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Hi Ben, The calipers in the photo are for the 260mm front brakes, not the larger 280mm front brakes. Manufacturer caliper numbers for the larger calipers are LCA333 & RCA333. You can use eBay to get the oem numbers from them. Basically the calipers are the same for the mg zs180, mg zr160 & accord of that era, but the carriers differ i believe (ive not checked any fit on an mb other than a zs). I can confirm that the calipers and carriers from the zs180 will fit onto a mb2 4x100 as thats what I'm currently running! If youre upgrading the brakes you'll need to change the master cylinder and prop valve if you don't have abs for it to work properly. My setup is: Honda Civic MB6 brake master cylinder Honda Civic MB6 brake servo Honda 40/40 brake prop valve (46210-S5A-912) Wezmoto Braided front and rear brake lines (700mm front / 560mm rear) MG ZS 180 Front & Rear brake calipers MG ZS 180 Front & Rear brake discs Cheers, Dan

A rather inebriated looking K24A showed up this morning But it has the RBB markings on the head which is what matters - meaning it is the "full fat" version with 3-lobe VTEC and ~200hp. There is a similar looking version with 160hp and only 2 cam lobes so you have to be careful! Hopefully get that mounted up onto an engine stand at some point and take a closer look inside but so far so good. For peace of mind i'm going to give it a compression test and have a peek into the cylinders with a scope before going any further.

Hi mate. There is some mystery over the actual numbers of each VTiS model made. The logbook should have made it easy to identify a genuine one, but unfortunately even that is a minefield as Honda dealerships made mistakes with them when registering the car with the UK DVLA. Some have VTiS on the logbook, some just state model as VTi. The only parts that were unique to the VTiS were drivers side floor mat which had the VTiS logo on it (the other 3 mats were just standard) the gear knob (alloy and engraved in the early VTiS, silver plastic/black leather with "VTiS" in black on it for the post 1997 ones) and the alloys (again, these differed so early ones got 15" Speedline Chronos wheels, later ones got the same as the ones in your photos which are 15" Speedline "fans"). The body kit was available in the accessory catalogue, but was standard on the VTiS. The "mid spoiler" on the aerodeck was also an accessory option. The other thing that marked out the VTiS was the pirates black paint. All VTiS came in pirates black only, so any you see that don't have pirates black are 100% not a genuine VTiS. The Aerodeck ones are a lot rarer as most were the mb6 5 door hatch. Hope this helps a little.

Hello to all of you, First time posting on the forum, kinda wanted to share a bit about my mb2 since i first came to find some knowledge about these mb chassis. It's my first car, family owned since new and it's getting to the 100k km mark, and in my two years of driving and enjoying the car i can say it's a great car and frankly very underrated and deserves a lot more recognition The car has nothing major done to it, it's mostly stock aside from some small cosmetics. The mods are: Front mudflaps out of a junkyard pirate black mb2 1DIN android auto radio Reuphostered steering wheel Rear spoiler out of a Rover I have many plans for it later but most of em are cosmetics and i won't bother to modify a D14, maybe just a intake at best since the oem one is plastic. It's getting lowered and i want it to ride on some ek4 vti rims, or civic jordan rims and vti lip is also in the list Cheer, Costa.

Its been a long time since the last update. So yeah of course it is fully wrapped now by myself and lowered even more. Looks pretty good but for sure sometime in the future I might paint it (I'm currently doing car painting education) plans for the future: Turbo... I found a cheap kit on marketplace and then I'm gonna try and make a reliable stock internal setup, so not that high boost

Looking good if I do say so myself! Headlights definitely letting the side down, need a good polish and coating.

Smaller power steering pulley (hopefully it will clear the bonnet without hacking any big holes in it) and 10% underdrive alternator pulley fitted As we've deleted the AC the factory belt was much too long (think it was something like 7pk1735 from memory). Managed to find a belt that will fit (7PK1400) - it seems ok but apparently there is a mark on the tensioner that you can check - i'll do this next time im with the car to confirm but seems like the right size. Engine mounts ordered - I went for Innovative Mounts for a Civic EG as the price for Hasport mounts in the UK is insane (£700+!) and I wanted to avoid ebay china copied junk on this project...

