FK8 RMM Shootout

Like most things in life, there is going to be subjectivity when it comes to opinions on what people believe is the best rear mount out there. I love reading everyone’s opinions about urethane stiffness on those Facebook Type R pages and hearing them complain about NVH *quietly giggles… You bought a freaking Type R! It’s not about comfort, it’s about performance. This post will no doubt be based on my personal feelings and opinions of which mount is best for the specific way I use my car. But, as with all my posts, I will be completely transparent regarding the pros and cons of each one of these mounts because no one has paid me to say anything, and no one sponsors me. I also want to help educate people on NVH, and what is to be expected when installing different types of rear motor mounts. Plus, take you through the installation process and what it looks like to install a rear motor mount.

Right off the bat, I want you all to know that I personally have had each one of these mounts on my car for at least 1500 miles or more. I have used them all on the street in normal driving conditions and on track too. I have used them in wintry weather (30 degrees Fahrenheit), hot weather (120 degrees Fahrenheit), and every temperature in between. Hopefully knowing this will bring more validity to my opinions and will help you soak up knowledge from this post rather than just scoff at it and tell me how I don’t know what I’m talking about.

I also want to address the elephant in the room… There are more than just three aftermarket mount options available for the FK8. Yes, I’m very aware of this. But I promise that this will still be a valuable service because the three aftermarket mounts I will be discussing are all quite different from one another.

Going from left to right we have the OEM, Hasport 62A, 27WON billet 90A, and Wunderladen Racing 90A.

Right away you’ll notice the peculiar design of the 27WON mount by the way it stands out amongst its rivals in the lineup. You may have even thought I messed up the orientation of it when I took the picture. Nope, the unique design of the 27WON mount only has a urethane bushing on one side. While all the others in the lineup have urethane bushings on both sides. I will discuss this in depth later in the post.

The fact that 25 years ago I “cut my teeth” on ‘golden era’ Honda’s meant that in all honestly, rear motor mounts were somewhat of a “new” thing for me. This was because the ‘golden era’ Honda’s didn’t have the ability to just add a rear motor mount. You must replace at least all three. So, in 2020 when I bought my 2009 Civic EX (FA1), my experiences with rear motor mounts began.

I was itching to do some modifications to my bone stock FA1 and with RMM’s being a good “gateway drug”, I installed a Hasport 62A rear motor mount not knowing just how big of an improvement it would provide. I opted to give the RMM (Rear Motor Mount) a try because it was cheap and easy to install. Immediately, I was blown away by the overall driving improvements it made and how much more emotion was evoked. Shifts are quicker, throttle response is better, and braking is more immediate.

A RMM will improve many different aspects of the driving experience and below I will talk about the big three.

• The most talked about is probably reduced wheel hop. This is because the RMM will limit the movement or pivot the motor has while accelerating or under power. Reducing how much the engine pivots keeps the force more evenly and consistently transferred to the wheels. With more even/consistent power to the tires, they don’t get as much chance to hop or skip caused by soft motor mounts not being adequate.
• The throttle response is more immediate because when applying throttle, the engine doesn’t get robbed of power through soft rubber bushings. Factory soft rubber bushings allow the engine to twist/pivot when power is delivered and energy is lost through that motion. When the throttle is applied with a stock rubber mount, the first bit of power/energy gets used in twisting/pivoting the engine. This can also be considered the absorption of energy. Then, once the stock rubber has deformed to its max, the power is only then transferred to the wheels through the transmission, out the axles, and to the wheels. Of course, we are speaking in mere tenths of a second. But this all ultimately translates to better throttle response and a more enjoyable driving experience. This is not only an improvement for applying the throttle to accelerate, but it also makes for a quicker response when blipping the throttle to downshift or heel/toeing.
• This one is probably my favorite enhancement. Braking performance increases and feels much more immediate (Results vary depending on how aggressive the urethane durometer you choose.) because under braking there is the opposite effect of accelerating and your engine pivots the other way. This is because under braking there is deceleration, which is a force transmitted to the engine mounts through the wheels, down the axles, and into the transmission. With a RMM, the energy of decelerating will not be lost to motor pivoting and thus translates into a more direct and immediate braking feel.

