[raghav.carfreak]

I personally think 7k is reasonable buddy, which brand have you used?
Isn't that what all dealers charge (between 5-6k or higher) for hid bulbs? what's the temperature you've got?
Is dim/dip a problem? Because I've heard that it takes awhile for hid's to switch on(something to do with heating up?)
and are these bulbs on your hi beam or low? Is the other still halogen or removed? (sorry for noob questions, It's just that I'm seriously considering a hid set up, since I dont have fog lamps in the civic, or i'd install them there, Vitamin M doesn't allow a projector set up or Projector headlamps either, so that's why
I want more of a functional set up, rather than show off, so just focussed bright lights should do my job

[satyamkaushik]

Just wondering, did you notice any change in the air conditioner's performance ?
I have heard that the performance goes down a bit ?

[saurabhkum]

Just a thought, is sequential kit works much better in automatic transmission? I've not seen or come across civic with cng. This thread is making me think on same lines. Will wait for long term report .

[arvi86]

Originally Posted by frankmehta

As for the key, trust me, they used the same tools that HASS would use. Only for 65% of the cost. Actually, for a change, HASS is not THAT expensive for the key.

I guess I need to look out for someone in Chennai who could do this job before settling for the HASS key.

Originally Posted by frankmehta

A cost differential of almost Rs. 10000 a month (I have calculated a little less since the car starts up on Petrol and on an average it uses 2 litres a week. EVEN at that rate, I recover the costs of the kit within 6 months.

Sir, you have made me jealous!

Originally Posted by frankmehta

• Got her some pretty sweet looking beige, suede floor mats and also had the Xenons fitted today. They light up the road like day, as expected. Here are a few photos:

The stock headlights (Low Beam) in Civic are useless and your Xenons would have solved that problem. They look cool too.

[frankmehta]

Originally Posted by raghav.carfreak

I personally think 7k is reasonable buddy, which brand have you used?
Isn't that what all dealers charge (between 5-6k or higher) for hid bulbs? what's the temperature you've got?
Is dim/dip a problem? Because I've heard that it takes awhile for hid's to switch on(something to do with heating up?)
and are these bulbs on your hi beam or low? Is the other still halogen or removed? (sorry for noob questions, It's just that I'm seriously considering a hid set up, since I dont have fog lamps in the civic, or i'd install them there, Vitamin M doesn't allow a projector set up or Projector headlamps either, so that's why
I want more of a functional set up, rather than show off, so just focussed bright lights should do my job

The lights are not branded and have been installed directly (without projectors) in the low beam only. The beam has been focussed accordingly, to prevent any beam scatter to oncoming vehicles.
Dip is not a problem at all, as the Civic activates high as well as low beam when dipping, which means that the high beam comes on almost instantaneously and the low beam takes a couple of seconds to come to optimum brightness, but since the high beam takes care of the job anyway, I don't find it much of a bother.
The performance of these lights is top notch, though, and it is highly recommended. I'd recommend a temperature of 5000k over 6000k anyday.

NEXT STEP: To install 3000k HID fog lights in the stock locations of the Civic bumper.

Originally Posted by satyamkaushik

Just wondering, did you notice any change in the air conditioner's performance ?
I have heard that the performance goes down a bit ?

Absolutely not, sir. In fact, my car just went for a cooling coil replacement and the AC chills so fast and so much that mom (who feels cold very easily) just keeps complaining throughout the journey. I thought my Fiesta could not be bested in this department, but MAN, you need to sit in my Civic to realize how chilled the cabin can become!!

Originally Posted by saurabhkum

Just a thought, is sequential kit works much better in automatic transmission? I've not seen or come across civic with cng. This thread is making me think on same lines. Will wait for long term report .

I can vouch for the fact that the sequential kit does extremely well on CNG. I am yet to face an occasion where I am low on power or in the wrong gear or bogging down on a slope. It's all smooth and convenient.

Originally Posted by arvi86

I guess I need to look out for someone in Chennai who could do this job before settling for the HASS key.

Sir, you have made me jealous!

