So after channeling front frame and crossmember 3 inches, i have the suspension travel, i have the oil pan clearance, but i still haven't achieved grace..

idk whether it's the wheel/tire combo or what. it looks great in person, but still there is something to be desired.

some pics for reference:









and a shot of the shifter tunnel that trips people out and the interior i haven't finished putting back in.




at this point i'm contimplating a number of things..

A) more low. the back is still stock save some ridiculous camber arms. i need to section the crossmember, relocate the camber link mounts, and z or otherwise modify the trailing arms before i can go even .5" lower. furthermore, if and when i do this.. the front will need some resolve. an inch lower in the front and i'll never be able to drive in anything but a straight line. unless i go with an air-adjustable suspension setup.. definitely thinking of it as the front would literally lay out on the jacking points.

B) different wheels. i love the rpf1s, but even when i first bought them i thought they are more sporty than what i'm really going for. maybe something polished/machined/chrome and with a traditional lip. that said, i could stretch, poke, camber.. but that **** is ridiculous and downright unsafe on a street-driven vehicle. they are 16x8's +38 and 205/45/16 on there now. contemplated a nice 15" setup, but with lower-profile tires i may as well go with tiny whitewalls and wires. these huge square fender openings we have give me nighmares, which brings me too..

c) somehow modifying the fenders.. thought about deleting the trim which would make for HUGE wheel wells. maybe grafting in civic fender openings or even a golf's or something. but the rears are going to be a serious time consumer if i decide to do anything besides leave them alone. idk, open for any ideas. either way, at this point any less fender to tire clearance and it'll be a headache.

that said, i have no other complaints, a little tweaking of aluminum lines and sectioning a couple of flimsy brackets and i still have a/c, p/s, and cruise. driving on the highways it has plenty of travel, no bumps, bangs or rubs (expect on ogre-sized potholes the rear reminds me of it's lack of re-engineering)

oh yeah, and exhaust ideas. i'd like something quiet, but in leu of further mods in the rear it's just a pipe running where the drive shaft was then up over where the crossmember bolts up in the rear and back out the stock location. it's loud. and it's getting old.. quick.

 

Looks terrible.

You should sell it to me

 

Thats a wholllle lotta low. Im having a lot of issues with rubbing in the front, and thinking of doing some mods. Can you show some pics of what you did?

 

if i can't get it figured out to where i'm 100% happy with it, i might!

that or i'll just put it back up on jackstands and do an s2k driveline swap. winters around here get awful boring...

i really want more low! but i'm starting to feel like it'll look dumb layed out, wish i had time to pick up photoshop.

anyway, what kind of rubbing are you getting? tire to fender? tire to that big pinch weld?

 

both.

 

on mine all that crap is gone and now looks like this:



only the wheel well remains. i'd recommend you cut it up about an inch and a half across the top of the wheel, then weld a filler panel across the gap that remains.

or if you don't want to get fabbin'.. take a big hammer and beat the **** out of it in towards the chassis then up flat. do it a little at a time all the way across and it'll fold neatly. thats what the super-dumped civic guys do.

as for the fenders.. i wish i had a pic. if you really want i can probably snap one in daylight. but if you pull the trim off, cut the portion of fender over top of the wheel and behind the trim completely out.

as for the trim it's self.. i drew a nice smooth line across the bottom to the edge of the crease where you could just barely see it on the car and cut everything off behind (or inside) and then sanded the rest of the clip mounts smooth. the two clips on the fender to the rear of the car will hold it tight to the car, and the two screws at either end will hold it on securely.

 

Any more pics of how the inner fender looks like now? Im definately going to be fabbing it. I just like to see what others have done and maybe where i can improve. I already beat the **** out of it with a 24 oz hammer. Still rubbin. lol.

 

this is before it was finished, but you can kind of see how it goes. looking back at it stock, definitely a few inches of free'd up suspension travel. it doesn't rub now, but keep in mind.. i'm only an inch lower than i was before, and now the entire shock tower and wheel well are 3 inches higher.

 

Channeled means?
Really dumped?
Looks different and good either way.

 

Thats pretty much what my plan was. Thanks for confirming that it works fine.
What thickness steel did you use? 3/16th?

 

wtf...really

 

if i hammer it that means i have to take the fenders off correct? and hammer the **** out of it? while drunk?

 

I hammered mine while sober and with the fender on. Maybe these are the issues of why im still rubbing. LOL

 

you should take a pic

 

i will next time i take the tire off. I think i blew my brand new tie rod the other day. Our roads here are GARBAGE.

 

just out of curiosity, what suspension are you running?

 

Poor crv.

Is it atleast the 2wd model?

 

probably will work best.. i'd remove the fenders though if you're going to do it drunk! lol

koni yellows for an itr. 600# coils on gc sleeves. front will soon be 800# though since i've removed the sway bar.

 

All the way around? ITR dampeners have the right part on the bottom for in the rear?

 

Wow really nice cr-v!

did you think about putting ctr front spindle??

 

chop the top next. take 5 inches out like the old lead sleds

 

yeah, they are like crv's rather than the civic fork-over design. people on here swear they're too short to use though!

and the steel plate is 1/8th inch. after running some numbers it was the best option to handle the redirection of structural loads. initially, a tube front was my go-to.. but this redesign is stiff, but i needed to avoid the uncrushable characteristics of a cage so if it's whacked by another car on the highway it's more likely to bend where a fender stay made of tube will spear through the cabin like a straw through a capri sun. (bad example, i never could get those things open when i was little) or i could've caged the whole thing, which again seems dangerous on the street. (but who am i kidding, what isn't dangerous on the street when it comes to honda?)

asfaik the knuckle is the same for all 5 lug applications. but definitely thought about using ctr/teg/civic/something upper and lower control arms with the center section of teg axles to reduce track width to run a more aggressive wheel in the front. the rpf1's are too sporty and really hard to photograph. they look downright dorky from most angles.

i've got a lot of stuff laying around to experiment, but time is my biggest enemy now. i'm 2 hours away from my wrenches and if this proposal goes through with the state, i fear i'll be stuck working some serious hours through the fall.

pretty sure you're being lame, but the thought has been brought up around the table more than once. i've already got months into metal work.. and i can assure you that i can't even imagine the amount of time it'd take sectioning pieces and forming pieces to fill the gaps to produce a chopped top on this.

that said, it's more work but way more fun than bolt on's and the typically swap-and-turbo honda scene that i'm used to.

 

In my findings from looking for a CR-V to buy, there are FAR WORSE fates than being slammed, and looking dope in the process.

 

ive been wanting to compare the front knuckles of our V to the ones on civic/teg 5 lug...
im kinda seeing that againts the crv, theyre already shorter to begin with, too bad theyre
really pricey, if it wasnt i could have just jumped into one...LOL

good luck on the progress...

 

BTW i wasnt being lame, Youre so far into this why not chop it? The windows are pretty flat so cutting the glass down wouldnt be too bad. It doesnt have side curtain air bags and the isnts much more than a few posts holding the roof up since the majority of the CRV side profile is glass. It would be hard but no one would ever see one like it