Civic #6 - EK4

[nobbs]

Hey guys,

At the suggestion of Mr. Bossman (Felix), I thought i'd start a thread on my most recent Honda endeavor.

2 weeks ago I picked up the below EK4... It's a little bunky but I picked it up dirt cheap.

Will ad more context to this story soon, but for now, i'll just post a quick pic off the for sale ad.

[dr1ftaX]

in

[eeko]

In x2

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[felixR]

Thanks for sharing Alex! Looking forward to your magic.

in

Wow haha.

[nobbs]

Got some time now so will update a bit.

Basically I've been into Honda's for the past 13 or so years, picking up my first EK GLI Civic in 2003. Since then it has been an all Honda affair for me apart from a couple of years when I jumped into the Evo camp.



I've been through 1x EK1, 2x EM1, 1x EG sedan, 1x Jazz and this is now my second EK4.

Most recently though I had a silver EM1. It was bought stock and modded to my liking over the 3 or so years I owned it.



My plan was to keep it forever and pass it on to my kids at some stage however, in October last year my wife got an offer to study medicine in Perth (we've always lived in Sydney) and we started making plans to move. The EM1 was always part of our moving plans however, after posting an EOI, I got an offer for it I couldn't refuse at the last minute. I sold it in almost stock form so put most of my goodies into storage as I made plans to buy another Civic out here in Perth at some stage.

More soon.

[Shakeel]

Hello Alex!

[Toddxxx]

Was gunning the other day that there was a lot of pictures from Perth on your Instagram haha
Now I know why. Big move.

[nobbs]

Hello Alex!

Yo!

Was gunning the other day that there was a lot of pictures from Perth on your Instagram haha
Now I know why. Big move.

Yeah man; it's only for the duration of her studies. Don't think I can be here forever lol... I'm back and forth to Sydney every few weeks for work at the moment though.

A little more on the purchase. As I didn't bring the EM1 over from Sydney, I sent my stock 03 Jazz Vti-S over instead as we were going to need a car here from the get go. Even before landing here I had my eyes peeled on the local Gumtree/Carsales/Honda FB pages looking for the next ride. Finding a Honda here is so difficult let alone finding a decent one. After 4 months of almost nothing, this black EK4 popped up in April; I talked to the owner and made plans to buy it however, he decided to sell it to a local whilst I was on a trip to Sydney as I was hesitant to put a deposit down without inspecting it. I gave up after this and decided to invest some cash in other things which depleted the car funds slightly and I reverted to making a project out of the Jazz (which was tidied up to mint condition since we got here). Now, the Jazz is a cool car however, I have always loved driving a B series. They just drive so nice even though they aren't the fastest car out there; the itch remained to buy a civic. With my wife reverting to full time study (no work), play money for cars is a lot more sparse these days but as fate may have it, this same black EK4 popped up again 3 months later and there was a glimmer of hope as it was stupid cheap. After contacting the owner he advised it was for sale as he no longer needed it; coming from an Aristo, he wanted to try something new with the civic but it just wasn't for him. After an inspection and some negotiations, I was driving home in this 1998 Honda Civic Vti-R; I was home again!

The car overall needed/needs some good TLC and is really going to be a long term project however, the body is straight, and the engine is healthy. I mentioned that I wanted a car I could keep forever and could share later on in life as my family grows, I think this is the keeper. I also mentioned before that I had parts stored away from my EM1 which I will get onto later. I had also started buying any rare'ish civic parts over the past 7 months in lieu of buying another civic.

The main goal of this car at the moment is a semi-resto project... Many who know me would know that I'm a very pedantic owner I want to get the car as mint as possible with some subtle mods.

Here's a couple of more pics from the for sale ad.







The car came with some goodies as below:
Simota Intake
Apexi N1 muffler with custom B-Pipe
Tein Street Flex Coilovers (from an accord! more on this later...)
Replica ITR gearknob
Old as heck Pioneer HU
'Performance Alloy' wheels

And... also some issues as below:
Some oil leaks
Rear engine mount
ABS light is on
Whining noise from engine (near belts)
Standard Perth roof paint fade

More soon as I haven't taken detailed pics of the progress to date...

[nobbs]

So as soon as I got the car home, I started making it my own.

First thing to deal with was the loud whining/whirring nose. Hanny's were my go to guys in Sydney however, now in Perth, I've had to find someone to take my car to for things which are beyond my skill level. I found the right guy and booked in some time with him.

Long story short, it was worn bearing in the air conditioning compressor pulley that was the culprit. We replaced it with a new one and the noise was goooooooone.

The car was recently serviced before my purchase from a local workshop. It's had oil, filter, gearbox oil, new spark plugs, new Ferodo pads all round and new DBA rotors on the front done within 2 months before me purchasing it.

In anticipation for another civic, I kept my eyes peeled for some decent 4x100 wheels since I arrived in Perth. I wanted nothing over the top but, a decent size and definitely had to be JDM branded. Enter my Wedssports TC05; they popped up for sale back in March and I jumped on them for a measly $375 however, knowing that they would need some love.

