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So after almost 2 years of sharing a car with the wife and commuting by bike, I decided to pick up a Honda again. We've just recently moved down to San Diego and things are a bit further apart than in the bay, so I figured it'd be good to have a way of getting around, and also I wanted to have a fun project to work on since this is the first time in my life having a garage.
I started looking around Craigslist, and stumbled on this '90 EF Hatch with a BAR'ed B18 swap, so I went to test drive it. Now, I may have jumped the shark a bit, and probably overpaid a bit as well, but I was just stoked to be driving a very raw and lively hatch. The car was $2k, with a salvaged title (previous owner said it was from someone hitting the door in a parking lot), and the ad said firm so I didn't really haggle. Previous owner showed me the recent alignment numbers, and smog numbers, and it all looked good. The interior and exterior were not in perfect condition, but it seemed to drive pretty well. I looked at it on a rainy evening, which in retrospect was probably not the best idea. But after the test drive I decided to buy it and drove it home the same evening. Once I had it in the daylight and had a chance to commute a bit in it, it definitely showed a few flaws that I may have missed
Drove it to work the next day Back in the garage Came with these racing harnesses, would like to switch back to regular seatbelts if I can find some Obligatory engine bay pic - came with a b18a1, same year as the car, 1990 First problem with it - the door latch stopped working just after I got it home. There's my problem, this guy won't stay in his bushing Popped out the old bushing, it looked pretty worn Ordered a new one for $2 + shipping
Popped the sucker back in there... but it was adjusted too low and wouldn't open the door. And the new bushing was doing its job really well. So I had to take out the handle entirely to unscrew the thing on the end of the rod a bit. Whoops. Works great now though! Pulled out the sub and amp that came with it. The doggo is inspecting them. In the process, started to try to pull out wires to clean them up a bit. Shift/brake cover removed... Another angle. Pulled the panel radio/climate control cover panel. Going to try to clean up that wiring a bit as well. Car came with a tach that didn't work, so I removed the screws, but still need to trace the wires and disconnect them. Not shown are the headrests the car came with. Pulled those out and undid the rear seatbelts. Not sure where these seats are from. Can't tell if they're leather or vinyl but they definitely need some cleaning. Also, there's an interesting CRV cupholder mod back there, a fire extinguisher, and a couple of loose speakers. A custom strut bar that may be welded on, with head rest mounts and seatbelt tabs. Thinking I may want to take that out, hard to fit bike stuff back there with it in. Took out the seats to give them a cleaning and to get to the carpet underneath. Louie doesn't seem to mind them though.
I'm far from an experienced mechanic, but I want to see if I can make this thing livable as an occasional commuter & for travel to bike races. Anyway, I love reading build threads of all sorts, so figured I'd share some of my progress so far (which between working full time and training for bike races isn't that much, but I'll put in what time I can )
It came with solid motor mounts, so there's tons of vibration in the cabin. Found a deal on some HASport mounts with new bushings on ebay that should arrive next week. In the mean time, just trying to clean out the interior a bit. Going to definitely give everything a good vacuuming. Thinking about pulling the carpet, and dying it if it looks pretty bad. Also going to pull as much of the interior paneling as I can and wash it down. It's kind of faded as well, so I'm considering hitting it with some SEM dye and making it all black.
Just got my compression tester delivered last night, but I was tired so I didn't get around to using it. Will test it tonight. Hopefully the compression is good! Prev. owner said the car's getting ~20 mpg, which seems really low - even with the b16 tranny. Slight smell of exhaust in the car when I rev it high, so I'll want to investigate that too.
Replacement hatch struts should be here today or tomorrow. I already dropped it on my back once while I was taking the sub out, ow.
Does anyone know if there's some sort of bondo-like material I can use for interior trim? I want to take out these tweeters on the dash and seal up the holes from the wires, and there are a couple of other little holes & gouges as well.
tweeter
On the bright side, the handling on this thing feels pretty great.
Your best bet on the interior dash repairs is either a good used replacement dash or a dash mat... FWIW I was getting 160 Miles per Tank with my B20b & b16 Trans with a stock ls ecu. Since then I retuned and have picked up MUCH better mpg's
Nothing I've seen for dash repairs, however I started this on my first 4th gen... I use drawer liners (the meshy rubbery rolls of drawer liners) and cut them into the flat recesses of the dash. That way my change doesn't rattle and my phone wouldn't slide around. It also does a nice job hiding any imperfections in the dash.
Hah, I guess I'm still learning this generation civic, didn't even realize they weren't stock.
Small update - did the compression test on Friday, cylinders 1 & 2 are at ~140 while cylinders 3 & 4 are up in the low 180's. Since they're adjacent cylinders, I'm guessing it's likely a headgasket issue. I didn't see any mixing of oil & coolant anywhere but will have to do some further checking. No big deal if it is, at least it's a cheap fix, although time-consuming.
In brighter news, a very good friend bought me a set of tools! I was going to go out and get some but now I don't have to, so I went out and got a tool chest from harbor freight instead. Should make working on this stuff easier.
Motor mounts have arrived and will hopefully be installing them today or tomorrow. Still waiting on hatch struts.
Pulled out the driver side motor mount but found that I need to change out the bracket that goes on the block to make the holes line up. The guy who sold me the mounts included it with the package, but the 3rd bolt for that is under the lower timing belt cover. To take off the lower timing belt cover, I need to pull the crank pulley. No impact wrench or crank pulley holder = blargh! Put everything back for now and will try to get my hands on one of those two tools and try again.
Was out of town this weekend so I didn't get a ton of time to do work, but some progress is being made. Will post more pics tonight, but in a nutshell -
Got two 24" breaker bars, a 24" extension, and the crank pulley tool. With my wife holding the pulley tool in place (with breaker bar braced against the floor, she was just holding it horizontally so it wouldn't slide out), I was able to break the bolt free pretty easily, within like 30 seconds. The loud crack scared the crap out of her though lol
So I took off the post mount, bracket, whatever you want to call it, off the block and put on the one I got with the kit. Then I realized that the new bracket is not threaded (and also has a stud with no nut), so I ran down to the parts store with it to get a couple of nuts that fit. M12 x 1.25 IIRC.
Anyway, back to the garage with the correct nuts, I'm finding that the holes are ever so slightly off so I can't slide the bolt through with the motor mount in its bracket on the chassis. I tried jacking the engine up and down a bit to move it around, but it didn't seem to help get it lined up. I'm thinking if I can take off or loosen the tranny side, then maybe that'll give me some more wiggle room to get it in place. So tonight I'll take out the battery and start clearing the area so I can get to that.
Also, I'm worried about the rear mount. I took a look down there with a flashlight and it looks nothing like the rear mount I have. I think it's supposed to have some T-bracket back there, but all I see is some custom looking plate with way more bolts than I expect. So that's going to be a fun one. Hopefully I can just remove that plate and pick up the right T-bracket and slap it in there, but I'll need to get underneath to check it out later. Probably tackle that after the passenger and driver side mounts are done.
Oh and a new discovery, two of my wheel studs on the driver side have play in them (e.g. I can wiggle them side to side), so I picked up a couple new ones. Of course, I couldn't get out one of the two rotor screws, so I drilled it out this morning. Fun fun fun!
Starting to look into head gasket replacement and new carpets too. Didn't see any mixing of oil/coolant, but I'm reading that it could just be a small crack/leak between the two cylinders causing the low compression in both. Will need to find a local machine shop that can check the deck on the head for me and fix if need be.
01-19-2017, 02:29 PM
1990 EF Mini-Project
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