Thanks for the update on the fogs - I managed to get a set of good condition blanking plates so i've removed the fairly rotten big fogs for now but I may reinstate them later. Left the connectors tied up behind. A bit more progress on the K-swap side of things: Drilled a couple of holes in the firewall just under the heater outlet to allow for the shifter cables to pass through (no photo, oops) Got hold of a billet shifter plate designed for an EG but it was sitting too proud of the tunnel so drilled out the fasteners for the shifter base plate and removed it DC5 shifter mocked up - was worried that it would be too close to the dashboard but it seems to just about be ok - the shifter box came with a short shifter already fitted which should help things Clutch and flywheel test fit - just waiting for various missing bolts to arrive from Japan before buttoning it all up. Toyed with the idea of getting an uprated clutch but we've gone with Exedy OEM EP3 clutch for now as it's many times cheaper than an uprated one (£126 vs ~£400) and I reckon it'll be OK for NA power levels. Any future plans to boost the car would require an LSD as well as a clutch upgrade anyway! Flywheel is a Competition Clutch 3.9kg

Thank you for the warm welcome both I am basically following guides for an EG K-swap as the car seems to be almost identical as far as a K swap is concerned. Even the EG conversion harness (to connect the new engine loom to the existing car loom) appears to work for the MB. Spent a day on the car today and progress as follows: Bye bye D14! Some areas of surface rust in the engine bay that we'll go over with a flap wheel and spraypaint over just to stop it getting any worse but not found anything that needs any welding etc so that's good news Made a bit of a mess knocking out the leftmost engine mount bracket (required to install the EGK2 Hasport mounts). Drilled all the spot welds out but it still wasn't budging so ended up going in behind it with a hammer and chisel and it eventually came off - the chassis has suffered a few battle scars but nothing a bit of sanding and paint can't cure! I've agreed to buy an EP3 civic gearbox so now that the gearbox has been chosen the next job I think will be to get hold of a shifter from an Integra DC5 and get that mounted in the car and get the shifter cables fed through to the engine bay and the shifter mounted. If i'd gone for an FN2 or accord gearbox I would've needed an accord shifter as the pattern is reversed. And finally my first mod! A set of clear indicators, I believe they were from an accord - I had to file off a small tab on the casing to get them to fit the connector was a direct swap so that's a good result

Progress so far Started to strip out the engine - radiator (probably leaking) and AC condenser (also probably leaking) removed: Painting the rear bumper - to cover various marks and scratches but also somewhat of an experiment to see what it looks like with rubber strips colour coded (from photos i've seen I think it will look better) I've started putting together a list of parts that i'd like to acquire (the amount of small parts you need for a K-swap is crazy. It's all bolt on but you definitely need a spreadsheet or similar to manage it!)

