94preludeguy

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This thread is devoted to my restoration project of my newly acquired 1991 Honda Civic Si. I've decided to go ahead and make a thread. I'm currently building my EG Civic and I mentioned picking up my EF in the build thread and had a bunch of people wanting to know more about it. Rather then cluttering my EG build thread with a bunch of updates on this car, I figured why not give the car its own story?

I found this car on craigslist one afternoon. There were no pictures, everything was misspelled, horrible information really no details about the car at all. Just basically a "need cash quick" gimmick. I usually ignore ads like this, but it did have a phone number. Car was posted around 2PM, I texted the guy at 5 asking for pictures and more information. Hours went by, nothing. I figured the car sold and I should move on.

Nine o' clock comes by and he texts me back saying he couldn't get pictures but could tomorrow. I asked if I could just come look at the car. Usually I don't look at stuff in the dark but I figured why not. I still didn't know what to expect or what I was even looking at. I get there and the guy's electricity is turned off so I can't even get a good look at it. He offers to meet me at the gas station up the road.

The car drove there and back fine. He told me it has a blown headgasket. He was asking $700 for it and after going back and forth for a while I told him if he'd do $450 I'd buy the car tonight. So around 11pm my girlfriend gave me a lift I grabbed the title and took it home. He included three brand new fuzion zri tires that match the almost new tires already on the car, enough oil for an oil change, a fuel filter and an oil filter. Cool! That's easily $150-200 worth of stuff right there.



Teaser picture of the dirty suspect. At this point I ordered a headgasket, timing belt, tensioner and water pump right away.



The car is straight as an arrow body wise and has two tiny rust spots. Nothing on the quarters car is in terrific shape! I carfaxed it and I am going to be the 4th owner on this. The autocheck score for cars 1-25 this car scored a 25! Has 211k miles. Best thing about it, nothing aftermarket at all. It is 100% factory and OEM and it is going to stay that way straight down to the factory alloys. :D

As long as the minor overhaul goes okay, I'm just going to convert the AC to R134 and just DD it. I really want to get my coupe finished up and boosted.

94preludeguy

Day 2:

Since the headgasket is supposedly blown I decided to self diagnose a little more. No milky oil/coolant but the block/trans had sludge and oil everywhere. I let the car idle for a good 20 minutes and it was taking forever to warm up, way way longer then my EG. Sign #1. Went to look at the tailpipe from the exhaust, white smoke on every rough idle puff. Sign #2. There are no knocks or any real weird noises from the motor so I'm keeping my fingers crossed it's just the headgasket. I'm doing the belt and pump because it would be silly not to!

Before I got started though, I really wanted to at least get the engine bay washed out. I don't mind getting my hands dirty, but I don't want them covered in grease grime and slime. So I blasted it down real good and decided to get the whole car. I can't bait to wax/buff this paint because it's in pretty good shape. Supposedly was repainted six years ago or so, paint has a purple flake in it that I'm actually really liking.

cody_sandlin

looks like a nice deal man. i got a 91 crx si and its not even that nice. Im planning on doing a swap a b20b non vtec with a ls tranny. i herd those r pretty great for boost.

94preludeguy

Right now I have all the fluids drained, battery, dizzy, intake, etc. all taken off. My goal tomorrow is to get the head pulled and at the latest by Sunday or Monday have the head back on torqued down and ready to fire up. I'm also waiting on NGK wires in the mail so I don't mind waiting a few days. Seller said he changed spark plugs recently well they were black, covered in oil and were bosch platinum lol.. Accel wires I believe so I figured it's not OEM but all NGK would be much better and still cheap to do. I'm planning on cracking open the dizzy and checking the cap, rotor, igniter and coil as well since I have all sorts of dizzy parts.

I'm so stoked to get this thing running. It will be the first car I've had with air conditioning in like 4-5 years haha. Plus not having a giant fart can will make long trips so much more enjoyable. Another nice thing is it has a brand new windshield. I've been driving my EG daily for the past eight months and it has a busted *** windshield that gets annoying.

James89DX

Really nice pickup. How's the interior?

Shaunathan

damn i wish i could find a 91 si in my area even half that condition.

but regardless, clean car, she's a beautiful.

looking forward to more.

94preludeguy

Interior is in really good shape. Needs a glovebox, couple plastics in the trunk and the rear cargo cover. I would like a new driver seat eventually its immaculate except a big 6 inch part where you can see the foam. It's too bad, hopefully I can find a minty driver Si seat later down the road.

