Honda S2000 Engine Swap Goes Horribly Wrong
Tossing an AP2 S2000 drivetrain in an AP1 should be simple, right? Well, apparently it isn’t.
Ah, the engine swap. Some credit it with creating the entire hot rod movement. And to this day, the simple(?) act of swapping your engine for something new and/or different never ceases to captivate us. But what the experts don’t tell you is that swaps rarely go over seamlessly. You’re going to run into at least one minor niggle, even if you’re doing an apples to apples swap. And that’s exactly what happened to YouTubers Speed Academy when they attempted to replace their AP1 Honda S2000 engine with one from an AP2.
On the surface, this seems like something that should be pretty easy to do. The dynamic duo starts out pretty optimistic, at least. They’ve got all the parts they need to make this magic happen. Heck, they even married an aftermarket baffle with the OEM oil pan. But there are a few custom parts at work here, including the air intake and throttle cable.
A precious accident makes things a little difficult on this S2000, however. The entire pedal assembly has shifted over, making removal of the throttle cable a pain. With that complete, it was finally time to toss the new drivetrain into the car. But as anyone who’s ever removed, or installed an engine in an S2000 already knows, there isn’t much room to work with under the hood. As our hosts quickly find out.
Neither wants to drop the subframe, so they resort to removing things off the engine. First, the valve cover. Then, the header. Next, they shift the tilter on the engine hoist. Four hours of struggling later, and the engine still isn’t in. And in the process, we (and they) learn an important lesson. Sometimes, engine swaps don’t go as easy as we see in all of those other videos!
Join the S2KI forums today!
