prakhash

March 29, 2013. After waiting many years I finally bought my first car. At this point I had been driving for about 4 years, and I had learned how to drive a manual already as well. Being obsessed with cars ever since I was a child, this was one of the moments I had been looking forward to my whole life.

Initially I wasn't sure what I wanted. All I knew was I wanted a Honda. EG's were my first choice, as this little hatch was the car that made me fall in love with the brand. My Dad had a 1995 Milano Red Cx hatch, and I remember it being really nimble and quick. I wasn't old enough to drive back then, but I remember sitting in the back seat, and also learning about components under the hood with that car. I also learned how to drive stick in a 1993 Civic Si, so the EG was of high sentimental value to me.

My Dad's car from back in the day.


Living in the 'Great White North', it proved rather hard finding a clean EG with no rust. So along with that I added the EK, EP3 and DC Integra to my list of potential first cars. SSBP is my favorite color on the Integra, but those being somewhat rare, I knew I would never find one... but I was wrong.

I came across the 'for sale' ad for my car one day, and I somehow knew this was the one. It had 170k kms on the original motor. When I went to see the car in person however, the body wasn't in the greatest shape. I will get to that a bit later. Mechanically however, it was sound, so I pulled the trigger.

Day 1, bringing her home.


First things first, I had to get the car certified. Turned out I needed some new ball joints (the ball joints on the car didn't have cotter pins in them ). Also needed some new brake lines.


An oil change, and coolant top up later, we're good to go.


Alright, so here's what's wrong with the car. It had a rust bubble near the moonroof, and the car was heavily riced before. The hood was plastidipped but half of it was peeling off, as you can see in the first picture. I peeled all of it off within the first couple days of owning it. Tail lights were rice, front fenders were rice, and one of the previous owners put a big wrap around spoiler on it, and drilled holes into the car. The spoiler isn't there anymore (I bought the car with an OEM GSR spoiler), but the holes in the body were poorly attempted to be filled. The moldings have been deleted, but the paint/bondo is cracking on the passenger side door. The run channels around the door and windshield are also tearing apart. The motor also burns oil as I found out later. AC doesn't work so summer time is really fun. At least the quarter panels have no rust, and peeling back the interior trim, there was no evidence of welding either, so I have original quarter panels.

Rust bubble on the roof.


Hole poorly filled and shaved by previous owner but not painted.


You can see two holes that were filled (little black things sticking out of the body), one beside the wing and one above the gas door. Same thing on the other side of the car.


I had my work cut out for me. It's safe to say the previous owner really didn't take care of this car. The AEM SRI had a crushed and dusty filter. So I replaed it right away.

Before/After.


I didn't want to be seen driving a car that looked like ***, so I bought a few replacement parts from an Integra part out. A 98-01 Type R front bumper with Amber signals, OEM Type R lip, OEM front fenders, and OEM 98-01 red/white tail lights. One of the fender liners were also missing on the passenger side, so I bought two of those as well.

Rice (left) to nice (right).


Started ripping out the front end.


After installing all of my parts I gave it a quick wash and a little photo shoot. I had a bunch of stickers lying around and was going through a bit of a sticker phase. Don't worry, these didn't stay on the car for very long.






Not many days after that and I went to my first local car meet.

My first rolling shot.


Parked.


I got a Megan Racing short shifter, and replaced the fake Type R shift **** with a Skunk2 shift ****. I also had a tranny flush done to the car.


This is what my car mostly looked like for the rest of the season. I was just driving it around and getting a feel for it.

I guess if you see in black and white, the car doesn't look so bad.


I also went to my first track event (CSCS - Canadian Sport Compact Series). I didn't track my car, I just parked it and spectated. However I really loved the attitude and lifestyle there, and I knew right away that this would be something I would want to do in the future.

Quick photo shoot before heading to CSCS.


Parked at CSCS.



Eventually I ended up getting a Type R wing. Just needs to be color matched.


All of my dash vents were not moving properly, and they were dusty. Being really picky, this bothered me so much. I decided to take it out and fix it.


At the end of the season this is what the car looked like.





Now she sleeps. Spring is coming soon so I can't wait to take her out and work on her some more.


Future Plans:
-Coilovers
-Wheels/Tires
-Brakes
-Fix the oil burning issue
-Paint
-Other stupid things (steering wheel, rear fog, racing seat)
-I would also like to do time attack or just lapping in the future as well. It would be harder to do once I paint the car, so I'm going to have as much fun as I can with it while the body is in crappy shape.

I'm open to your feedback, suggestions, and advice. Stay tuned for more!

blazedcivicr

Makes me miss mine so bad wish I still had her g/l with the build

prakhash

thank you! yeah, i've considered selling it a few times before. but i just haven't been able to do it.

prakhash

When I bought my car it came with Tokico Whites (adjustable dampening not ride height). If you look closely in my pictures you can see the car isn't sitting even. The back sags down a bit.

