Test Mule
'93 Honda Civic hatchback
Engine
K24A2 2.4L inline-four
Relevant Mods
3-inch short-ram intake with velocity stack and K&N filter, Skunk2 intake manifold, R-Crew header, 3-inch exhaust with Magnaflow muffler, RDX injectors
Key Features
- Direct drop-in camshafts; no valvetrain upgrade required
- Intake High-Speed Lobe: duration 295 degrees/(12.7mm lift)
- Exhaust High-Speed Lobe: Duration 288 degrees/(12.00mm lift)
- Safe to run up to 40 degrees VTC advance
| Drag Cartel’s K-series drop-in camshafts feature some pretty aggressive lift and duration while still being compatible with the OE valvetrain.
Description
If you're looking for a little extra all-motor punch out of your Honda, you could do a lot worse than ordering up a set of cams from Drag Cartel Industries. It's owned and operated by drag racing O.G. Jeremy Lookofsky. His famous CRX, L'Natural, put him on the map in the all-motor import drag racing world by breaking the 10-second barrier, and his '01 Pro Stock Civic broke the 9-second barrier at the Englishtown Fall Nationals back in 2012. Pretty mind-blowing to think a non-boosted 4-cylinder engine can power a Honda down the quarter-mile this quickly.
Jeremy is translating his all-motor success on the dragstrip into success as a parts manufacturer, and Drag Cartel has been producing K-series camshafts (and all sorts of other go-fast goodies) for hard-core racers for quite a few years now. The company's drop-in camshafts (DIC) are designed for the everyday street user as well as weekend warriors who want a bump in power without having to upgrade their engine's valvetrain.
Most people tend to focus on the high-lift duration, which in this case is 295 degrees (12.7mm lift) on the intake side and 288 degrees (12.00mm lift) on the exhaust side, but for street driving, it's also valuable to know the low-speed lobe durations are 250 degrees (9.6mm lift) on the intake cam and 243 degrees (8.4mm lift) on the exhaust cam. As a point of comparison, JDM K20A Type R cams have a high-lift duration of 224 degrees on the intake side and 219 degrees on the exhaust side, so clearly, the Drag Cartel cams are going to be encouraging quite a bit more air to find its way into the combustion chamber, even when they're on the small lobes!
| John from Foreign Speed made short work of the camshaft swap, and to his credit, he meticulously torqued everything down using the OE specs.
Results
We took our old EG Time Attack test mule—the very same Lime Green Metallic EG you used to see in Modified with some regularity, which now has a new owner and a fresh coat of Milano Red paint to go along with an '06 K24A2 engine—over to Foreign Speed for installation of the Drag Cartel DIC. I know, that sounds dirty and potentially even illegal in some states, but you'll just have to trust us when we tell you that John and his crew at Foreign Speed run a top-notch shop with more than a decade of Honda wrenching experience.
With the cams dropped in, the EG's front hubs were bolted to a DynaPack dyno and the keys handed to Nick from TuningByNick.com so he could dial in the Hondata K-Pro tune for the new bumpsticks.
As Nick told us, "I found these cams are a lot like stock cams in how smooth and easy they are to tune. Right from the start, I could tell there were going to be power gains everywhere under the curve.
In comparison to most aftermarket K-Series cams, these run smoothly and quietly with no alarming valvetrain noises. You can tell they are quality pieces, and they offered great gains with no sacrifices."
And as you can see from the dyno graph, the results were downright spectacular, with significant horsepower and torque gains across the entire rpm range and peak gains of 20 whp starting around 6,500 rpm and holding all the way to the fuel cut.
The torque curve is also nice and flat to go along with a solid 10 whp gained pretty much across the entire rev range.
Keep in mind, this tune was done on 91-octane pump gas, so no secret sauce is required to get the most out of these cams. They are, as advertised, a straight drop-in upgrade that delivered the biggest increase in power and torque we've ever seen from K-series camshafts that do not require a valvetrain upgrade.
Color us impressed, and color Luigi Montanez, the EG's new owner, one happy race car driver.
About the only limitation, if you can call it that, is Drag Cartel's recommendation not to run more than 40 degrees of VTC advance, so if you're running a 50-degree gear, you'll need to electronically limit it like Nick has via the K-Pro retune.
Special thanks to Foregn Speed Inc.
| Drag Cartel Drop In Camshafts Tuning By Nick 01
| Nick from TuningByNick.com worked his magic, fine-tuning the mapping on the Hondata K-Pro to make sure no horses were left behind.
| Drag Cartel Drop In Camshafts Graph
Gains Made
+20 whp
+10 lb-ft
Before: 230 whp and 180 wtq
After: 250 whp and 190 wtq