The stock headlights (Low Beam) in Civic are useless and your Xenons would have solved that problem. They look cool too.

Thanks. Yes, the Xenons have done a good job.



Just did a 250 km round trip to Lonavala and back on Saturday night. Here's a few things I noticed:

• I topped up some gas on the way, at Navi Mumbai (odo read 50 km) and when I was back, the odo read 250 km. She was still on that tank of gas, albeit the switch as showing the red LED. NO PETROL was used on this trip at all. KILLER!!! Filled gas the next day and 9.46 kgs of CNG went in. Which means I did 200 km on 9.46 kg of gas.
  
• Putting math into perspective:
  On CNG:
  Average: 21.1 km per kg
  Cost: Rs. 315, which translates to 1.5 rupees a km.
  Total cost of the trip: Rs. 375
  
  If the whole trip was done on Petrol:
  Average: 12 kmpl
  Cost: Rs. 1541 (for 20.5 litres), which translates to Rs. 6.1 a km.

• The headlights performed really well. The new Xenon bulbs coupled with the quite spectacular stock high beam did a fantastic job of lighting the road like day. Even in torrential rain, both did a fabulous job of making the drive safe.

• The car performed commendably on slopes and ghats, as we Mumbai people love to call them. Not even once did I feel her bog down on CNG on inclines of any magnitude, even with the AC on. There were only 2 of us in the car, but then again, I feel she will cope great even if she is on full load. Pickup from standstill felt very healthy on the ghat section and the car didn't cease to surprise me with it's prowess on an alternative fuel. Really, the car JUST doesn't feel like it's running on gas.

• The AC performed like a star. As mentioned above, it's a revelation as to how fast the AC cools the cabin and chills the occupants.

• We managed to scrape the car twice on toll naka speedbreakers and I was not amused. Only two of us in the front, and still the rear scraped the breakers. Driving gingerly over the breakers didn't result in scraping, though. Otherwise, the suspension really held up well and cocooned us exceptionally from irregular surfaces. The handling was confidence inspiring at high speeds and even though, it's not a patch on the Fiesta S, she did a good job of hugging the road fairly well. Steering weighed up quite well, surprisingly and even transmitted a wee bit of feedback from the road. Overall, I feel Honda got their ride and handling combination right.
  We did feel the rear bottoming out 1-2 times at speeds in excess of 80 kmph on bad bumps and some bumps even tried to change her direction. The high speed ride of the Fiesta was much better and she remained unfazed over bumps.

• The ICE was the reason why I enjoyed the evening so much. I love driving, but I enjoy it more when there's good music playing from good speakers. I totally LOVED the way the system sounds, and the Pioneer head unit is really shining, here. I had loaded 32gb of WAV tracks on my USB drive and selected RANDOM. Bliss... Totally!

• The car went through 2 hours of TORRENTIAL rainfall. Probably the heaviest I have ever driven in. Big potholes full of water tried to deviate her from her path, and the big ones successfully did that. But otherwise, she was munching miles at quite a quick rate, and I would like to mention the wiper arm setup here. I don't know why or how, or even when someone found anything wrong with the configuration of the wiper arms, but let me tell you one thing. With the kind of rain falling that night, ANY wiper system would be put to it's toughest of tests. The wiper blades were operating at full speed and did a great job in keeping water off the screen. There was no run-off from the roof or from the adjacent areas. It's quite a perfect configuration, IMHO, and sometimes I smile when I see the two wipers go their own ways and come back to meet at the centre. Was always intrigued by unique wiper designs and I am glad to say that this design is quite effective.

• The all round disc setup did a very very good job and the discs have great bite at all speeds. Even after 2 hours of high speed driving with intermittent hard braking, there was negligible fade in the bite and the car still stopped where it was beckoned to. No complaints on that aspect. Felt very safe inside the car and even felt like pushing her to her limits, but desisted as I have recently lost a dear friend on the Expressway (Sam Kapasi) and I didn't want to risk anything in that weather. Still managed to do 120 on a constant basis and even touch 165 and 140 on two separate occasions. The car felt like it could do more, but I didn't oblige.

