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After wrapping up my son's 1992 EG hatch project I wanted more pain fun. I decided that I would build my own car of some sort in the future with the idea of using the knowledge I learned K swapping his car. Somehow, I landed on the idea of a DA Integra Sedan.
Example
I looked at a lot of pictures and went back-and-forth on buying one of those or finding another e.g. hatch or possibly an EK over the last few months. I discovered that the Integra's are scarce especially in four-door. Conversely the four-door civic from the 90s is fairly available in quantity if not quality.
They all suffer from rust and age so I was shopping around down south hoping to find something rust free that was not flooded in a hurricane. It wasn't long before I realized that I did not have time to drive down and get one now that my job was picking up I tabled the idea of buying a car that I did not need nor, could I really afford. My kid's and my wallets were still smoking hot from getting the EG Civic wrapped up.
I was looking at Facebook marketplace and I saw a car pop-up in Detroit, an hour away. A North Carolina car that had been B 20 swapped listed at $5k. Lots of new parts and minimal rust. Just a lot of wear and tear on some huge, but brand new eBay tires.
I also had my eye on a Civic hatch near my wife's workplace. It was parked in a backyard in South Toledo. I decided I would go over and knock on the door and see if the guy would be willing to sell it. The guy came out and we talked about the car for a little while. It was his only source of transportation, and unfortunately, the car was rusty in the back. More work that I wanted to do. I think he would've sold it, but he would need to replace it and I wouldn't feel too good about what he would be in for in looking for a replacement car. The market is pretty terrible and everything is expensive and this guy did not look like he had a ton of cash.
After finally putting to bed the idea of buying another hatchback, I rolled up to Detroit to take a look at this car. My son and I combed the car over and we were a put off by the quality of the swap because the guy did some terrible wiring work. It needs to be gone through completely and redone, which I was not really interested in, but then I drove the car. The shifter is terrible and sloppy and feels like it has five neutrals but the clutch engages very well and it does row through the gears nicely. The CRV donated B20 pulls really hard and the guy had the paperwork indicating it was from a 65k mile CRV. I have been looking at these cars for a while and the Indonesians do some really cool builds on them and I thought maybe I could put a spin on their aesthetic so I grabbed it when the guy came down to a price I was willing to pay.
Day 1: some deets
Shitbox
3
5
7
B series, non vtec
All the bad stuff. It was hit in the front driver's side and all that needs straightened along with some rust and bad bad wiring
1
Gave it a bath and scraped a TON of glue off the windows from a prior tint job.
Got up this morning and took the car to a local shop to have my good tires mounted to the black wheels. I cleaned up the wheels and hit them with some semi gloss black. My son came home from work and I asked him if he wanted to drive to Cleveland to pick up a bumper. I found it on marketplace and it was in good shape compared to mine which was all cut up.
After I got home, I took off the front of the car and found even more hacked up sheet metal. Luckily, the bumper guy also gave me the bumper support And a foam insert. The bumper Support was pretty rusty so I wire wheeled it as clean as I could get it and then applied a coat of POR 15. I don't really like the stuff but for things that remain unseen it's not a bad way to slow down the rust until I find another part. I may go to the junkyard tomorrow and look for a car with a similar core support that I can hack off and weld in. Luckily, the previous owner installed a torsion bar and that is serving as the bottom structure of the front end.
While waiting for the POR 15 to dry, I am cleaning up a couple of sheet metal parts and trying to refinish the door bump strips.
Car started to misfire and give me some issues and I was getting impatient to get going on fixing rust and getting started on the build. I tried sorting the misfire out but the wiring is so bad I am not sure what is good or bad on the harness. My buddy suggested i get that sorted 1st before it burned. I grabbed a beer and an impact and decided to just go ahead and start from scratch as I intended.
So now the weather is getting bad and I am working late daily. Things have slowed while I pay down some debt but I am watching BF sales and considering a few purchases that are not dependent on my picking a driveline. I am on the fence about going K20 instead of keeping the B20 in place. The B20 is a good motor and trans and it would be cheap to just get it sorted and drive the car but i fear breaking it and scarcity of parts. I also love the cable shifter in my kid's car. It's likely I will go K20 or K24/K20head if I can source one. My son's car has a ton of parts we scored deals on but it seems like the bargains and available parts have dried up slowing this project down some.
Current status is "freezing *****". Between that and some medical crap the car is mostly stalled. I did pull a few more parts from under the dash and made a driveline decision
I plan to keep the b20 N/A and maybe add a Vtec head if one falls outta the sky by the time I get to that part of the build this winter. Because I made a decision on Black Friday, I bought a Hush performance Hydro clutch set up. I also ordered a Momo Montecarlo wheel and the Hybrid racing B series shifter. The next day (I call it "poor-Saturday") I happened across a set of 15x9 wheels for about $500 that I know won't fit so I will make them anyway because I love them. **** on me all you want, I will build the car around these wheels.
Looks like a good start. Na b20’s make great daily’s. You could always throw a modified b16 intake manifold on it and a tri-y header and some other bolt ons to make it a fun little car.
It was pretty fun already so I will probably end up doing just that, I am making decisions in increments and I think I will paint the insides and gut the car. Just the dash and door cards in front. Half cage. No idea why I want this thing to be useless and loud but I love the Kanjo style stuff and this will be my spin on it. Spent tonight staring at all the firewall stuff thinking about how best to tuck it. I haven't seen a lot of pics of tucks on these with the heat still in tact, I don't mind being cold but I do mind fogged over windows at night.
Hush Hydro kit came in today. I'll probably spend a few weeks buying suspension stuff, and cleaning out the car. It's filthy
Things have taken an odd turn. My kid smashed his N/A GSR swapped Integra. He always wanted a JDM front clip for it so we bought one, It has a boosted B16 Gs attached to it. It made it 180 miles home and pulls hard.
I may put this engine in the EF. I pitched in on the buy because I want the rear disks, spindles for a big disk swap, ECU, shifter and a bunch of other random stuff. We'll do the front swap when it warms up enough to paint
Lol in dude math, you actually made money with that deal. Everyone always talks about how the trailing arms are different on DA's, DC's and CRX's when it comes to disc arms... Is there actually a difference?
Lol in dude math, you actually made money with that deal. Everyone always talks about how the trailing arms are different on DA's, DC's and CRX's when it comes to disc arms... Is there actually a difference?
From what I read, CRX Si and DC2 are direct fit. DA is 1/2" wider. DC2 e brake cables work but are slightly longer. VTEC academy has a pretty good video on it
BUILD thread EF sedan