Wedssport TC05 15x7 +36 4x100



I gave them a quick sand.



As you can see, these are some old wheels and have seen their fair share of colors lol... I sent them to the wheel repairers to straighten out any kinks in the wheels and they were also sand blasted and powder coated. I went with a silver metallic color over the gloss white as I wanted a less 'boy racer' look.

The below was the result.



I picked up some Mugen lug nuts locally.



And... got some custom hub rings and mated them to my civic. The civic came with some almost new Toyo tyres so I just threw them onto the wheels, 195/55R15. Once they're worn i'll move onto some 205/50R15's.

[nobbs]

I had some left over parts from my EM1 which I held onto and some were already in Perth with me. Namely a Spoon kevlar intake arm with K&N panel filter, Spoon Duracon knob, OEM amber side markers, 270mm Broadway mirror and an EK9 drivers air vent/coin pocket (which cant hold any coins lol...). They were fitted promptly.





I gave the car a full detail (by hand) to get it into the best condition I could and I just enjoyed driving it.

A couple of days later, I took a work trip to Sydney and during this time I gathered all my stored parts I had laying around and brought them back with me.

This consisted of:
OEM SiR front lip
OEM window visors
Random bolts and clips I have collected over the years which always come in handy

Also on this trip I picked up some goodies off some mates:
OEM EK9 grille
OEM EK4 floor mats
OEM headlights (mint condition ones)
EK4 parcel shelf (mine was missing it)
Rear mudlaps
Pioneer bluetooth head unit

I lugged them all back to Perth with me.



I still have some Recaro SR3's and modified DC2R rails in storage in Sydney which were also in my EM1; I may or may not bring them over. Ignore the Jazz headlights, they were for the Mrs car.



Now you might ask, why all the effort to bring parts from one side of the country to the other? well... Perth's Honda scene is tiny, and its hard to find parts here! and if you do, they are no where near as cheap as in Sydney.

The day after returning, I set to fitting as many of my new goodies as possible and by the end of the day, the result was as below. Much better.









Note: I also sanded and painted the window sill strips and front wipers to matte black as the chrome was all showing.

[nobbs]

My plan for this car was not to have a slammed ride height but, it did need some more low. As this car came fitted with Teins, I thought I would just wind them down to get it closer to my desired height. When I bought the car however, the coilovers seemed odd to me as there was very little thread left to lower the car and the car was almost standard height. Also, there was some suspicious welding near base of the rear coilovers. After further inspection with my mechanic, it was noticed that the part number on these coilovers were for an Accord CL1..... Yep, someone had modded these to fit the civic. The CL1 coilovers have much longer shocks and thus, these coilovers where already at their lowest setting!

Pics of Teins once I took them out


Mysterious rear welding is obvious here


I started my search for some replacements. As the budget is tight, I was on the hunt for some used items. Not long after, a set of Buddy Club N+ came up for sale locally for a steal and they were mine.



I proceeded to fit them up asap and the result was as below... After/Before



The window tint was the original tint fitted from the dealer when the car was sold and the back window was bubbling pretty bad. I've always loved the look of dark cars with no tint so... the next step was to remove the tint which I got a local guy from Gumtree to do.

All done...



BTW, would have loved to take more progress pics but, I keep forgetting to take them because I'm too caught up in the moment lol...

[nobbs]

It's been raining a lot over in Perth over the last couple of months and I noticed a boot leak; a common issue with these cars is that the tail light gaskets tend to become brittle and allow water into the boot. I ordered some new items off Gaijin Garage and proceeded to fit them. When I removed the old gaskets they were all cracked and one of them was almost missing.



As the tail lights were out, I decided to do a DIY EK9 mod to them. I wired them up to light up the same as the Honda items (i.e all 4 light up when lights are on and only the top 2 lights come on when the brake is pressed).





You'll notice I changed my plates too, my front one looked like it was bent pretty bad at some stage and they straightened it out; this bugged me, so I got new replacements. I'll get some custom plates eventually. Also, I did the DIY rear wiper delete mod too and replaced the gold 'H' badge with a silver one. Also, I visited the local Honda wrecker to pick up an OEM jack and tools as the car was missing them when I purchased it.



I recently acquired a new rear bumper which was already in the original color; I picked it up for a steal ($20) and replaced it as my current bumper had some decent fade on the top edge.

Faded bar


Non faded bar

[nobbs]

I'm very happy with how the car sits at the moment; my mechanic is only available on Saturdays to do private work and has been busy recently as he just got married about a month back so, I've just been babying the car until he has some free time for us to sort out the mechanical things that require attention.

I have purchased some Wedssport decals for my wheels which have arrived a few days back, I'll get to fitting them soon. I also just purchased a genuine Spoon wing but it's in Sydney; ill bring it back on my next visit in a few weeks.

There was a nice sunset just the other day so I took my DSLR out and snapped some pics of the car; and with that, this thread is now up to date!

[Toddxxx]

cars looking nice man!

[eeko]

Love it al keep it up senpai

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