The crapcord: Bean's '97 Accord LX DD/autox beater

Weeeeellll since I've finally started posting more over here, I figured I'd start a build thread.

Picked up this '97 CD7 LX a couple months ago, have been DD'ing it/getting it back into shape. PO was a filth monger and didn't take great care of it, so I have a long way to go. Car looks pretty clean, and aside from the trunklid rust, it's very solid. Was originally building to run in STC, but it's way too fat, way too wobbly, and not nearly enough power can be made to be competitive. So I'm switching to RTF(Street next year), so I can get to know the car a bit better. This is my.... 4th(?) year autocrossing since 2004, although I took a break from about 2007-2011 when I lived out west. I've done some maintenance on it(cleaned EGR rail, changed VC gasket, installed new rear brake shoes), and just been enjoying it as a daily. Might try to do a rallycross or two, but primary focus is autocross. It's hilariously horrible at autocrossing right now, all it wants to do is roll over on the suspension, roll over on the tires, and then spin the inside tire in 2nd gear coming out of corners with a fury known only to Ares, the greek god of war. Gets 30mpg on my 70mi daily commute, and hardly uses any gas while autocrossing, though. This thing is MILES beyond the Civic's and other crapboxes I've previously owned in terms of comfort and refinement.

Mods currently: Vatozone intake, Rotor over hub conversion, Prelude VTEC rotors, ITR/V6 calipers up front, 05-06 RSX Type-S Muffler, blown a** flex pipe, Worn out old stock shocks, all seasons on steelies. Not quite autocross worthy.

22mm Progress rear sway bar and stock airbox on the way

Plans: Clean EGR valve(already cleaned rail/ports), Swap out worn out stock radiator for a new stock unit, Find stock 15" or 16" alloy wheels and wrap them in RT* legal tires, Replace the stock, busted flex pipe/b-pipe with a 2.25" b-pipe and silencer, Koni or Bilstein shocks, Fat Cat Motorsports bumpstops, upgraded front sway bar endlinks, Axxis/PBR Ultimate brake pads

I may get sneaky and try to add some power with an F22A6 top end, but that all depends on if I can snag everything up on the cheap and how devious/unlazy I feel. Normally, beer takes over when I'm annoyed with something- everyone knows this solves everything.

In terms of car setup autocross and rallycross are strongly at odds with each other, the car could be decent at both as it is, but if you put hard suspension on this car it'll kill the rallycross performance for better autocross performance.

If you want to win at autocross you've either got to swap parts between events or give up using the car for rallycross.

I think Koni's will be a fine compromise on the stock springs. Getting it to rotate with a bigger rear bar will help both. A swap of the wheels and tires will let me do both events in the respective stock classes.

BTW, did I mention I have a $2014 budget? ;)

Investment totals:

-Car- $1500

-HVAC knobs and Driver corner light- $5

-Valvecover gasket- $25

-05-06 RSX Type-S catback- $180 for muffler installation

-Ground Control Coilovers, which I traded for a progress rear bar, a stock airbox, misc odds and ends: $220

-16x7 TSW's, bought for $150, sold for $200

Total: $1880

I think with some more careful buying and trading of parts, I can get my budget down a bit. There's still some parts I've bought that I haven't sold yet, so I'm not including them in just yet. Realistically, I have less than $1800 into the car at the moment once I have these other parts sold.

It was nice out this afternoon, so I decided I've give the car a good once over. Quick wash, clay bar, and wax. The wax seemed to have hidden all the terrible buffing marks, but I'm going to have a friend give it a buff this weekend. Looks a ton better, fat dog approves.

Man I remember when my car used to have paint like that. Enjoy it while it lasts You could score well in the concours of the GRM Challenge.

Ehhh... probably not. Has some nasty rust on the trunk from what looks to be a botched spoiler install, or the 96-97 split trunks are prone to rusting right under the plate area. Tons of little dings and scratches all over the car. It needs both front fenders replaced as they're both dented; I've tried to pop them out using various methods and haven't had any luck. Driver door has some rust forming in a couple spots, looks like it was reskinned at one time and they didn't seal it on the inside, the paint is WAY worse on that door, really bad orange peel and it feels noticably rougher. Same goes for the trunk. There's definitely a run in the clear or paint just under the mirror. Going to try to use some Meguiars ScratchX on the roof since it's pretty bad, but I need to get my hands on a DA.

