My 97' Daily Driven Civic Hatch

[ibjeepin95]

Well, I wouldn't call this a build, more like a car I drive everyday and do some cool stuff to sometimes. More or less, I'm just showing off. Some of you know I'm a Jeep guy, and EVERYONE knows if you wheel a Jeep, you don't want to DD it. So, in July of 2011 I found this hatch. 1997 CX, 5 speed, base model as can be, no PS, but has A/C, 200k miles, owned all it's life by a female school teacher who had all the maintenance done by a shop. UNPOSSIBLE! I didn't honestly think unmolested hatchbacks still existed, but I found one. I drove it and immediately forked over the $1500 she wanted for the car.

The day I brought it home.



And other than swapping in an EX cluster (kept the speedo in the center for correct mileage) it was the same 2 years later.



Then, this summer, I picked up an EG coupe on Si's to flip. I swapped the hatch wheels for the Si's, bought a nearly new set of 195's for the Si's for $150 and put them on.



I also ended up getting a a Thule roof rack to haul my mountain bikes...



And sometime I put a new front bumper on it and painted it myself. Some doosh hit my car while it was parked at the Warsaw deck and didn't bother to tell me. Luckily, they just tore up the bumper. Oh well, the new one looks better anyways.

Last weekend I finally installed some Eibach Pro Kit springs and it gave it a good stance. Yeah, it's not that low, but for daily driving it's perfect. Just got it aligned this morning. Don't think camber kits will be needed.



And that's about it at the moment. Changed the oil yesterday. Odometer reads 243,xxx and she still runs smooth as silk. More will come soon I'm sure. This Honda stuff seems fun and easier than the weld/cut/fab Jeep stuff. :lol:

[JPolen01]

Love EK hatches. Looks like you found a good one!

[ibjeepin95]

Love EK hatches. Looks like you found a good one!

Thanks! I've always wanted a Civic since high school, and I've always liked the EK coupes. But now that I got a hatch, I think I have grown to love them more lol.

[Mike]

very nice. wish i could convince my wife that a civic hatch is all we need right now.

[CaptainHenreh]

EK is best K.

[Jake]

Looks good, especially on those Si wheels!

[*insertusernamehere*]

Nice! The red ain't half bad and I usually don't like red cars.

[Senor_Taylor]

Exactly what I want! I'm looking for a civic when I have more money so I can DD it and not worry about wheeling my truck.

[ispoonwithmugen]

Nice EK man! Any future plans for it?

[ScottyB]

love the EK chassis and the nice simple mods. seeing a red one brings back some fun memories.

[ibjeepin95]

Thanks guys!

Nice EK man! Any future plans for it?

Yeah. I just threw some headlights in it that I picked up cheap from a guy locally. I buffed them up and they look damn near new. As far as how it looks, it might get a front lip and maybe window tint. I like to keep it simple.

Right now, the motor has 243,XXX, but it's real healthy. I need to check compression and do a leak down test just to see where it's at. It is a DD and it will remain one until I'm done with school. And now that I'm going to JMU (I pay for my school myself), money has tightened up some. With all this said, I want more power :mrgreen: . So, as long as I can pay for school, keep wheeling my XJ (got a few things I still want to do to it) all while saving a little money on the side, I'd like to rebuild another D16 for when this one gets weak and POSSIBLY boost it a little. Boost scares me a little for a DD, since that adds to the list of possible things to go wrong (and I'd be more tempted to flog it), but it could make some good power. We will see. I've been keeping an eye open for another D16 to start rebuilding, even though I'm basically broke. :mrgreen:

[JPolen01]

Turbo single slammers rule! Check out Bisimoto for some insane all motor and turbo builds. He's got a 1000hp turbo d16 wagovan that is absolutely bonkers.

[ibjeepin95]

Turbo single slammers rule! Check out Bisimoto for some insane all motor and turbo builds. He's got a 1000hp turbo d16 wagovan that is absolutely bonkers.

I'll check that out!

[CaptainHenreh]

Get Kaan to hook you up with one of his K2x boat anchors.

[JustinG]

Stick with NA and add a LSD. Done.

[D_Eclipse9916]

^^ Seriously... A clean K20/B18C swap will have 90% of the power of a boosted (if not more) without any complications, extra weight, annoying boost leaks, extra oil lines etc.

[Sully]

I found you a D16 and the best part, it comes with a car attached to it http://www.mmsports.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11049

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk

[Jeff]

I remember back in college I helped a co-worker at Circuit City toss a t3/t4 on one of these. Just a base 16v motor...it was a riot. He beat the shit out of that little car running it 7psi boost with stock internals. Burnouts everywhere he went. It had some sort of JDMABCUSDAATFLMNOP spec super awesome LSD transmission in it fresh of the slow boat from Japan. He called me after he hooked the oil and water lines up backwards and pumped the motor full of sludge. I came out to his place and got the lines right, flushed the oil and cooling systems for hours and got the car running. Lots of fun!

[ibjeepin95]

So, my car hasn't hardly changes since the last update, but it may be soon. I'm really just looking for opinions. I can get this B18B1 (LS), an LS trans, and a "stage 3" clutch for around 400. The motor supposedly has different internals. All I know is that it is unbelievably clean under the valve cover. These motors are low compression and apparently love boost. Any Honda guys out there that can give me some insight?

[ibjeepin95]

I should also mention the stock d16y7 has 258k miles, and although healthy, I want mo' power.