Oni's Build from Honda>86>Honda>Evo X

[icebox]

Hi Ladies and Gents

Yes I know, I know its an Honda thread. I did own a Honda or should I say Hondas from a built EG turbo owned by my sister and handed down to me, to S2000 and to my recently departed Ep3r but i needed a big car so I spent solid 9 months looking for a decent 4 door car that I could enjoy and have people in the back seat without any hassle.

I had 3 choices, the new Golf R, the new shape Subie WRX or an outdated Evo X.

but here some photos of my ep3 to prove i actually owned a honda ;P



Up until March, all hope was lost and my partner was giving me the nudge to just move into a small SUV considering she loved the new HR-V after we test drove it. i was 3 days from signing the papers and driving away with a brand new HR-V when this near immaculate Evo X popped up for sale.The car was all the way in WA and I was in Sydney, people warned me about buying interstate and doing it out an inspection. I went with my gut and just called the dealer ship up and gave me the load down. Surprisingly the back story regards to the car was sad , the chap who previously owned it worked for a mining company up in Port Hedland and was made redundant due to the mining industry closing down he had to sell up to support his family. The price was reasonable considering it was stupidly hard to find an Evo x with manual with low KMs. Quick negotiation here and there and I was left with a price to think about. A quick 10 minute chat with the partner and I got the okay! (no im whipped, she has to drive the car as well). Called the dealer ship up and finalised my purchase of a Rally Red Evo X 2012 Model! the Ep3 was sold 2 days after i finalised the paper works

Here it is when I drove it home from the transport company



so went straight to business! Because old habits don’t really leave you! I had a few parts lying around from my pervious builds and I guess I wanted the car to stand out a bit. Soooooo Overnight parts from Varis, Gruppe M and Trust/Greddy

[icebox]

With the car coming from interstate, I had to get it registered which meant Blue Slip, and stamp duty and man stamp duty really rips you a new ass hole!. Like any car I purchase first few things I do is literally inspect hidden areas of the car to see if I find anything out of the ordinary and yes I did….

Found 2 focal subwoofers under each front seat and man they are horrible, cant believe the previous guy paid 500 bucks for each one to be installed. It was event fitted with Velcro. After market head unit and a blitz SBC boost controller which was a win I guess.

Took it straight down to Top One to have the guys, do the service and literally put everything in. we hit a little hurdle regards to the exhaust. When they put it onto the hoist we realised it had an aftermarket exhaust from x force (not hating on the brand but it sucks balls) and it made my very bolt on exhaust not so bolt on…. Which was a bummer. Took the car off the hoist drove to Haks and Arthur at Performance Exhaust in northmead and they did a make shift front pipe utilising an 100 cell hight flow cat which was awesome. Bolted everything back up and damn it looks amazing.





Went back to Top One to fit the diffuser and that was another mission in itself. As a lot of cutting, fitting and wiggling had to be done Anthony from Top One did an amazing job to fit everything even when the new exhaust caused some mounting issues.




But looks nice if you don’t say so my self

[icebox]

The main objective of the car was to really build a daily with the ability to drive to the track thrash it then drives back again with zero hassles. The car came with a KN intake which was an open pod setup. But NSW popo being the way they are I sort to have something sensible and sensible didn’t really go that far when a mate told me a friend of his had a brand new gruppe M for an evo x he didn’t need as he was selling the car. Just my luck~~ so met up quick met and greet proud owner of a gruppe M.



Colt Speed and Gruppe M are virtually identical in design in every other way. Colt Speed only rebranded the items from Gruppe M due to an existing partnership they have with their G Garage race car. So that went in with a GFB stealth BOV as the existing Turbosmart dualport stuck out like a sore thumb.

changed all the interior lights as well to LED thanks to the guys are dynamic diode in the states for sending me their kits




after a few weeks of driving this happened:


one of the exhaust hangers actually ripped which i have no idea how because this specific rubber was 1 cm in thickness :O, quick call to the dealership and placed an order for one. shit thing is no exhaust shop carries these as they are vehicle specific dont buy evos

pretty much did some trival stuff and replaced the wiper blades as the old ones were leaving marks



and put some recaro head rest into the car



in the mean time im in the process of thinking what to do next and i need to address the wheel gap business as it feels like driving a boat at this moment.

one way or another these needs to go on





i'll leave it here for now more updates to come

[Toddxxx]

And what a great way to finish the thread. Love ze40s!

[icebox]

I was pretty happy with the way it is now (except for the wheel gap oh my god the wheel gap) however with my day job I had to travel interstate for a day to deliver a minor seminar. While I was waiting for my flight back, I noticed an amazing deal on coilover and I jumped straight on them.



I was now a proud owner of a set of Tein Street Flex Z Coilovers which set me back way less then what I was planning on spending on a set of coilovers. $750 AUD for the coilovers brand new! Which is a bargain. Inspected them thoroughly when it arrived because $750 dollar coilovers you question yourself as its too good to be true especially for Street Flex Z which are the updated versions of the previous version. All was perfect everything was brand new which was winning! Obviously .