Not long after I installed the RMM on my FA1, I ordered a Hasport 62A rear motor mount for Angie’s Fit too.

I was so excited about how much the overall driving experience was improved on my car that I knew Angie would enjoy the benefits of it too. To this day, almost four years later, we both still have the same Hasport 62A RMM’s installed on our daily drivers. Because the 62A is a very mild durometer, NVH (noise, vibration, and harshness) is almost unnoticeable, and we can drive others around in our cars without them detecting any added NVH. In all honestly, the NVH is worse from the 200tw tires that we have equipped on our cars than the RMM. Angie has replaced the Hankook RS3’s that came on the wheels when we bought them, with some RS4’s and I have Yokohama Apex V601s. The stiffer sidewalls and aggressive tread patterns on 200tw tires tend to transmit a lot of road noise into the cabin.

OK, so you now know that I’m a huge advocate for upgrading RMM’s due to the staggering driving improvements they provide, their ease of installation, and their inexpensiveness. Basically… “bang for the buck” this modification is hard to beat. The best part about it is if you aren’t happy with it, you can easily revert to stock and sell off the mount recouping most of your money.

Let’s go back to July 2021, this was about 3 months after I purchased my FK8, and I was already fiending for some upgrades. Obviously having such success with RMM’s, I knew that this had to be one of the first modifications I made to the FK8. I wanted to have that “modified car” feel, quicker throttle response, and improved braking.

As most long-time Honda enthusiasts know, Hasport is a super reputable company and the parts they produce are top-notch. I have run their mounts on all my ‘golden era’ Honda’s over the years and frequently recommend them to others. Clearly, it was a no-brainer when it came to what RMM I was going to install on the FK8.

Because my FK8 was brand new, I was adamant about preserving the newness of my 45k-dollar car for at least a few years before it became a full-blown race car. I opted to go with the Hasport 62A durometer to prolong the unavoidable dash creaks, rattles, and vibrations from taking over the interior and making the car not feel so new anymore.

After installing the mount and getting the car back on the ground. I went to start the car and with expectations of a noticeable amount of NVH, I was impressed by the lack of NVH that I felt. It was great, the dash didn’t vibrate or make any noise and it was extremely hard to tell that I had RMM installed.

However, that is where the excitement ended, and the disappointment began. You see, unlike the lower power and lighter cars that I had previously installed the same Hasport 62A mount on. The FK8 was substantially more powerful, heavier, and had much better brakes. This meant that the 62A urethane wasn’t going to be adequate in stopping engine movements as drastically while accelerating and braking as it was on our other cars.

Don’t get me wrong, with the 62A durometer there is an improvement over the stock mount. The throttle response, shifting, and braking all felt slightly better and the wheel hop was substantially minimized. However, it just wasn’t as drastic of an improvement as it was when I installed the RMM on my FA1 or Angie’s GK5. Since both of those cars produce half the horsepower and a third of the torque that the FK8 makes. Because of this, the 62A durometer urethane can more easily keep engine movement in check.

I had the Hasport 62Amount on the FK8 for about eight months or six-track days and it just never gave me that “racing feeling” that I was craving. It’s worth mentioning that I installed a Hasport 62A mount in July, and in Vegas, that means temps are rarely below 90 degrees even at night. Because of the heat, the urethane was more pliable and delivered hardly any NVH. A few months later, filled with hope that cooler temps would cause the bushings to become stiffer, Vegas began to cool off. Unfortunately, even in the cooler weather the mount still lacked the “feel” I was yearning for. Because I was long past the “break in” period of the mount it was clear that the only surefire way to stiffen this thing up would be giving it a prescription for a little blue pill.

In my overall opinion, if you are apprehensive about too much NVH yet want some subtle improvements, the Hasport or any other 62A durometer mount should tickle your fancy. Keep in mind, if you are a NVH Nazi, there is a high probability you will notice the slight increase in NVH that a 62A durometer mount will cause. As for the rest of you, I wager that you will be able to tolerate the negligible increase in NVH for the payoff of enhanced performance.

If you are concerned about even the most minimal amounts of NVH and are frightened that even the 62A durometer might be a bit much for you. The Perrin or Powerflex inserts are going to be your best option other than of course, just keeping it stock.

