Every morning, for the past week, we've been driving this AEM-modified RSX Type-S to work in fourth gear. That's right, fourth gear. Back home every night too. That's over 400 freeway miles at 75 mph with the tach needle parked at five grand.
Sure we've been getting 13 miles to the gallon and our ears are humming from the Thermal R&D cat-back system, but life is too short to worry about nonsense like the rapid depletion of our planet's natural resources or a little inner ear damage.
Why?
Nitrous oxide.
AEM equipped its RSX with a direct port kit from Nitrous Express, and it's programmed to come on at 5000 rpm or above when the throttle hits the floor.
Holes in traffic have never been so fun. Each goes something like this: Nail the throttle. Hold on for dear life. Steer the car through the hole. Watch the tach needle sprint for 8000 like Carl Lewis with a hot foot. Wait for the rev limiter. Grab fifth gear. Floor the throttle again. Feel your spleen press against your spine. Jump on the brakes before you slam into the SUV you've just run up on. Slow to 75 mph. Downshift to fourth gear. Wait for the next opening.
Nitrous is cool.
The crew at AEM built this RSX Type-S as a showcase for AEM's line of street-legal performance products. But don't think AEM slapped on one of its cold-air intake systems, filled it with juice and handed us the keys. This car has been worked on from top to bottom, and the engine was completely rebuilt to withstand the constant juicing AEM figured we would put it through. AEM even replaced the stock slugs with .25mm oversized JE forged pistons. Manufactured from billet aluminum forgings and precision machined to very specific tolerances, these pistons lowered the compression ratio from 11:1 to 10.5:1.
One week and two empty nitrous bottles later and the RSX is back at AEM headquarters with front tires that are balder than bowling balls, but without any big holes in its engine block.
Besides the cat-back exhaust and cold-air intake, the engine also wears an AEM Tru-Power Pulley System, an AEM high-volume fuel rail and an AEM universal adjustable fuel pressure regulator. Denso Iridium spark plugs, which can withstand higher temps, are also part of the combination, and AEM asked the crew at Port Flow Design in Harbor City, Calif. to grind a bit on the K20's cylinder head. In search of more flow, it did a pocket port, a valve job, massaged the combustion chambers and did a seat blend similar to the Type R spec head. Despite what the graphics say, the whole thing is not controlled by an AEM Plug & Play programmable engine management system.
Off the nitrous, the combination dyno'd at 177 hp at 7600 rpm and 133 lb-ft of torque at 6100 rpm. That's 5 more horses and 9 more lb-ft of torque than we recorded with the stock RSX Type-S (see page 100). Then we reached into the glovebox and flipped the toggle switch that activates the nitrous system. Pow. Bam. Boom. 270 hp at 7100 rpm and 212 lb-ft of torque at 6500 rpm.
To get that grunt to the ground, AEM added an ACT clutch with a prototype organic street disc and an ACT Xtreme pressure plate, and a Mugen limited-slip differential from the guys at King Motorsports in Sullivan, Wis. They work with a Ground Control adjustable coil-over suspension with prototype adjustable Koni shocks and Eibach springs (375 lbs front and 500 lbs rear), a Suspension Techniques rear anti-roll bar measuring 20.64mm and a Specialty Products Company Performance Kit, which consists of adjustable lower control arms, EZ Arm XR adjustable uppers and adjustable camber bolts that allow you to set camber to track specifications or eliminate unwanted negative camber caused by lowering your car.
They also bolted on lightweight Axis VPD wheels that measure 17x7 and weigh 16 lbs apiece. They're wrapped in Yokohama AVS Sport tires measuring 215/45ZR-17 all around.