WonderBart

A buddy of mine surprised me today with a great addition to my Civic project, an Auto Meter Boost Gauge, I just broke the seal on the packaging today so it's brand new mint condition. I love when things like this pop up because it motivates you to get your car done faster. ... Read More

I passed the 204,000km mark on my civic and decided to do the timing belt before winter sets in with minus 10 degree tempertures and constant rainy days. The whole process took me about 6 hours to do, changing the timing belt, water pump and replacing the old alternator belt with a new one. Most of the process was fairly easy besides the main bolt on the crank shaft, for that i had to get out my 450ft·lb impact gun. After that it was pretty simple as I have experience doing this kind of job a few times already. I could of waited a few more thousand km's to do the timing belt but when I did the radiator months back I added water into the cooling system instead of antifreeze, so if the outside tempertures dropped below zero I would of been in trouble. Here is a picture of my new timing belt on the cam gear and the old water pump still looking in decent condition. But for the amount of work it takes to get to the water pump its always a good idea to change it anyways.   ... Read More

Summer is over and fall is upon us but I found some photos of my car that I took in late September so I thought why not put them up on my blog. She looks pretty clean but wait till you see her next summer, she will look even sweeter :) ... Read More

I did my brakes on my day off and everything went pretty good. I used a one man bleeding bottle that I got from Princess Auto and it worked very well. It was very easy to pump out the old overheated brake fluid and put the new DOT 3 fluid back in, I went thru about 1.5 liters of brake fluid for both sides. Although this is a stock brake setup for now, in the future I will put double or triple piston calipers and some crossed drilled and slotted rotors. Took me about 2 days to get the brakes to set in but now they grab very well. ... Read More

I was driving a few days ago at lunch and suddenly I heard a squealing noise from my front passenger side of the car, it took me a few minutes but I realized that it was my front brakes making the noise. I took the wheel of the passenger side the next day and did a brake inspection and yeah i have about 2-3 weeks of pads left but till then it's gonna squeal like a bastard. I called an auto parts store yesterday and and found out that the front rotors are only $22 a piece and pads are $33 for the set. Not bad considering that when I had my old 87 Acura Integra my rotors were $80 a piece. So hopefully sometime this upcoming week I will have time to change the pads and put on new rotors. ... Read More

So get this, everyone always thinks that small cars are crap cuz they can't transport long things that vans and station wagaons can. Well I had a project that needed 8 foot long 2x4's and didn't have a van but I knew I could fold down the seats and just leave my rear hatch open for anything that sticks out. So I went down to Home Depot bought some 8 foot long 2x4's and started loading them into my car but what I didn't realize is that I could completely fit 8 foot long 2x4's in my hatch and have the rear hatch closed. I load them on the passenger side of the car all the way down to the foot level and up toward the bench seats in the rear. While loading my car I even got a comment from another Home Depot customer that said "wow I didn't realize you can fit 8 foot long pieces of lumber in your civic, thats great". It maybe small but sure does a great job at packing long loads ... Read More

Replacing the old radiator was quit easy, all I had to do was drain the coolant, unscrew the top rad support, take the old hoses off, unscrew the fan and then installed the new one doing the same steps backward. It took me about 45mins to do the replacement and then another 15 minutes or so to add water to the radiator as the engine warmed up and air bubbles came out.   Old Copper Radiator New Aluminum Radiator Here is how it looks installed in the car ... Read More

Driving to work on the weekend I noticed the familer sweet smell of car coolant that I knew was gonna put a dent on my wallet some way or another. I lifted the hood when I got to work and all I could see is green antifreeze all over the front of my radiator and the inside of my bumper. I left it for a few hours for the coolant to cool down so I could take off the rad cap and when I did the the rad was full of fluid so I was like ok where in the world is it leaking from. But I did notice my reservior was low so I took an empty 2 liter bottle filled my reservior with water and washed down the rad and its surroundings. I drove it home that day and while driving I was watching my temp gauge not to over heat my engine. When I got home I opened the hood and looked at the area around the rad and couldn't see anything but a bit of coolant every where. I looked closer at the rad and and then I saw it squirt squirt squirt , my rad ... Read More