Now back to me and my predicament. After recognizing the Hasport 62A or any other 62A RMM on the market wasn’t going to give me the fizz I was looking for, I figured I would go to the complete opposite end of the spectrum and pick up the 27WON billet 90a mount.

Immediately this mount made an enormous difference in not only NVH but also drastically increased overall driving performance. (For the future, when I say driving experience, I’m speaking of… Shift feel, throttle response, braking, wheel hop reduction, and heightened driving experience.) With only one side of the mount having urethane and it being a 90a durometer the contrast was extreme when compared to the Hasport 62A that was previously installed on my car.

I enjoyed the way it made my car feel, drive, and perform. However, I had reservations about how much NVH there now was, how much it made my dash vibrate, and how many new rattles began to develop. On the flip side, it did do a superb job of handling the extra power of and the stoutness of the FK8’s brakes.

In life, it’s difficult to have your cake and eat it too. So, I had to take the good with the bad and just suck it up. Unfortunately, one of the most annoying things that was a byproduct of the lack of urethane on both sides was. At certain RPMs, the HPFP (high-pressure fuel pump) would produce a knocking noise that would transfer through the subframe by way of the non-urethane side of the mount. This noise would resonate through the chassis since the subframe is directly bolted to the chassis and create the audible “knocking noise” that sounded as if the engine was knocking.

The HPFP is a mechanical pump driven by the camshaft and every time the camshaft rotates, there is a lobe for the HPFP which then hits against the HPFP to drive the pump. That metallic noise is usually dampened/silenced by the rubber from the motor mounts that help prevent harmonics/vibrations/frequencies from traveling throughout the chassis.

During my first few drives with the 27WON mount, the knocking noise was very noticeable and I even thought that maybe my engine had developed a rod knock. After mulling it over for a few days and refusing to believe that my engine with less than 5k miles was toast. I was able to conclude that the mount was the cause of the “knocking sound” I was hearing.

As you can see below, the one side of the 27WON mount has no urethane at all while the Hasport one has a small amount. I know that on 27WON’s website, they claim that this actually reduces NVH and I’m no engineer, but I just can’t see how having a rigid mount would reduce NVH.

Also, you can see that the 27WON mount has a much smaller amount of urethane as compared to the Hasport one. Yes, I know that the Hasport has those flat rubber pieces that cover the solid urethane mount, but when you lift the rubber flaps you can clearly see the Hasport has a much larger diameter urethane mount. The less amount of urethane translates to more NVH. It’s also worth mentioning that the newer version of the Hasport mounts no longer has the rubber flaps.

I really did try to like the 27WON mount, I REALLY DID! After all, it gave me everything I was asking for in terms of performance, feeling, and emotion. I just couldn’t get past that awful”knocking sound” resonating through the cabin of the car. It was so audible that when others would ride in my car, I was self-conscious about them thinking my car had a rod knock. I would have to give them a disclaimer about how I didn’t have rod knock and it was just my stiff motor mount. It is worth mentioning, that I still had stock exhaust at the time and because of this, the “knocking noise” wasn’t masked very well. That is until I installed my Tomei Type R exhaust. Boy oh boy, that exhaust overshadowed the “knocking noise” I was hearing and even made it almost nonexistent. Pretty much, the Tomei exhaust enabled me to tolerate the “knocking noise” for quite a while longer than I would have if I left the OEM exhaust on.

You can read about my exhaust install by clicking the link below.

Tomei type R, for my type R

See more

From February 2022 until March 2023, I had that 27WON mount on my car. Multiple track days, various weather conditions, and that mount never failed me. It performed flawlessly and never malfunctioned. I hear people talking about the 27WON urethane ripping/tearing/degrading over time, but as you’ll see further along in this post. When I took the 27WON mount out to replace it with the Wunderladen mount, the 27WON mount looks as good as the day I put it in and there are no signs of wear.

Story time now about how I stumbled across Wunderladen Racing… About a year ago I remember reading somewhere about a unique rear brake upgrade and was intrigued. At the time I didn’t think it was something I could use but it was unique nonetheless. However, after encountering some rear brake issues while on track I decided to give this product a try. The product happened to be rear brake caliper bushings and was made by a small American company, Wunderladen Racing.