It almost seems old fashioned to create a build thread these days on the age of social media (one of the worst things that happened to the car community is the 2382834 facebook groups full of scammers and people asking the same questions over and over - but thats a rant for another day). I always find they are a great thing to do, if for nothing else for my own benefit to remember what I did previously 🙃 also found lots of great gems of info already on this forum - and more to discover im sure A bit of backstory - I've been bitten by the Honda bug after buying a 2010 Honda Accord with a K24Z engine - I'd originally intended to get something as a cheaper, ULEZ compliant run-around (I don't live anywhere near a ULEZ but sometimes have to drive into them for work) after getting bored with a non-ULEZ diesel Mercedes that i'd owned previously. I then discovered the scene for those cars, and good they look with the right modifications. I love it to bits but it's heavy, and the modifications you can do are somewhat limited by it having the less desirable R40 head on the engine and the rarity of 2.4 petrol, manual examples in the UK. Most buyers bought a diesel version (it was peak era of buyers being encouraged by the government to buy a diesel - how the tables have turned). I only know of a handful of others in existence and even fewer are modified. They are popular in the USA so some tuning parts are available over there but it often results in expensive shipping, import duties and long waits for things to arrive, and no chance to get anything second hand as most sellers aren't willing to ship internationally. Me and my father in law have been looking for a project to do together for a while as we've reached the end with most of our other projects (mostly just repairs and upgrades to our other cars) - initially I thought maybe a restoration project but we went to a car show recently and saw lots of cool JDM cars and thought that it might be an idea to do something along those lines. I have always been interested in a K-swap of sorts anyway and as I know quite a lot about Hondas and K-series engines from modifying my accord a plan was formed.. Initially I started looking at the usual suspects for a K-swap like an EG, EK, etc but we missed the boat on getting one for a good price and even rotten examples are changing hands for more than £2000 now, so I started digging into more unusual choices. After speaking to an acquaintance he mentioned to me that the MB civic might be a good place to look as it shares a lot of parts with Civic EG and Integra DC2, two now (to me at least) unaffordable cars but with great aftermarket support. I also looked at a few more leftfield choices like a really high mileage Honda CR-Z (came to the conclusion the subframe was rotten) and a Honda logo (too much fabrication). The MB/MC seems to be the last affordable 90s Honda, so it was now or never. I found a low mileage MB2 for sale. It was a 1.4i model, completely base spec, but that didn't matter for our purposes. In fact, I was quite interested because it didn't have a sunroof, and I've had nothing but grief with sunroofs in the past letting in water and making the car smell like an "old man's ball sack" (as my fiancée succinctly put it), and the low spec didn't really matter anyway for what we were going to do. Because of the low mileage (56,000) and original looking condition, including what I believe to be original dealer plates and stickers, I thought this could be a promising lead on a shell. It's very late for an MB2 - March 2001 on a Y plate - I've seen EP/EU civics rolling about on older W and X plates so they must've been sold at the same time - it would've looked and felt incredibly dated by comparison I imagine! The pictures weren't great as they were clearly from an auction (you know the ones I mean with the car photoshopped badly onto a showroom backdrop) I arranged with the seller dealer to go and see the car (near Bradford by the way - the stereotypes are alive and well) and when we arrived I was told the car wasn't available as there was "a problem with it" and it was parked at his house (undoubtedly this is why it was auction in the first place). Whilst being annoyed at him, I explained that we wanted to buy the car as a shell anyway and asked what was wrong - some kind of overheating issue - so we went around the corner to have a look at it on a driveway. The car looked fine although very dirty, and the sills/bodywork etc seemed to be solid other than normal age related surface rust and mileage genuine as the seats look almost new. The bodywork was unfortunately a bit tatty with various dubious repairs and perished rubbers but it's to be expected for the price/age. I took it for a quick test drive - which was a particular highlight as the prospective seller lit up a cigarette while I was driving around - without asking permission might I add - but other than the rising temperature everything seemed fine, so we agreed a price - so I drove it to the nearest petrol station, bought a bottle of radiator sealant (it seemed to be losing coolant) and poured that in, along with some water, and then drove it 1 hour home with the windows open and heater blowers on full to try to make sure I didn't break down on the M1. The car made it back fine although the temperature was climbing when stopped in traffic, it went down again when on the move. Here's the only picture I have of it at the moment: The current plan is basically to do a K-swap with a K24A with mild upgrades (K20 oil pump, 50 degree VTC), and an EP3 civic gearbox. We would love to build a boosted car eventually, but lets get the basics done first. As it's a heavier (by 90s standards) car and K24s are much cheaper these days, it seemed a better choice than a K20. In terms of styling i'm not really sure at the moment - probably try to keep it OEM+ for sleeper factor although not full sleeper - the wheels will definitely need to get changed as it's currently running 175 wide 14" tyres, budget brand that were getting on 10 years old (can confirm - they have no grip whatsoever). Watch this space 👀

Hey everybody, glad I could be a part of the forums now, I'd like to show you a couple pictures of my new to me MB8, it has some really nice OEM goodies too, like the wind deflectors and metal plates door sills. This is hopefully going to be a build thread for this car as I buy more stuff for it and upgrade it in the future. Hopefully you guys like it!

Got the grille fitted to the car, that was the easy bit as the rest of the day turned into a bit of a nightmare! Could probably do with painting the metal behind black (its not quite as obvious in real life) but other than that im happy with it for a DIY job We then tried to swap in the MG ZS 180 steering rack that I bought... what a pig of a job Once we've eventually wrestled it into place after removing engine mount and subframe bolts, we found it didnt fit because these pipes are shaped differently, meaning it fouls on the engine mount bracket (the factory MB one so I can't even blame this on it being a k swap!) MB pipe: So I had to remove the rack from the car again and then remove the pipes from the MB rack and swap them to the ZS one. I've never seen that mentioned before but it's worth knowing if you are attempting this... Didn't get as much done as i'd like but onwards and upwards

Nice car, factory wind deflectors are always a good choice I spent far too much money getting some JDM ones for my accord !

