I can't promise any special prize, but you'd definitely get high marks in my book if you put a Honda Marine engine in a $2000 Challenge car.
Photography by David S. Wallens
Something we recently learned: Some Honda Marine outboard engines feature VTEC, with its BF-series currently built around the ever-popular K24 engine. (Before you start thinking about cruising the docks for your next swap, realize that the boat line caps out at 150 horsepower.)
Just before the recent Music City Grand Prix, we went for a spin up the Cumberland River. Even though we’re not boating experts, as you can tell from our incorrect jargon, we found the Honda engines to be smooth, quiet and typical Honda.
[Amphicar: Does the Promise of a Car That Works As a Boat Actually Hold Water?]
Something new that Honda Marine also showed off: its HondaLink Marine app. It can track a boat, monitor its engines, and even keep you contained via geofencing.
The app can also provide virtual anchoring, allowing a boat to basically sit in place. Why would you want that? Perhaps to keep the boat in position while divers work around sensitive terrain, like a reef or a shipwreck.
GRM boat content, possibly a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
I can't promise any special prize, but you'd definitely get high marks in my book if you put a Honda Marine engine in a $2000 Challenge car.
In reply to Colin Wood :
That would be cool. The marine K24s are dry-sumped, too, I believe. (But the cylinders might be facing the wrong way for a car.)
GRB? Grassroots Boatersports? 
I just priced out the 100hp version for an old boat, coming in at around $13,700 before anycontrols. Roughly 7 times the value of the boat currently. With the used market not helping much the Challenge seems a long ways off.
Now the old 2 stroke 100hp Mercury 4 cylinder under my workbench, that could really make something like an old VW move.
In reply to JBinMD :
Maybe? I admit, I did dig seeing the VTEC sticker on the engine cover.
I thought this was going to be about some weird Civic to Bayliner inboard engine swap.
David S. Wallens said:
Something we recently learned: Some Honda Marine outboard engines feature VTEC, with its BF-series currently built around the ever-popular K24 engine. (Before you start thinking about cruising the docks for your next swap, realize that the boat line caps out at 150 horsepower.)
Their V6 engines go up to 11. I mean 250.
David S. Wallens said:In reply to Colin Wood :
That would be cool. The marine K24s are dry-sumped, too, I believe. (But the cylinders might be facing the wrong way for a car.)
Not all of them...
They've been using these automotive based VTEC engines on the marine side for quite a few years now. The V6 is a J35, the 'high-powered' I4 is a K24 and the 'mid-range' I4 is an L15. All are probably more cheaply gotten from their automotive applications.
I enjoyed these on a tourist ferry boat in Belize. That boat moved right along!
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