KINGVEM^^ED6

iTrader: (1)

Loooks really good id pay 450 for that allday

94preludeguy

Thanks man.

So how do you get the damn crank pulley off of this thing?? I have the tool to take it off any other Civic/Integra but this pulley has a bunch of holes in it. Please do not say air tools because I don't have them.

KINGVEM^^ED6

iTrader: (1)

Air tools

:p

skill178

Get someone to hold the brakes with it in gear. Slap a breaker bar on it and turn it over to tighten it up lol. Where's the fog lights? I'm missing one on my 91 si and they are not cheap lol...

Captain Key!s

iTrader: (4)

Nice to see another ED saved. Good luck man!

94preludeguy

Hard to turn it over when the battery, dizzy, oil etc, is all out.. I don't like using brakes for things like that I would rather do it the proper way. Seriously if you can't use the hex crank pulley tool like ANY other Honda what do you use? Is it as simple as jamming something in the holes and holding it against the block or something?

Also pretty sure they didn't come OEM with foglights.

Thanks man. This is my first EF I have really had to tear down and like I stated above, it's a bit different then all the EG, EK and DCs I've owned and worked on.

KINGVEM^^ED6

iTrader: (1)

Yeah man there a little different

Fogs were optional

Best bet is air tools bro

94preludeguy

Dude I'm not going to spend over $500 on air tools to get one bolt out. I have gotten plenty of crank pulley bolts out by hand it is not that difficult at all when you're able to use the right tool with it.

KINGVEM^^ED6

iTrader: (1)

Good luck my man

Too bad it doesn't have fluids ib it

I'm sure any local mechanic would break it for u

jdmboyef9

Any interior shots? Car looks good

skill178

Si was the only ef to come with color matched bumpers and fog lights. Maybe it is optional but I've never seen a si without fogs

jdmboyef9

Not sure where you got that info from but in hb both DX and Si came with color matched bumpers. Some of the DX and most if not all STD models came with black bumpers.
All models including sedan, wagon, and crx were offered with OEM Stanley clear fog lights in the USA and Canada but very very few actually had them.

94preludeguy

Yeah I was about to say I never see EFs with OEM looking foglights. Always riced out ones. I've been lazy yet busy with other priorities so I haven't gotten much done on it. NGK wires came in the mail. Tomorrow I'm really going to go at it and hopefully get the head pulled off.

I've been meaning to get interior shots but it's taken apart right now plus I'd like to clean it up a little bit. It is clean and almost complete though.

mt-fly-boy-25

MOAR pics! looks good though

bpotter05

I'm going to go look at a 400 dollar EF hatch tomorrow morning. I'm so pumped.

Pinoy_Boy

Any updates to this? Or is this on hold and the EG is the priority?

94preludeguy

Nah not really. School was ending and I was out of town frequently. Lately I've just been lazy enjoying my "summer break" since I'm taking 8 credit hours this summer. I'm going to start working on it tomorrow, just having a hard time getting the exhaust manifold and crank pulley off. One of the bolts on the header-downpipe is rusted/stripped on the head. I'm going to end up pulling the radiator out, disconnect the two sprint bolts and pull it out that way. Try to get the messed up bolts/nuts out of the exhaust while it's out of the car and replace them.

But hey I sat in the thing and "played racecar" shifting and turning the steering wheel. Feels like it's going to be a much, much more comfortable ride then my EG. My EG feels more racecar! Anyways it got me more excited and motivated to finally get the damn thing going. I've seriously had a huge box with all the parts sitting in the trunk for over a month now. Kind of saddens me.

As far as the crank pulley goes I guess I'll try and jam something in one of the holes and hope I can get it sturdy enough against the oil pump housing. Real afraid I'll break some **** this way but oh well. Really sucks that the D16A6 did not have the hexagon pulley. I have the tool for it and it's worked every single time I've used it. I prefer it over air tools, which I don't have anyways. So if anybody reads this, help me out with some advice on this pulley. No air tools, I need to get it off myself. Also keep in mind, I have a really crappy jack and a rock driveway which makes working under the car much more difficult. I hate it.
Have at it! :d

famous323

iTrader: (9)

strap wrench the pulley, either put wood blocks under it, or use a hydraulic lift to prevent the strap wrench pulley from moving.