Dirty/gross paint is a huge pet peeve of mine. I detailed cars in high school for a couple dealerships, turned me into a bit of a neat/clean freak. I almost cried when I sold my '99 Grand Cherokee that was a Colorado native car after I moved back to Ohio last summer. That thing was spotless underneath, and I really worked my butt off to make the paint look as good as possible. Interior was pretty perfect aside from the normal wear of the driver's leather. Of course, being a Denver/Colorado car, it had tons of rock chips on the front, and the bumpers were trashed from people not knowing how to parallel park. I loved that thing, but it nickle and dimed me to death from the previous owners' ill maintenance. I drained about 2oz of black, nasty fluid out of the transfer case the first time I went to change it. Surprised it didn't nuke itself.

This came in over the weekend while I was up in Northern Michigan doing some ATV'ing. 22mm Progress rear sway. Now I have to locate a couple of washers/spacer and some better bolts. The ones supplied look like grade 5 stuff. May have a buddy of mine sandblast and powdercoat it black, the gold is a little too blingy for my tastes.

Installed the 22mm Progress rear sway last night, pretty easy process. Instead of getting hung up/cutting the rear brake like bracket, I chose to install a 'spacer' consisting of a longer bolt with a washer or two and a nut between the control arm and the braket as a temporary stop gap until I figure out the best way of going about installing the endlink L bracket. More than likely, I'll pull a wheel off and drill a new hole about an inch forward of the existing one so I don't have to modify any brake lines/brackets. Seems like the best way of going about it, I'd rather not risk that line hanging free and cutting into that hose. Seems like I'm getting a little bit of toe arm/bar interference, but it's probably just the stock ride height. Car drives so much better into/around corners it's ridiculous, easily the best thing you can do for these cars for about $150. Can't wait to autocross it on June 9th. I might be able to squeeze in new tires or shocks by then, definitely both by the end of June.

Nice! This goes right along with my Maxima mods and the magazine's Camry project...gotta love fun, economical grocery getters! Can't wait to see more!

It's hard to falter these mid 90's cars. Good gas mileage, well built, decent enough power, lowish weight, mod friendly, reliable, good visibility, simple, and nice suspension designs. Not to mention most are at the low point of their depreciation curve.

In reply to beans:

Very very true. I think it's hard to beat a 90s Japanese car for reliability and economy (and sometimes some fun too).

In reply to sethmeister4:

New cars freak me out. They're nice and all, but they're too damn complicated. I was raised in the back of a '91 Accord(first car, learned to drive stick in it at 11), so these 90-97 Accords just feel 'right' to me.

I swear, the exhaust on this car is cursed.

Muffler falls off, replace with nice RSX-S piece. Flex pipe blows out, replace with new bendy tube after work today. Notice its also broken at the catalytic converter flange.

Exhaust is twice as loud now. Awesome. I wish I had a welder. Tapping the rockies in my garage tonight instead of going out. I'll deal with it tomorrow.

Fixed" the broken exhaust this morning. Drove over to mytee, had them cut out the whole midpipe and install a new one. Still has a minor, most likely pinhole, leak, but I'm sick of f*cking with the exhaust on it for awhile. It's back to being quiet, and I can only hear the leak at certain times. Saving up for a welder and building my own later on. This exhaust stressed me out enough so far. I've dumped nearly $300 into it and it's still not 100% right and how I want it. This will get me through for now. Shocks and tires are out the the equation for at least another month.

FINALLY got the exhaust 100% fixed. They found 3 leaks, so they just redid the entire cat-back with 2" piping and a new resonator. Leak free, quiet, and sounds great at full tilt.

Also got around to installing the stock airbox. Although not class legal, I yanked out the in bumper resonator, and removed the lower in-bay resonator/evap chamber-box thing. Kept the factory helmholtz resonator as I noticed it felt stronger in the 2500-4000 rpm range like this than with the previous 3" vatozone intake I bought the car with.

I'm completely in love with the way it sounds now.

Snapped a few pictures last night with it's new wingless look. Washed it for the first time in two weeks. I really need to go junkyard diving and get the front fenders, trunk, and passenger side upper door chrome trim. They're starting to annoy me. Maybe then I'll give the car a good detail. Doesn't look too bad in pictures, but there's so many light scratches and dings all over it, it's really driving me nuts. The trunk is absolutely shot. Rust, a REALLY terribly installed spoiler, scratches, dented, etc. I hate when people don't do things right.

Looks good! You should be able to find some decent newer model Honda wheels on Craigslist...that's how I found the Infiniti wheels for my Maxima. Nothing too crazy, but some 16's or, at most, 17's should be easy to come by. Sure would change the look for the better! Looks good without the wing though!

