I love the challenge because it gives you a chance to practice skills on a $500 car that you would never want to try on an actual classic. Like, say, upholstery. Would I try to re-cover the seats in a Acura NSX with some zipties, denim cloth from a goodwill jacket, and my wife's sewing machine? Hell no. But a 1991 CRX on the other hand....
Before Pics of Passenger seat. Driver's seat is totally hosed-the cover is shot and the foam is worse. 
The plan is to remove the seat cover, replace the ripped bolster sections with some denim, swap the foam and repaired cover to the driver's seat, and leave the passenger seat out for the concours. Got it? good.
Cover removal is mostly cutting these hog rings from different parts of the cover, foam, and frame.
Et Voila! One butt-naked seat. Hope to source the fabric and make the bolster templates tomorrow. 
Some Goodwill's are by the pound places. Very cheap way to get fabric. Or if you're a true free on the side of the road type look for a recent move out in the not nicer areas of town. There tends to be lots of fabric just get it before it gets rained on.
After a slow summer, we're back at it.
Slapping on an Chinese Ebay turbo was always part of the plan, and since we were buying a complete kit we thought the fabrication would be minimal.
We thought wrong. There isn't a single piece of this kit that fits the car without some sort of fabrication. Today's projects included making a bracket for the intercooler and finding a 1/8th bpst to npt adapter for the turbo oil feed line.
At least I get my wash bucket back now.
In reply to CrustyRedXpress :
Cool you're back. Is it running with said turbo?
CrustyRedXpress said:
I love the challenge because it gives you a chance to practice skills on a $500 car that you would never want to try on an actual classic. Like, say, upholstery. Would I try to re-cover the seats in a Acura NSX with some zipties, denim cloth from a goodwill jacket, and my wife's sewing machine? Hell no. But a 1991 CRX on the other hand....
Before Pics of Passenger seat. Driver's seat is totally hosed-the cover is shot and the foam is worse.
The plan is to remove the seat cover, replace the ripped bolster sections with some denim, swap the foam and repaired cover to the driver's seat, and leave the passenger seat out for the concours. Got it? good.
Cover removal is mostly cutting these hog rings from different parts of the cover, foam, and frame.
Et Voila! One butt-naked seat. Hope to source the fabric and make the bolster templates tomorrow.
Dang. I just practically “gave away” a like-new Si seat as part of a massive garage cleanout. I can put you in touch with dude if you want it. Located in north GA.
In reply to Stampie :
Not yet-the turbo/exhaust/BOV/WG/intercooler is mocked up, but the oil feed and return has to be run yet. It was running well and street tuned before we began the turbo install a couple of weeks ago.
As a part of the turbo kit we upgraded the injectors to DSM 450's and upgraded the fuel pump as well. We didn't have room in the budget for stronger rods or an LSD, which means we're limited to about 200hp being laid down mostly through one wheel =P
In reply to poopshovel again :
Ah! It's tempting, but I have a 5month old and a roadtrip just isn't in the cards. But thanks for the offer...let me know if you have a line on a D series LSD =)
In reply to CrustyRedXpress :
I was thinking more along the lines of “stick it in a box & ship” or “pick up on way to challenge” Where are you?
In reply to poopshovel again :
Generous offer-PM sent!
More parts went on today, which is always nice to see. I started out by swapping a 4lb spring into the waste gate; we're going to start with low boost and use the manual boost controller to adjust up from there. This WG is a chinese knock off of Tial's 38mm, and the assembly was just brutally bad-check out where they kinked the silicone gasket at the factory! You can also see some of the machining debris...the entire kit is just shot through with metal shavings.
The catch-can mounted nicely where the charcol cannister used to live. I'm routing a line from the air filter pipe to the catch can, and from the catch can to a Y fitting that will go to the PCV valve on the back of the engine block as well as the fitting in the valve cover.
Lasty I ran the vaccuum lines, albeit incorrectly. If you can find the error in the vac routing below you get like 100 internet points. At least. The line under my finger is going to the blow off valve, and isn't the issue. The WG itself will require a 90 deg. elbow or a hole to be cut in the hood. We'll see what the budget allows.
And that's the news from lake woebegone; where all the men are strong, the women are good looking, and the hondas all have turbos.
Spent part of the AM ordering various hoses and plugs that were either missing or incorrect in the ebay turbo kit. Got a little bit of fabrication practice in as well....
The turbo kit included a bunch of 2.25 aluminum intercooler piping, but none of it fit without some cutting. Unfortunately this means that the hose retention bead that prevents the silicone connectors from blowing off under boost was gone. Luckily there is a cheap(ish) tool that some guy makes. Behold...the jobber-do!
After filing the end of the pipe smooth, you put it in this vice-grip looking contraption. You squeeze the jaws together, move the pipe, rinse, wash, repeat all the way around the pipe.
Et viola-home made retention bead.
I spent some time moving the intercooler up a few inches and finalizing the piping from the IC to the intake.
It feels almost blasphemous to cut up a CRX bumper, but Crusty's had a number of scrapes and bruises. After some serious dremel work the bumper fits around the IC and piping.
The battery and posts arrived today as well. The posts had to be ground down slightly to fit the battery, but this setup allows me to use the existing battery location by turning the battery on it's side (it's AGM), which allows the intercooler piping to go over it and up to the intake.