Wunderalden Racing is a company for enthusiasts by enthusiasts and while they do sell all sorts of aftermarket parts from other companies. Their house-made parts are specifically designed to help you go faster around a track. This really spoke to me and while typing up my post about installing the rear brake caliper bushings, I was doing some research on their site to ensure I had my facts straight. While on their site, I noticed that they had developed their own iteration of a RMM and they were taking pre-orders.

On a side note…If you are curious about what brake caliper bushings are, how easy they are to install, or what great purpose they serve. You can read about my installation of the Wunderladen Racing rear brake caliper bushings by clicking the link below.

FK8 Brake Caliper Bushing Upgrade.

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Because the 27WON RMM still left a sour taste in my mouth, I was keen to try something different. I mean, IMO nothing could have been as extreme as the 27WON mount, and fresh off the recent installation and endorsement of the Wunderladen Racing rear brake caliper bushings, I decided to give the Wunderladen Racing 90A durometer RMM a shot.

Now, I know what you’re thinking… How many other ways can you reinvent the RMM? It’s a relatively basic part with an equally rudimentary function.

Knowing that Wunderladen Racing has a 10th gen civic that they abuse on track and use as a test mule for developing new parts. I knew they were directly dealing with the issues specific to my chassis and weren’t trying to make a RMM just for the sake of making money.

This excited me and I signed up for the preorder of their RMM.

The Wunderladen Racing RMM comes in either a 75A (street) or 90A (race) durometer urethane. While this is comparable to other companies out there, that’s where the similarities end. With the Wunderladen Racing mount, in either durometer stiffness you go with, the bushings are staggered stiffness which helps to reduce the amount of NVH transmitted to the vehicle. Also, another one of the advantages is that it uses more bushing material than other mounts, which helps to extend bushing life.

Like other big-name companies out there, the Wunderladen Racing mount is also made from 6061 aluminum. I like how it’s anodized in a “stealth” black and has two different options for bushing colors.

Below you can see the actual mount I received. Preordering the mount meant that you received a hefty discount and that you only had a choice of bushing stiffness, not color. You will also notice that mine only has a sticker of their company logo and not an engraved name and logo like the final production ones have.

If I’m being honest, I really would have preferred to have black bushings to achieve that really subtle stealth look. But for the price, I’m not complaining as it’s still a 90A durometer and still performs just as it would if the bushings were black.

Comparing the Hasport and Wunderladen Racing mounts. Below you can see the differences in the smaller bushings on both mounts and how the Wunderladen Racing one has a much more bushing area compared to the Hasport one.

You can also see how the larger bushing on the Wunderladen Racing mount is nearly the size of the rubber covers of the Hasport one. Remember, as mentioned above, the Hasport mounts bushing is covered up by those rubber flap pieces on either side. On the newer style Hasport mounts they no longer use those flaps and they didn’t do anything.

Below you can see the Wunderladen Racing mount compared to the 27WON mount. The orientation is correct on both mounts. The solid side of the 27WON mount and the large rubber bushing on the Wunderladen Racing mount both go into the same spot on the car… The subframe.

I like how 27WON thought outside of the box when designing their mount. However, the NVH that comes with their mount is substantially more than that of the Wunderalden Racing mount produces. And this was after nearly 1500 miles on it and only one day at Buttonwillow with the Wunderladen Racing mount.

Again, below both mounts are the same orientation and both smaller bushings mount to the bracket coming off the transmission. The Wunderladen Racing one isn’t quite as large as the 27WON mount, but remember, there is only one bushing on the 27WON mount.

OK, enough information and it’s time to get on to the installation part of the post.

First of all, because I have Mugen side skirts I can’t fit a jack under them so I must drive up on some wood.

Using a couple of 2×6’s I’m able to get the car high enough to sneak a jack in on the side of the car. Before I had the Mugen side skirts I was able to get a jack under the side of the car without driving up on wood. So, if you don’t have Mugen side skirts you should not need to drive up on wood. It’s also worth noting that I’m on Swift Springs too. So, if you’re on stock springs or anything that isn’t as low as swifts then you might be able to get away without having to drive up on wood.

Next, I raise the side of the car up by placing the jack where the thicker pinched part of the chassis is. Make sure you are on that thicker part, if you are not, you run the risk of bending those pinched areas that run along the underside of the car.