So I bought these used Tein Basic coilovers. Can't wait to install them.

JDMImporter

Clean, it reminds me of mine.

prakhash

thanks!

prakhash

Bought some new wheels as well. Got them with brand new 205/50/15 Dunlop Direzza Z2. Good tires?

phenom3030

Good job so far on the revival process!

prakhash

thanks! still a long way to go.

prakhash

So, it snowed today. Dafuk. But my car should be coming out of storage in another 10 days. Can't wait to get this build thread going somewhere.

In the meantime, I have been on/off about buying a Miata. Need convincing that I should keep the Integra. The fact that it's RWD, small, affordable, a roadster, etc. has me wanting one. And my Integra's paint/body situation isn't always the most encouraging. But I want to track it and have fun. We'll see...

ProjetEF

You really need to keep this car !!! Just a paint job and it should be fine !!!
Is it a stock GS-R ???

Miata will never give you that historical fun you have with honda'S. The integra is much more practical to.

We had snow here this morning to, it should melt today :D
Nice project btw !

prakhash

Thank you, I appreciate it! Yeah, it's a stock GS-R, and I did some research with the serial number on the block, and it turns out that the motor is original to the car.

Update: Took my car out of storage yesterday. After 5 months and 20 days, driving it again felt great.
Today I went to the store and grabbed some lug nuts, and finally got my wheels on. I will post pictures soon!
I'm looking to get my coilovers installed on Monday, and possibly paint the wing the same colour as the car, because it looks hideous.

prakhash

Cleaned my coilovers today, getting ready to install them tomorrow.

Before/After.

prakhash

Coilovers are finally in, thanks to my cousin "drift_n_shift" who is an old member on here, but doesn't post anymore.

A rusty bolt on both of the front forks snapped while trying to remove them, leaving us no choice but to remove the driveshaft to drop the spindle and remove the old suspension. Then we had to go out and grab some new forks. It proved to be more time consuming than we expected, but then again, unexpected things always happen even when trying to install the simplest of things.

Front:


Rear:

prakhash

Got my wheel alignment done today. My upper ball joints were missing cotter pins, so I made sure that was taken care of. My ride height was also adjusted and evened out. Car rides great now, feels really solid. I pushed it a little going on the on ramp to the highway, and there's much less body roll now.

Alignment getting done:


Took a couple of photos of how it sits now:

prakhash

My wing is now off, and I have begun sanding it down to paint-match it. I'm using 400, 800, and 1000 grit sandpaper. Not too picky about how it turns out, but might as well do it right while I can.

Before:


During:


After:


There were some chips in the paint so I started sanding it smooth. You can see the original color of the wing. I hope there isn't a problem in the finish because the yellow is at a different "level" than the blue, even though it feels smooth to the touch.
Any opinions from people who have dealt with this before will help.

prakhash

Here's how my car looks wingless. I'm definitely not used to it, and it feels weird and empty without it. I love wings way too much.

ShinsenTuner

iTrader: (1)

Makes me miss my old one... take care of her!

eM1_kiD

looks clean man, keep up the good work from a fellow SSBP owner.

prakhash

Thank you! Some days it gets really hard, because I'm not overflowing with cash. It's easy to ditch her and buy something else that is clean. But I love this car, and the color, and I want to build it up to something perfect.

Thanks man. That's awesome, there aren't many SSBP's around.

Jake0lson

Looks great man, goodluck with everything! From a fellow SSBP owner

StayKrafty

Definitely a good start to something awesome. Keep it up man!

prakhash

Another SSBP owner? Sweet! Thanks a lot!

Thank you!

prakhash

Finished sanding my wing today and gave it a clean up. My Dad used his new pressure washer on it, and ended up chipping some paint, so I had to sand it smooth in those areas again.


Painting this wing is a little tricky because it has an underside and curves. I found a way to hang it, and decided to paint it in the garage.


Gave it the first coat of primer.


However, even though I sanded down the areas where there was chipped paint, you could still see it after the primer.


I'm going to have to sand it again, and then do another coat of primer to top it off. I'm hoping it will turn out decent. I'm planning to do a full paint job in the foreseeable future, so I will possibly get the wing done professionally again.

prakhash

While hosing down my car with my Dad's new pressure washer, the paint on top of the rust bubble on the roof of my car (see above), chipped off revealing all the rust. It looks really bad.

I'm hoping to have some SSBP left over from my wing paint job, so I can use it on this. I'm going to have to sand it as well. If anybody has any experience with getting rid of rust, do I need to sand it and afterwards use body filler to smooth it all out? Will the rust be completely gone, or can I expect it to pop back up again?