The +1 diameter rule goes into effect next year, so I've been looking for a set of 16x6 '97 Acura CL 5-spokes that everyone seems to hate(but totally ignore they're 16lbs a piece) since they're the correct offset for HS/RTF for '14+, but I've also been keeping an eye out for some Nissan wheels that I've heard are decently light and come in 16x6, too. Factory size is 15x5.5, but there were TWO port/non-dealer installed 15x6 wheels available, one on the V6 and ABS equipped cars, and one on the '97 SE's. They're both too heavy, and 6 inch width still sucks for the tires available; just about the only one I can do is a 195/55/15 which is still too short. There's a super rare 15x5.5 'swirl' 5-spoke wheel that's about 13lbs, and I've found a set for dirt cheap semi locally, but I haven't been able to get in contact with the seller. This 4x114.3 bolt pattern kills me, it's so hard to find wheels that aren't too wide or heavy. I kind of want to swap to a 5-lug setup, so I'm not really in any kind of hurry to find wheels to be honest. I'm OK with the steelies on it now. If I come across a deal on some wheels, I'll pick them up, but if I go through with the 5-lug swap, I'd have to ditch them. I think this car would look hot on some 02-04 RSX 16 inch 5-spokes for daily purposes, and then I can swap onto some much stickier tires on light/wide wheels for autocross next year if all goes through as planned.

13lb wheels http://limaohio.craigslist.org/pts/3799787805.html

Considering trying to make it down for the $2013 Challenge. I need to source up some better wheels/tires(will go Kumho if I can make it under $2013), shocks, brakes, and springs. Just about the only options for wheels I can dig up are 17's or 15's, 16's are pretty hard to come by unless I scrounge up some Sentra/Altima wheels on the ultra-cheap. Really don't want to go with any other shocks but Koni's or Bilsteins, so I gotta keep my eye's peeled.

I gotta get off my lazy ass, take pictures of the spare parts I have, and get them sold.

Installed my front motor mount insert last night, total pain. Need to snag a 90-93 DX/LX rear mount and fill/install an insert to really get the full benefit. Can already tell there's a little bit more vibration, but engine motion is MUCH better controlled.

Went junkyard diving this morning, had a good pull out of it! For $56 I was able to snag up an F22A6 cam, 94-95 front lip, Prelude intake tube, and brand new looking radiator. Didn't even think to snag the H23 upper plenum and TB, but I could've flipped those for some decent coin to the 90-93 Accord crowd. Really wanted to find a finish panel/trunk in decent shape, but every one I found either had dents, rust, or rusted bolts that immediately stripped out.

Already installed the prelude intake tube, had to use a rubber section to hook up to the Accord airbox. I would've snagged the Prelude airbox as well, but couldn't find the lower section of the box. Waiting a couple of hours for the car to cool so I can swap out the radiator and install the front lip. Gonna wait a bit to install the F22A6 cam until I can find a P06 ECU to chip/tune, aftermarket header, and F23 intake manifold. With a tune and those parts, I should see an easy 15-20whp gain.

Going back next weekend to see if I can scrounge some more good stuff up. As long as they're still there, I'll try to snap pics of the STUPID clean MX83 Cressida and 323 Hatch.

Just got done swapping out the radiator. Pretty revealing pictures.

Old

New

Installed my 94-95 lip

beans wrote: I think Koni's will be a fine compromise on the stock springs. Getting it to rotate with a bigger rear bar will help both. A swap of the wheels and tires will let me do both events in the respective stock classes. BTW, did I mention I have a $2014 budget? ;) Investment totals: -Car- $1500 -HVAC knobs and Driver corner light- $5 -Valvecover gasket- $25 -05-06 RSX Type-S catback- $180 for muffler installation -Ground Control Coilovers, which I traded for a progress rear bar, a stock airbox, misc odds and ends: $220 -16x7 TSW's, bought for $150, sold for $200 Total: $1880 I think with some more careful buying and trading of parts, I can get my budget down a bit. There's still some parts I've bought that I haven't sold yet, so I'm not including them in just yet. Realistically, I have less than $1800 into the car at the moment once I have these other parts sold.

So... lets at $56 to what I have previously listed for the front lip, intake tube, F22A6 camshaft, and radiator.

$1880+$56=$1936

$77 left to spend. I need to sell some damn parts.

F22A6 cam going in this weekend and hopefully I can scrounge up an F23 manifold at the junkyard. Don't think I'll be able to fit a second set of wheels/tires in under budget(still will buy anyway for street duty). Shocks will be an even bigger challenge.

Sooooooo V710's in a 265 don't fit This is pushed all the way up against the knuckle. Same story for the rear.

Looks like I'm stuck with 225's at most for reasonable clearance.

I got 235/45-17's under my Maxima with tons of room...not sure if there's as much room under the Accords or not.