Well 2 weeks have passed and I managed to get some more mods on the car. I got Mufflertech to install a 2.5" exhaust from the Catalytic Converter all the way back to a Magnaflow muffler with a chrome tip. This should be sufficient to spool up a turbo pretty quick on the up coming 1.6 Liter VTEC. I also purchased a Vibrant short ram intake that sounds really good when you slam the gas pedal to the floor. It sounds stock while driving normally around town but when you slam the pedal it has a really deep throaty sound to it. A few weeks back I picked up a carbon fiber hood and some used projector headlights so I put the headlights on and now it looks like it has attitude. The hood will have to wait for a paint job because I think I will paint it too.   Stock Intake vs. Vibrant Intake   Stock Headlights vs. Projector Headlights   Magnaflow Muffler + Chrome Tip  and Another front angle picture ... Read More

I found a very informative link about programming your ECU and from what i got was that if your running a turbo or any kind of boost its better to program your ECU to work with it, instead your stock ECU working against it. Here is another link to a guy that will add a chip to your OBD-1 ECU for $75. ... Read More

Wow what a weekend, I created the jig to force out the rusted bolt out of the rear lower suspension arm but no success. So I said enough and cut that arm off with a grinder and picked up a used one from a wrecker for a decent price. I got all new bolts and while assembling the rear suspension back up I made sure I greased the bolts up really well. I finished of the rear and adjusted the front again and by that time it was end of the day already. Here is a picture of it lowered, it's definately lower but not too crazy. So far driving it for 4 days now it handles so much better on corners, way less body roll but it is definately a stiffer ride so gotta watch out for those big pot holes. ... Read More

So while working to lower the car I looked at the rear drums and noticed they are really rusted and ugly. Being so rusted they defeat the point of having nice looking wheels because they kill the look. So I bought some Hi-Temperture caliper/drum paint and new drums as they were really cheap and it wasn't worth the time to wirewheel the old ones. I painted the rear drums red and man do they ever look good now the red drum and new wheels really compliment each other. And lets just say i've gotten more then a few people saying it makes the car look a lot better. Next task when I get a chance will be to paint the front calipers and part of the rotors. ... Read More

So last weekend I figured hey why not swap out my current shocks and springs with the new shocks I got a while back and the Coilovers. I ripped into the front and had a problem with a couple bolts so I had to go out and get a 400 ft/lb impact gun and compressor. After a few hours of wrenching I managed to put it back together and I dropped the suspension 1" and damn it looks good now. So I was like ok if the front took 2 hours the back should be easier cuz its only 1 bolt on the bottom and 2 nuts on top of the strut. After 6 hours I was still hacking away at it cuz I broke both the bolts for the shocks and no real progress removing the shocks from the car. Regular force wasn't working so I took a quick ride to the hardware store and picked up a propane torch and finally managed to take off the right suspension arm off the car with the strut still attached. I took this lower arm with the strut still attached to work next day and managed to cut the strut off ... Read More

The car is red and I like red but i want something better looking then just standard Honda red so i'm gonna go for Candy Apple Red. It's a red thats very deep and distinct looking from other reds and if you add the extra clearcoats it looks really good. Below is a hot rod painted in Candy Apple Red and man does it look good. ... Read More

Got new wheels end of last week and they made a big difference on how the car looks. And the 15" Bridgstone Fuzion ZRi 195/50 tires handle really good on dry or wet road. Next step will be the lowering shocks and the coil overs to drop it 1" ... Read More

I found writeups on B Series and D Series honda engines on wikipedia and so far i got that B Series are more expensive to build then D Series but besides that it's still hard to choose, ether the B16A 160HP or the D16Z6 125HP. Now the B16A has more HP but cost might be a problem. Time to do more research. ... Read More

I got a good deal on some Z1 fiberglass fenders, 4 brand new struts and oem bumper foglights with wire harness and switch a few days ago. I also picked up some White 1 1/2" gauges that i'm gonna mount into the dash, i got a voltage gauge, water temperature gauge and also a oil pressure gauge. Gotta see where i'm gonna mount these babies cuz i'm also gonna get a pillar pod for the drivers side for my tach, boost gauge and fuel mixture. ... Read More

On March 18, 2007 I purchased a Red 1993 Honda Civic DX, it was well maintained and looked good for the price that I paid. It had a dented front drivers side fender and some minor body dents but engine was in great running condition. She looks pretty plain jane now but give her a few months she will look great. This Blog is about how I mod and customize my 1993 Honda Civic. // ... Read More

Welcome to my 1993 Civic DX Blog. This blog will focus on the transformation of my regular looking and performing civic into a race bread road warrior but on the track and preferably mission raceway down the 1/4 mile. ... Read More