When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
Hello everyone! Today I finally picked up my first Integra with 230K miles on the chassis. The original motor has been pulled out and rebuilt with roughly 92k miles on the rebuild. I purchased this car with the intent of turning it into a daily driver that I can hit track days frequently. A little background of myself, I currently own a NSX, but my past cars consist of a '95 Toyota Supra, '77 Datsun 280Z, '88 Mazda RX-7 FC. These past cars were amazing and delivered a completely different driving experience, but I find myself loving VTEC more than anything. This Integra was a good chassis for me because it already has the JDM front end on the car and a bunch of "modifications" done to it. In my opinion, the mods are quite questionable so the first thing I did during my ownership, was remove all the modifications. Another benefit of buying a modified Integra was that I can sell the parts to offset the cost of the car. The car also has an issue where VTEC doesn't engage. I can hear the crossover, but I personally can't feel it getting more powerful so I will have to look into it!
Here's a picture of when I first got it. As you can see, it's riced out.
Current Stage:
When I got it:
Last edited by aling289; Sep 23, 2020 at 07:45 PM.
Needless to say, the Buddy Club P1 wheels were garbage. The offset were terrible and the 15 inch sizing was just not it for me. I ended up going with some Konig Dekagram wrapped in some Toyo R888R for track duty. The Konig Dekagram's are surprisingly pretty light and considering it was only $600 for a set of 4, I would say these are a steal! The reason I didn't get some TE37's yet is because I plan to eventually do a 5 lug conversion. After getting the tires mounted and balanced, I ceramic coated all four wheels with GTECNIQ C5 Wheel Armor. This will hopefully help keep these wheels looking clean and fresh!
After ceramic coating the wheels, I decided to tackle the engine bay. After 20 years on the road, the engine bay was extremely filthy. I used Meguiars APC diluted 10:1 and Meguiars Acid Based Wheel Cleaner diluted 10:1 to freshen up the engine bay. Finally, I coated the entire bay with some Meguiars Hyper Dressing. The end result was an engine bay that looks like it has less than 50,000 miles on it. In reality, this engine bay has over 250k miles on the chassis.
Fitting up the Konig Dekagrams was not going to be as easy as just bolting them up. The rear fenders have never been rolled before, so naturally they needed to be rolled if I wanted to go any lower. I've never rolled a fender before, but after doing it on the Integra, all I have to say is to take your time. Use plenty of heat and start section by section. The end result was a rear fender that was rolled extremely flat with no pull to the quarter panel. The paint condition was also not affected, although on small part did crack. I wasn't too worried about it due to the fact that the car has been repainted before to Championship White and cracking on a repainted car is normal.
And here's the car mounted up with the wheels! It's missing some components on the car such as the wing, stickers, and lip so the car looks funky at the moment! Hopefully that will be taken cared of soon!
The wheels themselves are not bad. Not too heavy either. Just the sizing and offset of them makes them terrible haha.
Ya, I hear you. For some reason it does look like trash with however that suspension is setup at the time of the picture. I've personally owned and had them on my integra and it didn't look even close to that sunk etc and they were also 15's. Great wheels but need to be put on a properly setup suspension. Konigs are decent too (had a 2 sets over the years as well).
I mentioned before that the JDM headlights that came with the car are trash. The previous owner blacked it all out and melted some of the plastic in the process of opening them up.... As a result, they are not salvageable so I just purchased another set of headlights. These new headlights have the typical chrome peeling on the inside and foggy exterior lenses. I gave them a sanding and buffing session to make them clear again. I then ceramic coated them with Gtechniq Cyrstal Serum Light to prevent oxidation. I will probably be opening these up in the future to repaint the inside to make them "Fresh" again.
I know the bumper is messed up. I sold the bumper already and purchased a new one! Also ordered a new set of Type R Badges, Side Decals, Shift Boot, and a bunch of OEM parts!
I forgot to take pictures but I replaced the VTEC solenoid gasket, Spark Plugs, Spark Plug leads, and changed the oil on the car. The VTEC issue is still not fixed which leads me to suspect it might be the LMAs are bad. I purchased Skunk 2 LMAs and a stock P72 Ecu incase the car is "Tuned." My friend and I started by taking off the valve cover gasket, timing belt covers in an attempt to change the LMAs ourselves. We got stuck with at the crank pulley bolt but finally we got it loose. And then.... the harmonic balancer wouldn't come out. After many days of trying to do it ourselves, we gave up. Working at a dealership before, one of my technician friends agreed to change it for me!
With the LMAs and Valve Stems replaced, I thought the VTEC would be fixed! However, the issue was still present. I decided to remove the catalytic converter and replace it with a test pipe. Boom! It was a clogged cat all along! Knowing this, it would've saved me a lot of money but hey, the car is more refreshed now! After fixing the VTEC and changing the LMAs, next up were the brakes. The old brakes were warped and making a lot of noise. The pedal feel and dirty brake fluid meant it would for surely not last at ALL during track days. To combat this, I purchased Hawk HPS Track Pads, New Rotors, GoodRidge Stainless Brake Lines, and StopTech Brake Fluid. This combination gave the car a FIRM brake feel that helped the car stop a lot faster. The install was relatively straight forward until we put the stainless lines on. We needed to put "2" cooper washers on the caliper side instead of one washer... The lines never came with instructions and as a result, I paid the price. I had to bleed the system TWICE!
Some of you may notice that the front bumper is off! The reason being that I sold it in favor of another used bumper. The old bumper had a cut out for a J's Racing Duct which meant no amount of repair could fix. Not to mention all the holes that were drilled for the canards. Before fitting the new used bumper, I will repaint it along with the fenders, type r wing, and the rear bumper!
Here are some pictures of the fenders, bumpers, and wing after paint! The whole set up including the tent, compressor, air hose, two spray guns, and all the prep material was roughly $500. The hardest part was preventing dust from landing on the freshly painted parts! I also purchased a rep Mugen front lip from ABS Dynamics. The front lip had very good fitment. The reason I purchased a rep lip instead of a carbon fiber Spoon lip was because my driveway IS EXTREMELY steep. I wanted to purchase a cheap lip to test out the clearance!
One thing that I do to all my tires is denibbing them! I hate the nibs on fresh tires and as a person that pays a lot of attention to the details, I denibbed them all!
'97 Integra DC2 Track/Daily Driver Build Thread
