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MB2 K-Swap Civic project - from base spec to race spec


btjtaylor
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Had a few days of time owed from work so spent a couple of days on the MB. Made good progress refitting all off the front suspension and then fitting the rear disc arms.

 

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The only snag is annoyingly I had to put a load of rusty old bolts back into my nice clean arms as I managed to order bolts for the rear of an EK civic not an MB. Turns out all of the MB bolts are no longer in production anyway so I'm going to take all the spares i've got and give them a soak in evaporust and see how they turn out ... next best thing I suppose.

 

Calipers, brakes and feeding the handbrake cables up into the car to go but it all looks like it should fit 

 

Hopefully have the car on the road in the spring! 

Edited by btjtaylor
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That evaporust looks like pretty good stuff when I saw Edd China use it on youtube. 

Would eg bolts be a better match? The MB suspension stuff tends to be eg /dc2 related rather than ek. 

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Posted (edited)
20 hours ago, dr_broon said:

That evaporust looks like pretty good stuff when I saw Edd China use it on youtube. 

Would eg bolts be a better match? The MB suspension stuff tends to be eg /dc2 related rather than ek. 

 

Good shout

I had a quick look and it seems to be the same issue as the EK ones

 

After doing a bit of reading, it looks like the MB rear bolts are based on European standards. The JDM cars are based on JIS (Japanese Industrial Standard). I knew something wasn't quite right because the rear bolts are 13mm / 15mm heads and normally on Japanese (at least JDM model) cars its 12/14.

 

I've managed to order all of the rear bolts using the MG Rover part numbers instead. There are a few front suspension bolts that remain illusive, I may have to either try and clean up the originals or order generic bolts.

 

I made a spreadsheet to try to figure this out (my starting point was based on the bush diagram from the powerflex website). Once I finally get them all replaced i'll post up a list somewhere, it might help someone else in the future.

 

image.png.f43f64267d9719ef85ed550489b99a9a.png

 

Edited by btjtaylor
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Rover bolts came in clutch so the part numbers above are correct for anyone who's curious. Some of them were in MG Rover branded bags which was a blast from the past, they must've been 20+ years old! 

 

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Removed the engine oil sump and fitted the 4PistonRacing baffle plates, really nicely designed piece. Much easier than weld-in baffles.

 

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Realised a massive fail with the rear brakes. The rear arms I bought were off a ZS 180, and came with 260mm discs installed. I purchased new discs and pads, and I could not for the life of me get the discs and pads to fit. I tried EVERYTHING, figuring I was doing something wrong. I then got my father in law to try and he couldnt get them in either.

 

In the end, I looked up the part numbers on the rear calipers and found out they are for a ZS 120 which has 240mm rear discs and thinner pads.. so that explains it. The previous owner had obivous bought the wrong calipers, but managed to force the disc and pads to work .. somehow. I think they had removed a bunch of material from the pads .. the mind boggles.

 

New set of ZS 180 rear calipers on order... an unexpected expense I didnt need but at least i've got to the bottom of the mystery 

 

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(apparently the 30 in the part number means 30mm piston. Correct ones have 34mm pistons).

 

 

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Suspension all refreshed now

 

Hardrace front ARB bracket bushes (21mm for anyone wondering - it was quite hard to figure out the size without measuring it in person!) and hardrace front compliance bushes

 

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Mostly new bolts … a few still on order (if you look really careful there's a subframe bolt missing) 🤪

 

Hardrace ARB droplinks (to fit a civic EG - the ones to fit an MB6/DC2 are a different shape)

 

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