Hi, realise I've been a bit of a stranger here lately. Apologies. Hope the team is good, Glad to see still going strong. Thaught id pop in as been tinkering again. History repeating I suppose. This time gone for an ep3 and made a fast road car/semi track car. Baught late 2024 from Southampton. Got it back and realised it was originally from my local honda dealer. So it came home really. Complete Stock car well used but with plenty of history, not the best example but far from a nail. In the last 12 months. Ive done lots of bits. From tidying underside underside. Rebushed. Rebuilt rack. Powder coated arms. New everything really. New timing chain etc. Rebuilt the gearbox. Added lsd. Then started prepping for turbo. Quite a bit of work to do on these to make room for the setup as there's looms and lines everywhere on the bulkhead. Anyway lots of custom bits and 3d printed stuff later. And I won't say it's complete. Cus they never are. But it's a pretty wild little car now. Lots of fun.

I clear them regularly because I have tin foil hat. So shouldn't be an issue. Merry Xmas anyway.

Know what you mean about the weather. In theory winter's the perfect time to get sone jobs done cos the deck is off the road, but got zero motivation to do anything in the cold / wet / dark. @Dave any idea why Jake can't post pics?

Yeah, was gutted! Still no idea what it was, but got the parts now to fix her so will probably look at getting them fitted over the Christmas break.

Cheers mate. Not exactly mint. But it's tidy enough. Bit over mint. Although I do try do decent work on em

I don't have it to hand but I will check the car next time I am with it and let you know (it's not parked at my house unfortunately) - probably at the weekend If it helps there are some results for the rover part number (RGD10001) on autodoc RGD10-001 A.B.S., ASHIKA | RGD10001 in AUTODOC

Cheers - thats what we ended up doing in the end and it worked, The pedal has a lot of free play at the top so I need to adjust the pushrod and the bump stopper thing at the top, will tackle that next time

Just took a rather nerve racking first proper drive of around 15 miles to a local stainless exhaust fabrication place before work. I've left the car with them as I really didn't fancy driving any further with the noise level/fumes but I should get it back next week! I've asked them to make up a 3 inch exhaust, with a high flow cat, centre res and back box. I want the least restriction but I don't want the noise level to be too crazy and get kicked off a track day so we'll see what they come up with. Its definitely overkill for NA but we might boost it once day so it would be "future proofed" for that. Car for the most part drives fine - the only things I've noticed so far: - The steering is a bit off centre - it could be just the boss isn't on right but I think it probably just needs an alignment as we've had the front suspension apart several times to fit driveshafts, coilovers etc. The power steering is working perfectly though which was a big goal of mine as most people delete the PS on these kind of swaps but it's not pleasant to live with off the track. - The throttle is a bit "sticky". Sometimes it idles at 1200rpm and then if you pull the pedal up with your foot it settles down. I have tried to adjust it once before to no avail and I've checked the TPS is calibrated properly. It may need a new throttle cable as im using the 25 year old original one. - Just as I was pulling into the exhaust place the car started to run really badly and stumble. I turned it off and back on then it was fine. I did notice on my laptop that it is running very rich - I am hoping it's just over fuelling due to the o2 sensor being almost certainly too close to the end of the pipe (its just before the flexi and there's no exhaust after that point). I'll not worry too much about this until there's an exhaust fitted! - The front end feels a tiny bit loose but ive not driven the car enough really to comment fully. We haven't adjusted any of the suspension or changed any worn bushes etc at the front so I will reserve judgement until thats all done. But honestly, for a first proper drive it didnt go badly at all. No fluids leaked out or parts fell off!! Did get a few odd looks as frankly the car sounds ridiculous but that will be all sorted soon enough... My father in law followed in his car with a bunch of tools and a jack in the boot but luckily we didnt have to do any roadside repairs.