Sadly I wont be putting them in until I get some decent tyres for the wheels and my sway bars to arrive. But overall its slowly coming together.

First things first, we had to make an enclosure for the subwoofer I had, which was a JL audio TW3 10 inch, the reason I went with it was for the purpose of mounting it into an EVO MR subwoofer enclosure that came with the Rockford upgraded models. Lucky for me the car originally came with the upgrade but ditched it for some Focal under the seat subwoofers which was horrible.




and the finished product


more to come

[felixR]

Quality mods and wheels!

[Shakeel]

Awesome build so far David!

[icebox]

Quality mods and wheels!

Thanks Felix,

Awesome build so far David!

Thanks Shak, so much more to come but so little time

Great read, thanks for sharing buddy.

Your plates remind me of Street Fighter 4

Thanks buddy, haha I never thought about it that way, the intention that my partner had with the license plate was to say Lucky Devil but its missing one more 8 (Asian thing)

And what a great way to finish the thread. Love ze40s!

Thanks Todd, yeah im lucky to have got the ze40s at the price I purchased them at as people are selling them at $900 to $1000 dollar a rim :O

***Long Update***

With everything coming along I was confused with how to approach the car now. I guess that’s what happens when you have a new toy in your hands you just buy stuff without thinking twice haha. So I made an order of what I need to do first and work my way to it.
1. Audio System – Since I already had most of the stuff from my previous builds so saved me a fair bit there and who wouldn’t want a bit of luxury in the car.
2. Suspension and Brakes – because that Wheel Gap that I mentioned so many times, main objective is to be function > form because being stanced is stupid no offence ;P
3. Power mods – this will be the game changer as I am already working with a very well named company in the states.
4. Body works – I have a very good item what to get and no I wont just slap a wide body on it and call it a day as Varis and Chargespeed are the only JDM company at the moment that make widebodys but im thinking of going Victory Function a US company that make really amazing front fenders check them out.

So like I said I bought stuff without thinking twice and the result are:
Defi Gauges – the standard essentials, but im thinking of running a fuel pressuer gauge in the cabin as well any opinions on that?

Some air fresheners because they were on sale

A second arm rest with a proper center compartment trimmed in leather.


So back to the car!

With the first thing on the list, had to get the audio stuff sorted, as Im not the only one driving the car, I have to consider the Partner and my old man whenever he decides to take it for a joy ride without me knowing?

So it starts, front components and rear speakers have been installed with a 32mm spacer (Factory width)





So I got asked whats the point of doing all that work to fit a subwoofer into a stock enclosure when you can just buy wickedcas enclosure? 3 things really:
1. Easy to remove and put back in especially if i track it as weight is everything!
2. Factory OEM look!
3. Can utilize the actual trunk space like the wickedcas sub at half the price to purchase and make.

The car originally came with the subwoofer however the original owner removed it for god for bit unknown reason? But looking at it now it sits right at home once the boot carpet goes back in.
The old headunit had to go, primary it was my old man’s idea to get rid of it as the interface was horrible and he disliked the layout. The original head unit I had in the Civic was a pioneer GPS unit so I opted to go the same, as the format and layout was similar and much easier to use.

Pulled out the old headunit and dear oh dear look at that horrible cable management.
Before

After

In the headunit goes


Heres where I’ll leave it as plenty of stuff to do and I still got stuff on the way from across the other side of the world.

[icebox]

Just a quick update, with all the old stuff out from the factory, my friend Phil managed to get all the wiring done and completed. All the wiring was tucked underneath, the carpet which was what the previous owner should have done.

The JL Audio Amps gone in and nicely tucked. And have to say it definitely looks really nice compared to running the ugly Subwoofer/Amp combo. And it was 10 x lighter phew~.



The carpet of the subwoofer was trimmed a little to accommodate the enclosure back into the boot, and honestly it should really have never left the boot. The enclosure really blends in with the overall boot so well.



With the luxury side done for the car now it’s time to focus on Suspension and Brakes!

With the coils already arrived, I need to think about tires and sway bars I am planning to pick up either whiteline or superpro swaybars front and rear and hardrace rear control arm and roll center adjusters.

With the brake side im trying to determine whether I make the jump to girodisc rotors or purchase DBA rotors and call it a day for now.

But I guess that’s for another time.

[icebox]

Received some parts from japan quicker than I expected, which is always really good!

The box came bigger than I expected and it fit into the Evo X with no problems. So here it is nicely wrapped and shipped from the Japan~, I couldn’t wait so I opened It before I even took a photo~ who can blame me hehe



All the parts laid out


Pretty much I picked up some spare parts off a race car in Japan that was going to be used as a donor for a shop that was going to enter WTAC. so here is what I got:
2 x LH and RH Evo X OEM HID headlights
2 x OEM ballast for the HIDS
2 x B Pillars
4 x Defi Gauge Visors
1 x Carbing Carbon 4 gauge holder
1 x Trust/Greddy Oil adapter plate
1 x trust/Greddy Radiator adapter
1 x set of 8 Spoon Ridge collars

So you may ask why did I buy another set of OEM projector HID for the car? Well I want to run 4 real quad headlights. The car came with OEM project which was really rare as most GSR models only came with the halogen headlights. From my understanding the car headlight was a factory upgrade as it was only the MR that received the luxury of the projectors.

