Vanishing Point

Re: 1969 S800M Coupe.I won't bore everyone with infinite details on my buying a '64 Honda S500, but here goes. About a week ago I saw an ad for the S500 on a auction site. By it's description it sounded like a nearly complete restoration just needing final fitting and some minor parts. After talking to the owner it was even better than expected, the entire car was restored. Completely disassembled down to the last then dipped to remove old paint and any rust. The frame was powder coated, the suspension, engine and chain drive rear end was completely rebuilt. All the hardware used in reassembly is new using NOS parts sourced from Japan and Germany extensively. The body originally white, was repainted and new red seat covers were installed. The car does need final assembly and some remaining parts will need to be sourced to keep it original, but by in large it is a complete S500.

My plans for the car are to finish the final assembly after sourcing the final missing parts, make some minor corrections on the prior owners build. Once finished I will be trailering the S500 to some car shows, taking some short drives but mainly preserving a significant piece of Honda heritage. According to some experts only 1363 S500's were built by Honda, of that number perhaps only 100 or less are still around. I would love to communicate with anyone owning a S500 as very little is known about the car, especially here in the U.S. I will be posting pictures of this car in the future, along with it's companion Honda S800 before anyone asks me about pictures.

~ Steven

Vanishing Point

The last few days I've spent cataloging the boxes of parts in order to determine what I'm lacking or need to repair. The problem I'm already running into is determining the identity of the parts and their probable fit location. Not having a parts manual and the accompaning exploded drawings isn't helping. I'm hopefully I'll still find one, in the mean time I'm using a PDF S600 parts manual as a reference guide. The other issue is not having accurate photos of what the interior or under hood should look like. On line photo's are not detailed enough that I have found so far. I want this S500 to be as accurate and faithfully to it's original build as possible, I don't want to settle for less. I'll use this thread to update my progress and post some photo's in the future.

Work done so far:

Cataloging of known parts and sorted in individual containers.
Rubber mats washed, then prepped for needed repairs.
Rubber interior trim cleaned with dedicated rubber cleaner (after soap) and Shin-Etsu grease applied and bagged.
Newly recovered seats, door cards cleaned, vinyl protectant applied and covered in protective covers.
Dash top and glove box cover cleaned, vinyl protectant applied..
Newly painted interior/exterior of car has been wiped down with de-Ionizing solution, clayed and ready for paint correction.

~ Steven

AussieAS285

I would think Brian Baker can help you with detail information.

Vanishing Point

Thanks, we shall see in that regard AussieAS285. I'm hoping Brian Baker can help me keep this project on track and the restoration accurately done.

Vanishing Point

A couple of major hurdles have been overcome, one was not having a OEM parts manual and the other finding reliable sources for parts. I was able to locate a reprint of the parts manual which I am very grateful to have, thank you Spread Tools. For parts I've been around the world. To the Netherlands (CMSNL), Ricky Nagata (Australia) and Spread Tools (Japan) and here in the U.S. where I found a complete brand new exhaust system. So far this search has lead to parts, friendships and a lot of advice for which I am truly grateful. This will be a marathon, not a race, to see this restoration fully finished accurately.

Blue-Civic-Hybrid

iTrader: (1)

Sounds like you got a literal diamond in the rough. Now all you have to do is upload some pics!

markmackay

Hi Stephen
Ive got a Honda S500 im restoring as well.
Please get in touch with me.
My email is markmackay666@gmail.com

Regards
Mark