Spot on. I'm sure these cars look better the older they get 😎

Cheers mate, yeah so far its a blast, so flat and planted. I haven't had a chance to take it for a proper drive yet though. Need to get the Alignment sorted, so pondering getting some adjustable camber/toe arms for the rear first. Thank you mate, they're 15" 7J ET35, 195 50 15. I had issues at the front with this height when I had 15 6J ET45 as it rubbed the inner arches. So far no rubbing but I haven't been pushing it. It used to rub slow speed stuff when turning and bumps. I should have room to lower the rear also. Yeah I kinda loathe spending the money on the press buts its been invaluable. I remember doing one of the front arm bushes and thinking there's no way in hell I would've been able to do it any other way haha. Should pay for itself the first wheel bearing job. Yes mate, I did a quick write up of what I did here Ill grab some more photos soon to explain it better. Im intrigued about the bonfire hahaha

Bought a set of (very) budget semi-slick tyres "Accelera 651 Sport Xtra" from a company called Tire Streets that i'd seen advertised on various youtube channels. I don't have particularly high expectations as they were extremely cheap (£280 for a set of 4) but according to various internet comments/reviews they seem to be reasonable. I can always upgrade them in the future if needs be. The rubber seems soft which is a good start for a track tyre. Normally I don't like to order tyres separately to fitting (as usually the fitting cost removes any savings) but I couldnt find anything suitable supplied and fitted so I paid the local tyre place £15 a tyre for fitting and balancing which seemed reasonable. Look forward to getting them on the car soon... Finally got around to finishing restoring an MG ZS 180 rear anti roll bar I picked up from a friend a few months back. It was in pretty sorry condition but it seems like they are not sold new any more. Fortunately, you can still buy drop links, poly bushes, and all the bolts so it was just a case of stripping it down, removing the rust, painting it and replacing as much of the hardware as possible. The bushes were a real pain to install without a press but after a lot of farting around in the vice I got there eventually... For reference here's how it looked before (!)

Met a lovely lady at the phycopath horror amusement park tonight in newcastle, told me to post in here as she loved the car

Another thing to check is what type the buttons are. Some use voltage signals to operate lathing think that is probably for newer cars. Thinking you'll probably need the complete harness from the clock spring/spool to whereever it goes behind the dash. If you're just planning on fitting the ones for volume, then just terminating the other ones should in theory be fine as they won't be used. You'll also need the harness from the wheel to the radio as it will have some form of connector on it for the radio. Without seeing it, im guessing it will have a female 2.5mm or 3.5mm jack plug socket. Or possibly a male jack plug of the size mentioned above. Have a look in the integra forums (not the FB groups as the info in them is limited and sometimes incorrect!) for folk who are doing radio upgrades/double din conversions on their integra's. I think you'll be looking at getting these from America though as never seen any UK spec ones with those buttons fitted.

So are you looking to replace the steering wheel with one that has cruise control switches? Assuming that the steering wheel fitment on the ma9 is the same as the MB/MC one, then you're looking at wheels with the same fitment as eg/dc2. I'm fairly sure that ek and accord shared the same wheel, but it's a different fitting to ours. EDIT... Just realised that it looks like the cruise control buttons are an add on to the steering wheel. It might be worth exploring parts diagrams like on Honda parts uk to see what optional extras might have been available and get some parts numbers to help your search. If, as the first post suggests, the US integra had it as an option, then the cable fell from that could be compatible - in which case have a spy at acura parts websites in the US for parts diagrams

Yeah fingers crossed I'll get to have a quick spin in it, the plan is once the wheels and tyres are on, better front brakes fitted, and a few other small bits are sorted I can take it for an exhaust at least as somewhat of a test drive. Hoping to avoid the cost of getting it delivered there as we don't have a suitable tow car unfortunately. The car came with 12 months MOT when I bought it so we have a bit of time.. technically I am sure it's not valid any more as no exhaust is a fail but just to avoid getting in trouble (hopefully)... that is the next priority item as starting the car up is really antisocial at the moment for the neighbours! The car does run and drive but I've literally only been up and down the driveway in it so far 😂 but nothing flew off/leaked out of it yet so that's good progress... It still needs a proper map on the ECU and there's still a whole bunch of other work to do on the suspension and then safety gear inside (half cage, seats, harnesses, etc) but we can sort that over the winter and be fully ready for a show/track day in spring. To be honest that is all fairly straightforward fitment wise and more about saving up the money to buy everything than actually fitting it that will take time!