I jack the car up about that high (see below). Not too high, but just enough for me to get another jack under the front of the car.

Frontal view for good height reference.

Slide the jack all the way under to the jacking point on the rearmost part of the subframe.

Once the car is level you can take the jack on the side out.

Then, continue jacking the car up as high as your jack will go. I’m a big dude so I need as much room to crawl around under the car as possible.

Pictured below is the recommended jacking point per Honda FSM.

Place the car on the jack stands and remove the jack.

Remove the metal undertray. To do this, you will remove the X2 Philips screws (orange circles) and then use a flathead screwdriver to unfasten the X6 red circles. At this point, you can now slide the metal under tray out.

Then, if you remove the X3 10mm bolts (green circles) and X2 plastic clips (blue circles) you should be able to gain access to and remove the RMM bolt that goes to the subframe without having to completely remove the cumbersome plastic splash shield.

With the undertray now removed you can see the 27WON RMM that was installed on my car.

Once you remove the X3 10mm bolts and X2 plastic clips that hold a portion of the plastic splash shield on, you can now pull the plastic down enough to gain access to the 17mm bolt that fastens the RMM to the subframe. As mentioned above, if you remove those X3 10mm bolts and the X2 plastic clips you should be able to sneak the RMM bolt out without having to completely remove the plastic splash shield.

Below you can see how I have a shallow 17mm socket used in conjunction with a slightly longer 3/8 ratchet to increase my leverage.

This is where it gets a bit tricky. If you have an aftermarket front pipe you will need to remove the front pipe to allow the 19mm bolt enough room to completely unthread from the bracket. If you don’t remove the aftermarket front pipe, you will not be able to remove the RMM and you’ll get mega frustrated.

If, like me, you have a stock front pipe, then you should be able to have enough room without having to remove the front pipe. A lot of people still struggle, even with the OEM front pipe. Take your time! It’s best to have some sort of helper to rotate the engine front and back to allow the bolt just a bit of extra wiggle room.

Keep in mind that even with a stock front pipe, you WILL NOT be able to completely slide the 19mm bolt out. Fortunately, the bracket that it bolts to is slotted on the side closest to the exhaust front pipe and allows for the RMM to be removed while the bolt is still halfway through the mount.

See the picture below to help better illustrate what I mean. See how the bolt will only come out so far before it hits the OEM front pipe? If you don’t have any friends to help you rotate the engine, then you can use a prybar and place it in between the subframe and transmission. You don’t need much force to get the engine to move, so don’t start breaking things because you are prying like crazy.

OK PAUSE! It just so happens that I’m going to be installing an RV6 performance front pipe while I’m down here. So, the next picture will now show that I have completely removed the plastic splash guard to gain access to removing the front pipe. Remember, if you have an OEM front pipe then you will not need to completely remove the splash guard.

BUT… If you do have an aftermarket front pipe… Again, you will need to remove the front pipe to install the RMM.

• Unbolt the front pipe from the downpipe by loosening the X3 14mm bolts that secure it to the DP.
• Unbolt the X3 12mm/14mm bolts (depending on what exhaust you have) from the exhaust pipe.
• Lastly, you will need to remove the front pipe from the rubber hanger. I strongly suggest getting some “exhaust hanger removal pliers” to make light work of it.

Now with the front pipe removed, you can see more clearly how the bracket is slotted. But, since you have removed the front pipe, you can now effortlessly slide the 19mm bolt out, and then the mount should slide out much easier.

Below is just another image to show in more detail how the bracket is slotted.

Now, the Wunderladen mount slides right in. Make sure you grease both sides of the mount that slide into the subframe. For any mount, it is a tight fit and the grease will help the mount slide in much easier and prevent any sort of damage to the urethane as it goes in. You may need to persuade it a little by tapping it with a dead blow hammer.

Yes, I know that there are other variants to all the mounts I previously had on my car. Hasport has multiple durometer stiffnesses available and yes, I’m sure that their 88A durometer would be a great “apples to apples” comparison for the Wunderladen Racing 90a RMM. The 27WON RMM also comes in a 70A durometer that would probably be a great “happy medium” between the lackluster Hasport 62A and the extremeness of the 27WON 90A mount that I had.