• The other thing I found worth mentioning was the fact that the engine stayed at low RPMs (2.2k) at all points while cruising at speeds of 120-130 km and only rose while accelerating. If it was on Petrol, I would have seen the needle pinned at 3000 RPM plus. Maybe, CNG is more efficient than Petrol at high speeds (when high volumes of air is being swallowed by the intake). Maybe, just maybe. But I did clearly notice the low RPM at all times on CNG and this is probably the reason why she gave such a good average.

Overall, had a FANTASTIC trip, enjoyed a good drive through some torrential mad rains, and ate some good food at Sunny Da Dhaba. The Civic is a very very good lateral upgrade and I wish I get to relish many more such happy trips with her.

[Jignesh]

Originally Posted by frankmehta

On CNG: Average: 21.1 km per kg. Cost: Rs. 315, which translates to 1.5 rupees a km. Total cost of the trip: Rs. 375
If the whole trip was done on Petrol: Rs. 6.1 a km.
Overall, had a FANTASTIC trip, enjoyed a good drive. The Civic is a very very good lateral upgrade and I wish I get to relish many more such happy trips with her.

Hello Frank,

That is simply amazing. Driving a Honda Civic for Rs. 1.5 per KM is mind blowing. Recently even I did a 535 kms trip to Lonavala, Lavasa, etc & my car's petrol cost per KM was approx Rs. 4.75 per KM.

Your thread has cleared all doubts from my mind. Recently I was in search of used Diesel Car for approx Rs. 3.5 like Indigo CS, but could not find some good options.

I would not like to install CNG kit in my current Car (WagonR K10) because of loss of Boot Space. But now I am very clear in my mind, to save fuel cost, I need to buy a used sedan like Honda City & install CNG Kit in the same.

Thank you for a eye opener.

Regards,

[kalpeshc]

The brokerdalal.com site has a very tempting offer on a 2007 Civic - 4.95L.

[satyamkaushik]

You sure are having fun with that Re.1 per km cost
I envy u !!

The car is for sure a chiller, and it is not just with your mom it is the case with me as well keeping the blower level at around 2 when the car chills up.

We both seem to share the same model, can you clear one of my queries ?
Do the indicators blink when you lock/unlock the car ? Or am i confusing it with the accord ?
When i unlock my accord there is a single blink and when i lock it there are 3.
When i do the same on the civic i can just see the cabin bulb lighting up.
Is it just with my car or is it with you as well ?
I know thats a silly ques

[Blue Thunder]

Originally Posted by satyamkaushik

...Do the indicators blink when you lock/unlock the car ? Or am i confusing it with the accord ?
When i unlock my accord there is a single blink and when i lock it there are 3.
When i do the same on the civic i can just see the cabin bulb lighting up.
Is it just with my car or is it with you as well ?
I know thats a silly ques

2009 V-AT ...all the indicators blink when locking/unlocking.

[PlatzdaTurbo]

Originally Posted by satyamkaushik

You sure are having fun with that Re.1 per km cost
I envy u !!

The car is for sure a chiller, and it is not just with your mom it is the case with me as well keeping the blower level at around 2 when the car chills up.

We both seem to share the same model, can you clear one of my queries ?
Do the indicators blink when you lock/unlock the car ? Or am i confusing it with the accord ?
When i unlock my accord there is a single blink and when i lock it there are 3.
When i do the same on the civic i can just see the cabin bulb lighting up.
Is it just with my car or is it with you as well ?
I know thats a silly ques

Have a Civic 1.8s, August 2006 model. Now at 82K.
Got my CNG kit installed in Jan 2011 when it was at 58k.
To answer your question, YES the indicators do blink when they civic is lock/unlocked.
Thrice when locked,once when unlocked.

[satyamkaushik]

Originally Posted by PlatzdaTurbo

Have a Civic 1.8s, August 2006 model. Now at 82K.
Got my CNG kit installed in Jan 2011 when it was at 58k.
To answer your question, YES the indicators do blink when they civic is lock/unlocked.
Thrice when locked,once when unlocked.