Been chipping away at jobs the last few weeks and should be ready to drive soon. Everything in the engine bay should be done now - had a quick tidy up any loose pipes/wires and made sure everything was bolted down securely. It's not a super tucked show car but I think it's neat and tidy enough for the type of build that it is. Plus everything is easily accessible for servicing! Fitted a small washer fluid bottle - £10 from Amazon so it's a bit cheap and cheerful but it connected straight onto the factory washer pump connector and lines! Removed the rear washer pipe as we've already removed the rear wiper. The Hybrid Racing cold air intake bolts into where the factory washer bottle sits so it had to go. Picked up a set of Enkei RP01 (15x7 ET35) wheels for a reasonable price (about the same as i'd pay for a set of Rotas or similar). Will get some tyres on them this week and see how they look on the car. The main thing is they fit fine over the MG ZS front callipers with plenty of room to spare. I wasn't sure they would initially as the ZS came on 16s, although admittedly with much less offset. They've been rattle canned by the previous owner but honestly he (or she) has really not done a bad job at all. Initially I was looking to change the colour but for now they will do as is, for now I'd rather spend money on getting the car working than cosmetics!

That E10 is absolute dog turd.. Only e5 goes in ours, especially after it ruined the injectors in Karen's accord. It's like a double bonus of super unleaded in top of not being E10 👌

Moving to Kelso in the borders mate, it's about 20 odd mile from here, nit too far but further into the borders. Closer to your direction lol. The village has been fine but the land with this house is too much to maintain, so bought a lovely detached bungalow with garage and a lot smaller garden. Will give us a lot more free time, and Kelso is our favourite borders town. Plenty to do there, plus it gets its fair share of classic car shows too along at the events ground. Win win!

Thanks, it's an alpine unit so even though it's new I think it fits with the 90s-ish vibe of the car. It's no doubt the brand I would've gone for if I had the money back in the day haha. It has RGB lighting so I can change it to march the dash which is nice (I'm being picky but I don't like it when the colours don't match!) The car came with a pretty retro looking JVC CD player but only 1 channel was working for some reason and it had a really shoddy aftermarket Bluetooth kit (calls only) with wires bodged in all over the place so I thought it was best to bin it all and fit something new I did consider not bothering with a head unit but even though the build leans towards track car, I've been in cars which are totally stripped before and whilst you might be able to get an extra 20kg out by removing the heater, stereo, half the dash, etc, it makes the car unusable for anything other than trailering really Yes he basically said he managed to get it all down the side by sticking a pair of long noise pliers through the popped out hazard switch and holding the cables out of the way of the head unit I've stripped everything from the front seats back and deleted the air con (it was broken anyway) so I'm not even sure I'll be able to hear the radio over the rattling but that's about the extent of the weight reduction for now. It should be a lightweight chassis anyway as it doesn't have a sunroof or other luxury features 😂

Hi all, So I can confirm aftermarket seats, without cutting frames or welding mounts to car, are completely possible. If you have read my before method with the universal frames this way is a lot easier and more cost effective. After 3 months of research I found a company called Planted Technology, they produced made to order seat sub frames for many cars. I emailed them to ensure my car was not an EK or an EG. I measured up the cars holes and got back the details of the closest fit frames they make. The Honda Accord 4th & 5th gen have the same interior as the MB3/MB6. I took a risk bought the frames and they do in fact directly fit. I admit it was a bit of a fiddle as they had to come from America so may have been slightly warped or bent on delivery, never the less I got them in as seen in the image below Here is a link to the main page, it would better off ordering them from GSM performance Planted Technology https://www.plantedtechnology.com/products/planted-seat-bracket-honda-accord-4th-5th-generation-1989-1997-passenger-right GSM performance https://www.sportseats4u.co.uk/product/planted-honda-accord-bracket/ Things to consider, these frames do not come with threads. M12 Nuts will be needed to fit seatbelts, M8 Nuts and bolts to fit seats to rails or frames, washers highly recommended

Thank you very much for confirming this and your post - makes my car build a lot easier as I was expecting to have to modify the stock seat structure (which in itself is a problem because my passenger seat was accidentally disposed of - best not to ask)

Got this photo from my father in law this morning that he got the head unit in in about 5 mins on the first try, always the way 🙃

More progress MB6 dash installed and MB6 cluster fitted Modified the centre console slightly (basically just removing the tray in front of the gear stick) to accommodate the shifter box Cut a hole in the back of the glovebox and mounted the ECU inside Installed a steering wheel boss and OMP 300mm wheel Unfortunately I wasted a couple of hours trying to get the head unit to fit in the dash as I was struggling with all the spiders web of cables behind so I couldn't get it rolling today 🥲 but it's a marathon not a sprint!

