Sup guys. I just purchased a '98 DAP hatchback a couple of weeks ago. The plan is to make it a suitable DD until next Summer where it'll begin evolving into a track car. I previously had an Integra that was evolving into a track car until I wrecked it at Laguna Seca. I was planning on picking up an EG since everything would've swapped over, but EKs just look more modern. I'll be using this thread to keep track of any progress that I've made.

The Car
The "EK" is a 5 speed CX model that I purchased from the original owner with about 175k miles on the odometer. There's no A/C, P/S, ABS, or power anything. It's damn slow on the freeways, but it's definitely more fuel friendly compared to my '00 M5 (30+ MPG vs 12-13 MPG in daily commuter traffic).



The car has been mostly taken care of considering it's almost 20 years old and completely bone stock. It shows the usual wear that such a car will collect over its lifetime, but it's a good place to start. The first thing I did was replace a super rusty looking clutch slave cylinder and swapped out the cluster to one with a tachometer. There was also a nice dent on the driverside bumper that I managed to mostly pop out by pouring hot water onto it (thanks YouTube!).




After washing up the car, I went out to take some baseline photos with all of the imperfections (driverside fender dent, dings, oxidation, peeling, and scratches).










After taking the baseline pics, I went into the garage and began detailing it over a couple of days. This includes claybar, polish, and waxing. I'll save the detailed pics for the next post, but here are some during photos to give you an idea.

 

Cleaned
Here are the post detailing photos. As you can tell, the hood and roof looks 1,000x better than before. One downside from having a detailed car is that I now notice even more dents and dings! Anyways, I essentially retook the same photos as before for comparison. I also installed Spoon rep side mirrors since my OEM driverside adjustment handle broke and I don't like the Dumbo ears style. I also pushed some of the dent out from the driverside fender. I'll massage it a little more whenever I take the wheel and fender liner off (probably during an oil change).

 

impressive on the paint

 

Can we get some details on how you saved the badly oxidized paint? My integra has some oxidation and I would love to get it looking as good as your paint is looking now.

 

Thanks! I just needed it to be in acceptable condition. I'll buy some eBay touch up spray paint for the rear hatch.

Here's a link to a detailed walkthrough of the entire detailing process. Most of us are familiar with claybarring so you could focus more on the polishing section.
How to Detail a Car Step by Step - Detailed Image

Here's what I basically did...
1) Wash.
2) Claybar.
3) Polish with Menzerna Super Intensive Polish on orange pads on the roof. I wish I had yellow pads available...
4) Polish with Menzerna Super Finish on white pads on the the whole car.
5) Wax with Meguiar's NXT Tech Wax.

Normally I'd polish the whole car with the SIP and THEN use the SF everywhere, but I was just trying to bring the car up to an acceptable level where my coworkers would stop judging me. Also, I used a Portercable random orbital polisher. Just note that if your clear coat is gone then it's already too late.

 

Nice.

 

That is a pretty incredible job, especially on the hood and roof. I thought for sure they were goners and would need a new coat of clear coat from your pictures.

 

I would say my clear coat looks about as bad as yours, at worst. How would I know the clear coat is gone? Sorry if that's a dumb question...

 

Thanks dudes

I'd say it's done if you see it peeling and flaking off lol. If it's like mine then go for it!

 

Cool thanks!