So we do have people with a cng kit on a civic, you are the 2nd person i know

So how is your experience by far ?
Any major issues that came up ?
How is the overall performance?

Another ques that comes to my mind is, where do you guys get your car serviced ? Because i have heard this Honda policy of not entertaining cars that run on CNG.
I have once even seen a honda city getting refused by the service advisor on the same grounds.

By the way the indicators on my car seem to work normally but they don't respond when i lock or unlock the car. :-/

Originally Posted by Blue Thunder

2009 V-AT ...all the indicators blink when locking/unlocking.

Mine don't
How do i figure whats wrong with mine ?
The guy who made the key told me that they only work on the newer 1.8 S and V's but not on the original 1.8 S (2006/2007).

Is that really true ?
I doubt.

The ones on my accord work the same way as yours.

[saurabhkum]

Originally Posted by PlatzdaTurbo

Have a Civic 1.8s, August 2006 model. Now at 82K.
Got my CNG kit installed in Jan 2011 when it was at 58k.
To answer your question, YES the indicators do blink when they civic is lock/unlocked.
Thrice when locked,once when unlocked.

This means your civic has done more than 25k on cng. How has the experience till now. Request you to kindly share your experience as this will help us who are thinking on same lines. Which kit did you used and if your civic manual or automatic ?

[PlatzdaTurbo]

Originally Posted by satyamkaushik

So we do have people with a cng kit on a civic, you are the 2nd person i know

So how is your experience by far ?
Any major issues that came up ?
How is the overall performance?

Another ques that comes to my mind is, where do you guys get your car serviced ? Because i have heard this Honda policy of not entertaining cars that run on CNG.
I have once even seen a honda city getting refused by the service advisor on the same grounds.

On basis of practicality , my experience has been excellent. Extremely cheap to run and no dramatic drop in performance.
The civic is a far from torquey car (poor low end) and it needs to be worked to enjoy it even when running on petrol and so half-clutch and initial acceleration is sometimes a pain if you are not used to the car's behavior with CNG. You need to press the pedal more and you might even stall the car until you get used to it.
Overall performance ,again but for the initial acceleration in the first gear performance has not really been affected. She still runs and how !
NO MAJOR ISSUES have cropped up so far. Touchwood.
About Honda not entertaining , that is just a load of hogwash. Linkway Honda are the oldest Honda dealers in Bombay and all my Hondas have always consistently gone to them.Its a year and a half since my car has the CNG kit and it has been serviced by Linkway Honda excellently multiple times since then.No questions asked. You just need to specify and tell them to not fiddle around with the CNG mechanism & avoid getting the engine bay wet while cleaning up.
For whatever niggles the car has faced with the CNG mechanism it has been resolved at Greenglobe Fuel Solutions in Mumbai.

Originally Posted by saurabhkum

This means your civic has done more than 25k on cng. How has the experience till now. Request you to kindly share your experience as this will help us who are thinking on same lines. Which kit did you used and if your civic manual or automatic ?

My experience in a nutshell ,iv described above. If there is anything specific you want to know i could tell you or even Frank for that matter.
The make of my kit is BRC (closed loop sequential) and my Civic is a manual.

[satyamkaushik]

Originally Posted by PlatzdaTurbo

On basis of practicality , my experience has been excellent. Extremely cheap to run and no dramatic drop in performance.
The civic is a far from torquey car (poor low end) and it needs to be worked to enjoy it even when running on petrol and so half-clutch and initial acceleration is sometimes a pain if you are not used to the car's behavior with CNG. You need to press the pedal more and you might even stall the car until you get used to it.
Overall performance ,again but for the initial acceleration in the first gear performance has not really been affected. She still runs and how !
NO MAJOR ISSUES have cropped up so far. Touchwood.
About Honda not entertaining , that is just a load of hogwash. Linkway Honda are the oldest Honda dealers in Bombay and all my Hondas have always consistently gone to them.Its a year and a half since my car has the CNG kit and it has been serviced by Linkway Honda excellently multiple times since then.No questions asked. You just need to specify and tell them to not fiddle around with the CNG mechanism & avoid getting the engine bay wet while cleaning up.
For whatever niggles the car has faced with the CNG mechanism it has been resolved at Greenglobe Fuel Solutions in Mumbai.