Spent the bank holiday installing the new timing chain/guides/tensioner, service manual print outs in hand and triple checking everything. All sealed up now, should be able to get the engine back in next weekend, all being well. Chain that was on was stretched - not by as much as some i've seen but the main difference I noticed is the chain tensioner was quite far extended whereas the new one is much less extended, maybe it couldn't take up the slack or something jumped on first start. Anyway, hopefully this is all sorted now. Also changed the crank pulley seal as I don't ever want to be going in there again!

After nearly a month delay with far too many emails back and forth we finally got hold of the replacement engine mount bracket from Innovative Mounts and the engine is now finally bolted in! Got a few other bits fitted after this photo like the radiator, hoses, and fan, and then started to work on some of the plumbing like the clutch line. Getting exciting now - to be continued!

thanks Simon 👍 yes looking at the rubber parts, found the parts for the top e.g. Items 9 & 6 , struggling with the bump stop ATM, Item 11, PN 51722-st3-e01.

Quick photo from last night. Looking forward to the suspension refresh and getting this thing slammed. Other news - carpet and some dash trim is out ready for welding.

Some of the rear seat configurations The middle row also flip round to face backwards.. Pretty clever setup 😎

You can't really tell from the pics how grotty the interior is/was, but it's starting to come up nice. Used some leather cleaner on the seats yesterday and the filth that came off them was amazing. Still need another go and conditioning, but well impressed with how well they've come up. Not sure what to do about the bumper yet, as it's pretty bad with a big section missing... Tempted to go dial it back a bit with the bumper, but it does look cool on the import photos

Well, the tourer is no more, a nice chap from Wales bought it, and it's either going to be saved to tow his race eg, or end up as an engine donor for it. Karen's got herself a nice blue R18 fk civic, but it's not any good for family adventures. So we've just got a new project...

Can confirm these are direct replacement to the existing big fogs. You might need to swap the plug over however. If I remember correctly the front seal wasn't great so I used a big o-ring between the glass and the front screw on cap piece to keep the water out

Yes definitely! Focus at the moment is building up the engine ready to go into the car. I've got most of the things sorted that need/are easier to go into the car before the engine is in place, e.g. the shifter box, shifter cables and the power steering hoses (it's a real pain to reach the bottom of the PS rack with the engine in!) ready to go now I haven't got any engine mounts sorted yet but im hoping that some genuine Civic EG hasport ones come up for sale used at some point. They're incredibly expensive new (£750!) so I can see why people are tempted by chinese knock offs you can get on ebay, but personally I won't do that. You can get an alternative from Innovative Mounts for about £400 or so, but I dont need to order yet until i'm ready. A lot of these parts, its worth biding your time and seeing what comes up for sale on marketplace, ebay etc rather than getting things new as usually the price is high because it's come from the USA generally and import duties etc are rolled into the price. I've also managed to purchase a VTI-S front lip and side skirts from a car being broken, along with some door mouldings that were in better condition than ours which are all cracked and horrible (the ones right under the window on the top of the outside of the door). They seem to not be available new, i've tried both Honda and Rover part numbers. Most of the clips got smashed during the process of prising them out (I think you're supposed to do it from the reverse side with the door card out to release them) but it seems like you can still get those new fortunately. Also got a set of used MB-specific Meister-R coil overs which seem to be in very good condition so that was a score as they're also pretty pricey new. The rear lip is elusive but I think we may end up modifying the bumper somehow anyway depending on exhaust fitment etc so it's probably just as well for the time being.

Tubs2 looking good in the sun today, even with a thick coating of pollen.

Quick test pic

Cracking work so far mate. You make it sound so easy lol. Hoping to see this at a Civic5 meet (if we ever get one organised again!) Be good to see it in the metal.

New OEM-grade replacements should be a safe bet. Even if they are not as stiff as 'upgrade' parts (which are only an upgrade if you want to track your car), they are still a lot better than any old, chewed out bushings.