So regardless I was lucky to come across them and took it off their hands.

The one thing that I was really looking forward to receiving was the Carbing Carbon 4 Gauge Holder which was amazing! I have been searching prior to purchasing the car to find a gauge holder for RHD cars as a lot the products I saw online were mainly for LHD which was a bummer.

So I took one of the gauges and visors out of their boxes and decided to mock up what it would look like and I got to say even so it’s just a gauge holder it was one of the best investments yet for sure.





Fitted the Gauge to the carbon




So you ask why the visors as it looks better without them, well to be honest I ran gauges in my Civic and got to a point it was kinda annoying to see the gauge reflect onto the windscreen. The partner really wanted to install a dash camera as Australia drivers are probably up there with the world’s worst drivers out so the visors would stop the reflection I hope. With the way the holder was designed I wasn’t concerned about the visor blocking any of the visibility of the gauges as it was aimed directly towards the driver once I installed everything.

So finally picked up some adapters to finally be able to run the gauges but I might put off from it until I have my EFR kit arrive from the states


So you may be confused as to why I picked up Spoon ridge collars for an evo? well Spoon actually make ridge collars for all branded vehicles and its actually internationally patented. I had them in my sisters Turbo EG and it was the best mod I did to it as what the ridge collar does is designed to fit between the subframe and the chassis and fill in the gap left by the bolt. It eliminate 90% of movement for the subframe, also fixing basic geometry of the car.



With all that, this also arrived for my friend, Vive Gaming VR which was super fun to play and one of the first few batches delivered to Australia


Gave It a little try and man that shit was hella fun to play



Sorry for the long post. Just got told the EFR Kit should be shipped next week so im super excited but I wont be able to install It until I pick up some essentials

[felixR]

Interesting feedback about the Spoon Rigid Collars! I'm curious as to how much of a difference it will make in the Evo.

[icebox]

Interesting feedback about the Spoon Rigid Collars! I'm curious as to how much of a difference it will make in the Evo.

i definitely cant wait until i pop the rigid colllars on the car, as when i tracked the Eg turbo it made a big difference but thats just a personal opinion.

im hoping once i organise my sway bars and getting my brake stuff sorted i can pop them all on at once.

[icebox]

Just a quick little update, haven’t really done anything big at the moment apart from stock piling on parts. So over the weekend I managed to finally get around to installing my second arm rest that I retrimmed in leather and put a secondary compartment in. It took about 30 minutes to do as the hard part was really getting the original one out.
5 minutes in pulling out the center console, i realized how easy it was to taking it all apart and Zero effort was required!~. So now I’m considering installing a short shift but sadly all the short shifters are mostly designed for LHD and I really wanted a Cobb short shifter but they don’t make it any more




So back into it, after pulling it all apart the hardest part is removing the back panel without damaging the hinges that the latches attach itself to. Lucky enough to only break 1/6 which I will fix down the track.



So here’s a side by side comparison with the original one that came with the car and the second one. It sits a lot higher due to the second compartment, and the actual arm rest can extend (sorry no photos)







Other than that, nothing else has been done to the car as I am still looking to finding the best budget brake setup as I need to overall everything from rotors, lines, piston rebuild etc.

[icebox]

So i jumped the gun and purchased a set of T3 DBA rotors as the price for a two piece Girodisc shipped to Australia was well outside my budget for now.

pretty much the list for my brake upgrade so far:

4 X DBA rotors all round
2 x Initma SR brake pads
1 x Goodridge Brake Lines
2 x bottles of Motul brake fluid

overall set me back about $950 Aud ($725 US), decided to go Goodridge instead of HELs mainly due to the horror stories ive been reading online regards to the quality of the lines but regardless everything was under my budget by 10 folds! i am pumped to get all this on with the wheels and coils

so pretty much manage to score a deal overall!

i manage to find someone who made custom dashmats, looked okay i guess with the cutout of the holes for the vents where it should be. i will be cutting into the dash mat in the future so i can place my Carb gauge holders in but at this moment im just waiting on a fuel pressure regulator gauge from Defi and my A/F gauge. a good friend of mine who did the install for the car audio will be making a custom A pillar mount for my boost and A/F Gauge which i cant wait.

but so far only update i got until i have everything installed

[icebox]

not a major update,

but at this moment, hording all the parts until i can find some time to take it in to the workshop,

pretty much in the last 2 months i have managed to acquire the following:
4 x DBA T3 rotors front and rear
Initma SR pads front and rear
Goodridge brake lines
Girodisc front and rear shims

suspension wise:
Front and Rear Swaybars
Front and Rear Endlinks
Roll Centre Adjusters
Lateral Locks for Front and Rear
Spoon Ridge Collars



im just waiting for my Headlights to be sent off and get some tires for the wheels before i go and install everything with the Coils i got.