My experience in a nutshell ,iv described above. If there is anything specific you want to know i could tell you or even Frank for that matter.
The make of my kit is BRC (closed loop sequential) and my Civic is a manual.

Reading what you said explains everything.
You seem quite happy with the performance and the cng conversion over all.

Actually mine doesn't have much of a running as of now.
Say a around 500-700 kms a month.
I use my swift for the daily runs which is about 80kms a day on petrol.

Was just making some calculations in my mind, is it really feasible for me to get a CNG conversion on the Civic ?

You said getting used to the clutch is the only issue, but mine is an automatic so i dont think it would bother me much, plus frank seems highly satisfied with his car's performance.

Would you guy recommend, Getting a CNG kit on my civic, which is a 5 year old car with 100k on the odo ? What i was thinking was to get it converted to CNG and use it as my mainstream car.
Or should i keep it as it is and use it the same way.
I dont think i would get a decent price if i go and try selling it off.
The only thing that bothers me is, that the car is working perfectly fine and i dont have any issues with it. It is as quite as any other civic , it still can rev so hard that it can beat the **** out of others on the road, but what are gonna be the after effects of the conversion.
Will i end up ruining a 5 year old beauty ?
Is it feasible to get the conversion done on a 100k odo car.
Totally confused.

[PlatzdaTurbo]

Originally Posted by satyamkaushik

Reading what you said explains everything.
You seem quite happy with the performance and the cng conversion over all.

Actually mine doesn't have much of a running as of now.
Say a around 500-700 kms a month.
I use my swift for the daily runs which is about 80kms a day on petrol.

Was just making some calculations in my mind, is it really feasible for me to get a CNG conversion on the Civic ?

You said getting used to the clutch is the only issue, but mine is an automatic so i dont think it would bother me much, plus frank seems highly satisfied with his car's performance.

Would you guy recommend, Getting a CNG kit on my civic, which is a 5 year old car with 100k on the odo ? What i was thinking was to get it converted to CNG and use it as my mainstream car.
Or should i keep it as it is and use it the same way.
I dont think i would get a decent price if i go and try selling it off.
The only thing that bothers me is, that the car is working perfectly fine and i dont have any issues with it. It is as quite as any other civic , it still can rev so hard that it can beat the **** out of others on the road, but what are gonna be the after effects of the conversion.
Will i end up ruining a 5 year old beauty ?
Is it feasible to get the conversion done on a 100k odo car.
Totally confused.

I dont think you need a CNG kit at this stage if (big if) you dont intend to double your monthly mileage with the civic anytime soon. Even if you consider your top limit of 700km/month you are not even clocking 8500km yearly.
I have been literally mile munching with my civic ever since i got the CNG kit on it, even after having 3 other diesels in the family. Anywhere between 10-14k a year and you could contemplate CNG ,IMO.
Since you are in Delhi your total investment for the closed sequential would be anywhere between 55-60k bucks. At your current mileage your recovery period could be lengthy so id say wait until you actually feel the 'need' and the pinch. Back in 2011 when CNG on cars (aftermarket) was a relatively new concept, we were dead sure that we would be clocking miles in & out with this car and that is when we took the plunge.
About ruining a good car and such things, please dont worry. My civic is more than 6 years old yet immaculately maintained and i love her like anything. Like i said before apart from the initial acceleration and sluggishness there is absolutely no difference. In automatics that would hardly be an issue. Frank might have explained it better but i honestly have not had the time to go through the entire thread.
Finally , how much has your car already clocked should hardly be a point to consider before you install the kit (assuming it is in decent shape) . What you need to factor is the distance you 'intend' to clock with it now on until the time you sell it.
Good luck