume of the empty cat chamber will reduce the exhaust velocity.

An Aspire tranny would also provide a slight boost in acceleration due to the slower gear ratio, but you would lose some MPG. You could do the trans swap in a week end. You could also install a lightened flywheel while the tranny is out. All these parts could also be switched over to a B6 if you ever decided to swap the engine at a later date.

* I have noticed that the stock exhaust manifold on my Gen1 B6 has significantly longer primaries than the factory B3. In theory, the Gen1 B6 manifold should bolt up to a B3. It seems to me that would make a cheap and easy upgrade. It wouldn't provide the scavenging like a long tube design, but it would retain the heat & gas velocity and should provide an improvement over the B3 design. Anyone ever tried it?

Didnt I already go over this though when he asked about the cam swap? A header and intake/exhaust isnt going to do much when the head flows like crap. A cam isnt going to do anything when the head flows like crap. Porting and intake/exhaust isnt going to do much when the cam is for MPG. If you want a b3 to put out any more power you have to do EVERYTHING together.

Its not worth the time/money. Just swap engines.

[Biff]

Nothing beats displacement for cheap power. Find a 323 and slip that engine in. It is probably the most popular engine; really makes the Festiva fun!

[bhazard]

You forgot one important bit of info. Is your car and auto or manual?

If its an auto you dont have to worry about swapping transmissions with the higher power swaps. The auto can take the abuse as it is.

[blkfordsedan]

Didnt I already go over this though when he asked about the cam swap? A header and intake/exhaust isnt going to do much when the head flows like crap. A cam isnt going to do anything when the head flows like crap. Porting and intake/exhaust isnt going to do much when the cam is for MPG. If you want a b3 to put out any more power you have to do EVERYTHING together.

Its not worth the time/money. Just swap engines.

The stock head does not really flow that bad for 1.3L displacement. Granted, I would not install a performance cam without porting, intake, header, etc.....and you are correct that the engine will perform best if everything works together as a package. However, to say that significant improvements will not be seen because the stock head doesn't flow that well is not true. You may not see as much improvement, but there will be an improvement none-the-less.
I have installed LT headers on many different completely stock engines over the last 25 years, and I have yet to be disappointed in the results!

[Grey Vw]

Just don't bother trying to mod the B3. Dumping the same money you would on a swap into the B3 won't get you anywhere close to the power levels of a swap.

I'm attempting a b6t swap as the first big anything I have done at the moment.

I'm in high school too and also wish to smash "daddy bought" high school kid cars Good luck finding a donor and don't disappear after a week

[91_festy_Gl]

BP, F-series, exhaust cam swap and those hondas are history. Ask that honda guy that met my fester last night! 85 in 3rd gear is insane.

[mckabe]

Mine is a manual, and will stay manual no matter what. Now I just don't know to go with a b6 or the b8 I figure I can always throw boost on at a later date. What is the difference in power.

[TominMO]

Mine is a manual, and will stay manual no matter what. Now I just don't know to go with a b6 or the b8 I figure I can always throw boost on at a later date. What is the difference in power.

My turboed B6 is making at least 120 HP at the wheels with 10 lb of boost, and can get at least 40 MPG if/when I can keep my foot out of it. The stock tranny does fine with it BTW.

[mckabe]

B6 is in the escorts right? How hard would it be to find thestuff to turbo it? How much power is the stock b6 putting down.

[Safety Guy]

I'd see what's available in known good shape (ie., you saw it run before removal and know the owner didn't thrash it) and choose your B6 or B8 that way. The B8 only takes a bit more work and a relatively easy right side engine mount mod to swap, while the B6 swaps right in motor mount-wise.

Choose what runs best for the lowest price. You'll probably want new timing belt and water pump, new seals and maybe some new gaskets. Get on Rockauto and some other car store sites and see how hard replacement parts are to find and how much they compare in prices.

Depending on how much experience you already have the B6 or B8 is a good way to get to know the vehicle and do some performance mods to them on your own without risking the harder to find turbo engines or taking too much time and energy.

For example, I'm on my second engine swap (finished my third suspension/brake swap) right now and I could only find a B6 oil pump pickup tube gasket at Rockauto. FYI, I chose the Festiva for "my car" because they are unimposing, easy to work on and at 50 years old I'm still a "beginner."

Just my two quarts!

Karl

PS: Just saw your last post. B6s come from Mazda 323s; B8s come out of Protege DXs. The only Escorts you'd be interested in would be the 1991 on GTs, which had the BP DOHC. Do your searching and reading for a few days on this site and then ask more questions and plan it out before you act. Maybe you should go with improving handling first with an Aspire suspension and brake swap. Pretty straightforward, and by the time you finish that you should be up on all the engine possibilities.

[drddan]

High school= bunch of kids who think p.o.s hondas are cool. Does anyone have the link to the b8 swap? Search engine is not working.

Just so ya know, our search does not recognize words with 3 letters or less. Putting b8 in search will give you nothing. Try ....engine swap, or similar.
Has to be 4 letters at least.

[DrMaxwellEdison]

I'm in high school as well... haven't had the time or money to do a swap yet... but with the B3 there isn't much you can do aside of porting and all that, which if you're gonna spend the money to do that ya may as well do a swap.... if I get extra cash though the swap will be imminent

[TominMO]

B6 is in the escorts right? How hard would it be to find thestuff to turbo it? How much power is the stock b6 putting down.

The B6 is in 1986 - 1994 Mazda 323s, and makes 82 HP at the crank; about 70 at the wheels. It's a nice cheap upgrade, and you keep most of your gas mileage. Don't bother with porting a B3 motor, headers, cam, etc. You won't get the 19 extra HP of the B6, and will spend a lot of money not getting it. Mine is very peppy even off boost.

[blkfordsedan]

I thought he was looking for simple, cheap tricks for the B3 that he could do in a night & drive it the next day? A good tune-up, K&N filter and cat delete pipe are all relatively cheap & simple and will make a noticeable difference. Funny how the Festy Bug works! Within 10 posts, he's already decided he has time for a swap!

[red stiva]

Pft, you really care that people laugh at you? I'm 15 and drive em to school with pride, just keep it clean and mechanically well and you can laugh at them with the satisfaction of gas mileage. If I want to be fast there's other cars in the garage.