Still waiting on some parts from Amazon, but hopefully the oil feed and drain will be installed in the next two or 3 days. We're getting close.
In reply to CrustyRedXpress :
Nice choice in beer.
Stampie said:
In reply to CrustyRedXpress :
Nice choice in beer.
Nice choice in hf $3 boost gauge.
If those are ebay hose clamps they will let your hoses pop off. The nylock nuts only have about 2 threads inside of them and fail. You can replace the nuts or put another nut in back of them to make them hold.
In reply to Stampie :
I'll bring some if you bring the bar again this year!
In reply to MrJoshua :
Sharp eyes. Better go check my nuts.
More progress as the parts trickle in from Amazon. Battery is in its original location, but turned on it's side (AGM) and new tie downs have been fabricated. Fabricated may be generous here, but the battery isn't going anywhere. Blow-off valve installed as well.
The oil drain line has been giving me fits. The ebay kit came with some -10 AN hardware that (of course) didn't fit; they essentially created a sharp 90 degree bend in the line. After some googling, I ordered a 5/8ths drain flange for the turbo, some 3/4 inch braided steel hose, and got a 5/8ths hose barb with 1/2 NPT thread from the hardware store, and a 1/2 NPT tap from Amazon. Removed the pan and went at it with the drill and tap...
The drain is gravity fed so it should have a smooth drop down to the pan, with no kinks and no dips. Unfortunately, tapping the side of the pan gives the fitting itself a small amount of donward angle because the side of the pan isn't perpendicular to the ground. This isn't mentioned in the youtube videos I've watched, or the forum threads, so it's staying for now. When the turbo isn't draining the oil is forced out the seals, so if this thing smokes like a chimney, I'll know where to look...
Hope to get the vacuum hoses fully routed today, and may even start on the exhaust if the mailman gets here...
Vacuum lines are done, and so are the oil and catch can/PCV lines. I needed to shell out some money for a oil adapter sandwich plate, a block plug and a 90 degree -10 AN fitting. If Crusty runs again next year most of this crap is getting ripped out and something more creative, and cheaper, will go in it's place.
Oil and coolant went back in the engine, and I turned the engine over a few times so I could get oil in the turbo before starting. Unfortunately, my water pump chose that moment to E36 M3 the bed! Weird failure-coolant was really dripping out...my best guess is that having it be dry for a month or so contributed in some way. They're cheap to replace so no big deal, but when I was swapping it out I found something that I'd only heard about before.
Cavitation!
The old pump was one with sheet metal fins, which are apparently the worst kind for this sort of thing. Cool to see this in real life, not cool to see it on a car that I'm prepping for a race.
I'm not saying Crusty is going to start tomorrow, but I'm running out of reasons for why she wouldn't.
Saturday update- She runs! I loaded a basemap on the ECU and took crusty around the block. She's running lean at a bunch of places and is way, way too loud to street tune.
Tooning- I had to switch tuning programs last week but data logging and real time programming is up and running. I would have loved to take crusty to a dyno to get the ignition maps worked out, but it looks like i'll have to be happy with just the fuel maps since I can tune those on the street.
Exhaust and BOV- I have all the parts required to get a thrush resonator on Crusty. Hopefully that will quiet things down enough for me to get some tuning done tomorrow and not get arrested for disturbing the peace.
Logistics- Good news is that a friend is loaning me his tow rig for the trip to Gainesville, and registration and hotel is done. The bad news is that my teammate is unlikely to make the trip due to work commitments.
Any advice for somebody brining a car to the challenge for the first time on his own?
In reply to CrustyRedXpress :
Get there early and if you need help just ask. My first year it was just me and then 7 year old Lil Stampie. I had multiple teams offer to help me. Let me know if you need anything. I'll the old guy near the orange Q45.
We have 7 guys on our team so I'm sure we can offer help. Our plan is to arrive about 6 pm Thursday.
In reply to Stampie :
Thanks Stampie! That's a generous offer, and I'll try like hell not to need it =)
There's always a few of us that are willing to help where we can. The key to this whole deal his to relax a bit and enjoy it. There's really two ways to look at it. One way is that it's a race where a party breaks out. The other way is that it's a party where a race breaks out. Decide which one of those you want it to be and embrace it.
In reply to Fladiver64 :
Thanks! Jealous of your team- I have to build a bigger one next year.
Tuesday update-Did some street tuning last night and it feels loud and fast. Even at only 10lbs boost, it's an intoxicating feeling in a ~1900 lb car. Looking forward to tuning it.
The exhaust is on, hardly does a damn thing, might take it off to free up budget.
The last oil leak has been found, and fixed.
Question on Bondo-
I filled an area on my rear quarter panel with bondo before painting it. We bought a 1 gallon can and a tube of hardener for about $60 and didn't use much of it. Do I calculate the budget hit by weight based on what is left in the can and what the can and tube cost new, or does the cost of the entire can/tube hit the budget?
Since budget is calculated by "what is on the car" I think it's the former, but wanted to check.
Current Air Fuel Ratios-they're super rough, but will be enough for me to drive to the dyno.
In reply to CrustyRedXpress :
Prorate on what you used.
