My "Build" thread and pics (56k unfriendly)

[rico05]

I LOVE two tone pig nose coupes! Great work! Some nice wheels and better rubber and maybe some dampers and springs and that will be one enjoyable daily!! And much respect for you taking on a swap with zero experience.

[mRodiek]

I like your build and the progress your making, your making it into a car you want to drive no matter what others say and I have a lot of respect for that. Keep up the good work

[Rauland-S13]

I'm surely hoping to see a pic of your new stereo. Just out of curiosity, but is it a touch screen?

Modified by King Ranzo at 2:41 PM 8/30/2009

Yes it is. I'll have some pics and specs on it posted tonight.

[Rauland-S13]

Thanks for the props. Plan on getting some wheels, 17 or 18" but going to wait till after I get it painted. But I am going to drop it before then (kinda jonesin the tear drops right now and I might get someone to polish them up for me) with some basic (but good quality) lowering springs. Rather like the ride comfort right now, and as small as the town I'm in is, it has some pretty rough streets (potholes that make H1's and 4x4's think twice) so anything stiffer than stock would probably be too much.

and let me tell you, doing that swap... man was it a learning curve. Now that I have a second car, and I'm a bit more experienced with more time, I could probably do it. But holey swiss cheeze was I underprepared the first time.
Modified by Rauland-S13 at 5:31 PM 8/30/2009

[Rauland-S13]

Thanks a lot. It's taking me a while but I' getting what I want. The cars not a mustang killler, but thats not what I want, nor what its going to be. (however, I will not be beat by a 97 civic again. Stock. . More on that later).

[Rauland-S13]

Ok, so here are the promised pics. Such as they are. I warned you all before, I'm bad a taking pics and documenting.

So, two weekends ago, my Step-Dad (the dude who helped me with my attempted engine swap) came by for a visit. While he was here, we decided to do some work on the car. First up was the O2 Sensor. Went to the local autopart store to pick up an O2 Sensor tool. Gave me the wrong size. Nearly ended up rounding off the corners of the old sensor trying to remove it. Smartened up and compared the socket to the new sensor. Took the sensor to the parts store, got the right socket, and she changed out like butter.A pic of the new sensor installed.

Next up was the knock sensor. Unfortunately, didnt get any picks of the new sensor, nor of the replacement of said sensor. It was a littler awkward, but we managed to change it out with out any removing of parts, or lifting of car.

Right after we celebrated that task, we decided to remove the stock intake system and installed my Tenzo R system. Wasnt too bad to install, some minor difficulties (mostly due to the craftsmanship of the intake and the hoses supplied) but all in all not too hard.

A couple of different pics of it:Yeah.... i know... I need to clean my engine bay



If you look in the lower right corner.... yup...retrofitted to R134a. AC conversion already done before I bought the car

After that, we takled the shifter.If anyone says that you cant swap out the entire assembly with out dropping the transmission a little bit is full of it. its not easy, but it can be done (though it probably would have been a bit faster if we had dropped the transmission).

Big hole where the shifter will go. The wiring that you see is for my speakers and amplifiers inthe trunk. The single wire on the left is so that my deck will play DVD's when the eBrake is engaged.

New shifter on the left, old stock shifter on the right.

We cleaned off the gasket remains, applied a high heat silicon gasket and insalled the new shifter. Do you think I took pics of that.... no. That would be too easy. *sigh* I think I fail at the whole documenting thing. Ah well, once I get the interior detailed, I take some pics then.

Not sure which is more repsonsible, the O2, the Knock, the Air intake, or the Short Shifter... but the car is MUCH more responsive than before. So much so that my buddy in the 97 Civic who spanked my @$$ last time we raced wont even accept my challenge now. (And before I get flamed for street racing, this was done at his parents farm where there was nothing but wheat for as far as the eye can see). All I know is that the car as more oomph than before. And phenomenally (ok, phonomenally may be a bit strong) better mileage. The engine has a deeper tone to it. Not ricey at all, but about as low and throaty as a N/A 4-banger can get. and the Short shifter is a dream. Quick, concise, absolutely worthe every penny of the $50 I sprent on it

Now back to the work done...

After we got the shifter installed and made sure the car would still start, we attempted to do Neverlifts mod http://www.nicoclub.com/articles.php?id=272023 for the SOHC - DOHC tach. All i have to say is that it works, is really easy and here's the pics.

After driving the car for a year and and a bit with no tach, it sure is nice to have one again.... and i didnt' have to sacrifice my digital dash

Since I've had a couple of requests for pics on my deck, here they are. Since I'm an audio guy, more than an engine guy, its my pride and joy in my car. So lots of pics.

the Deck is a JVC KD-AVX77 single DIN in dash DVD receiver with touch screen and 5.1 surround (just to mention a couple of highlights).

Three different screen shots. The deck has 4 pre programmed backgrounds, and you can upload or capture from DVD four more. You can also customize the layout of the buttons (left or right side of the screen) and what buttons show. As well as customize the background colour to match your interior (to one of 4 preset colours)

Main Menu screen

Surround sound adjustment (also does 5.1 with out the need for an external processor... very cool)

You can also adjust the speaker distance as well as the indivdual volume of each speaker when in surround mode

She also has a 7 band equalizer with 7 pre-set setting (each customizable) and 3 User Defined settings.

DVD Menu screen. This is for DragonForce: The Making of Ultra Beatdown.

So thats where it stands right now. Still have to install my water pump and power steering pump. Oh yeah, two new toys came in too...

Fuel injectors

and

HID conversion kit.

Thats pretty much going to be it for a while. Winter is coming up soon (2 months away) and as slow as I am on getting things done, I'll be lucky if I get it all in by then. that and I'm looking at buy a house so.... moneys a little short for a while.

thanks for reading.


Modified by Rauland-S13 at 1:23 AM 8/31/2009

[White Comet]

looks good, but why are you happy its retrofitted to r134a? r12 is better

[Rauland-S13]

Thanks. The reason I'm happy its retrofitted to r134a, is because in Canada (not sure of the US) any vehicle that has an r12 system that needs recharging or fixing has to get retrofitted to r134a. No exceptions. Its against the law for auto shops to recharge a r12 system. when I got the car, I thought the AC needed recharging so I asked around, and 3 different shops told me the same thing, and each one quoted me between $5000 and $8000 to get the job done. And since I only paid $3600 (all this is CDN) I'm quite happy the retrofit has already been done.

[White Comet]

ah i had no idea. in the US lots of cars have been switched to 134 to there are still some places that can do 12 which is much colder. since you're in canada though why not just remove the ac

[Rauland-S13]

I like my creature comforts. And even though the summer is only 4-5 months long, it still gets up into the 30's (mid 90's F).

[White Comet]

in pa summers can be pretty brutal, this year more then anything the humidity was the worst but we still saw lots of days in the high 90s. i ditched my ac anyways. if you're just keeping the KA for now it doesnt make a big difference, but when i did my engine swap i'm really anal about how clean it looks so i pulled all that ugly crap out. my little brother's s13 he just bought came from the factory with no ac which is odd since it's an SE