For reference, here is a list of all the companies that currently make a RMM for the FK8:

• Wunderladen Racing
• Hasport
• 27WON
• PRL
• Perrin
• Powerflex
• Whiteline
• Airtech
• J’s racing
• Cusco
• Hardrace
• Torque Solution
• Boomba?
• Maybe more?

So, as you can see, the market is flooded with options. And it would be damn near impossible to compare all of these under the same conditions. One objective of this post was to talk about three totally distinct types of mounts and what can be expected from different durometer stiffness.

I would rate it like this…

• Perrin and Powerflex inserts would be for NVH Nazis.
• Any 62A durometer mount would be for the entry-level enthusiast.
• Any 70A-75A durometer mounts would be great for someone looking for performance increases without converting their daily driver to a race car. There will be some NVH.
• Any 88A-90A durometer mount is going to be for someone who only drives their FK8 on the weekends and has a dedicated daily driver.
• Anything above 90A is going to be for someone who makes more than 400 whp, drag races their car, and/or uses slicks or drag radials.

Of course, if you love NVH or can tolerate it. You can put any stiffness durometer you want on your car, even a completely stock FK8 can benefit from an upgraded RMM and will make your driving experience livelier and more enjoyable.

My RMM journey reminds me of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. In my case, the first mount I installed was too dull/numb. The second was too extreme. and the third mount was just right!

In all honesty, if my initial experience with Wunderladen Racing and their rear brake caliper bushings hadn’t gone as well as it did. I might have never taken a chance on ordering another RMM, especially one from a small company in an already flooded market.

To sum it all up, I’m happy I took a gamble on ordering RMM from Wunderladen Racing. It gives me everything I’m looking for in a RMM and none of the “knocking noise”. It’s a bit stiff, but that’s what I wanted from a mount. I would be willing to bet that for most of you that are worried about too much NVH, the Wunderladen Racing 70A mount will deliver everything you’re looking for without the risk of too much NVH.

Below is a little preview of an upcoming post (RV6 Front pipe install)

My other purpose for this post was. I wanted to praise Wunderladen Racing for investing in the track community. Wunderladen Racing actually has a track enthusiast’s best interest in mind and because It’s all American-made, American-designed, and American materials, you can be sure you are getting quality. Since the track community is a very niche one and doesn’t offer the same amount of reward for the risk, few companies spend the time/money on R&D parts that benefit us enthusiasts and would rather go after much more lucrative parts such as intakes or exhausts.

What I’m trying to say is, no one is going to become filthy rich from hyper-focusing on track-specific parts, the market is just too small. For this reason, we need to try and support as many of these small, American companies that are doing the Lord’s work for us.

TLDR:

I love my Wunderladen Racing 90A rear motor mount. It does everything I want and nothing that I don’t want. If you are scared of NVH, I suggest getting the Wunderladen Racing 70A ream motor mount because it will bring you a lot of joy with much less NVH. Why get a Wunderladen Racing RMM? Sure there are many other companies out there producing RMM’s, and very good ones too. The reasons to go with the Wunderladen Racing one are simple, Engineered, and built by people that understand what tracking a car is and they actually track their own 10th gen Civic too.

Below ill link the Wunderladen Racing 10th gen rear motor mount so you can check it out.

Honda Civic X Rear Motor Mount

Again, this post was not made to talk badly about any company listed above. Neither the Hasport nor 27WON failed me, they all performed as they should have. I just wasn’t happy with the durometer ratings I had chosen and thankfully this ultimately led me to take a chance with the Wunderladen Racing mount. As you can see, I’m extremely happy with my Wunderladen Racing 90A RMM because it does everything the 27WON mount did sans the hectic NVH. Caution, there is going to be NVH with the Wunderladen 90A mount, and again, if you’re scared of that… I suggest going with the Wunderladen 70A mount.

As always, thank you so much for reading my blog. I hope you found your way here because you are an enthusiast, and you are looking to learn in great detail. If you have any questions, comments, concerns, shade, or just want to say hi. You can reach me Via Instagram @Functiontheory, you can email me at Billy@Functiontheory.com, or simply comment on the post below, and ill respond.