$2015 Challenge entry - 88 Accord LXi

In reply to tuna55 :

I've seen your welding.  And experienced it, breaking off in my hand at speed.  

You sure you don't want to take my suggestion?  

Derick Freese said:

I've got a white coupe door you can have, if you are coming to the challenge or can figure out a way to get it to you. Obviously too big to ship.

Bring it. Ill het it to tuna in the next few week's 

It's OK guys, I fabbed up a plate last night.

Of course I have to buy longer bolts now, which I will do today, before welding it in. It's a nice looking plate. I'm pleased.

Ok. The offer stands though 

ok ok, I need help.

First off, remember I am doing this stuff late at night in the dark after a full day of work and then being Daddy.

First issue is that the fine pitch screws Lowes had were super soft and I stripped one while test fitting everything. I decide that I have to get it out of there, and it's stuck, so I have to drill it out. Oof course when I do this, the remaining shank is below the surface of the door, so it's crazy hard to turn it to get it out. I finally do, maybe 30 minutes later.

Then I get everything back together, and test close the door. "close", great, but now it won't open. Apparently the lock no longer works at all, but neither latch will open the door. So I finally get that figured out, about 30 minutes later.

I then get to welding. Actually the welds lay down pretty well, aside from the one arc I made before I remembered to open the gas valve. I mean they are super pretty. I go to take a picture, and the phone (and music player) dies, and I hear ::sizzle sizzle:: and notice that the innards of the latch are melting into one decidedly un-latch like glob.

Now the door won't close. The plate is perfect, though.

So I need a latch. Can we make that happen?

Yeah, the lock bits broke when the latch was flapping around. This door is done. So many things. 

I drive a Miata, no way I can get it there. I'm about an hour away from the hotel, if you can come over this way.

In reply to Derick Freese :

If we can't make the connection I'll buy a latch locally.

Derrick: call me and let's see if we can work something out. My phone number is 828 260 1254

That door should easily strap to the miata roll bar.  

Get a pic of it for the magazine, nearly guranteed that they'll get it up in the write up because awesomeness like that is the true GRM way.  Especially if you use some caution tape to tie it to the roll bar.  :D

I'm going to see if I can ratchet strap it to the back of my car, but if that doesn't work, I'll give you a call.

Cool. Keep me posted 

It fits on my Miata, making it the first 3 door Miata I've ever seen, lol. See you there. I'll be at the parking lot build.

We're about an hour out

There needs to be a "report posts" button.

I need to flag Derick for awesomeness.

Derick is indeed awesome.

I want pics of the three dor Miata.

I’m the meantime I’m doing a great impression of Bo Duke. 

If you're climbing in the car window, you're doing a good impression. If you're sliding across the hood first and then climbing in the window, you're doing a great impression.

Let me tell you from experience - if you need to secure the door closed while driving, use something with less give than a bungee cord. Unless the idea of it swinging open while you're going around a curve then slamming itself shut again sounds like fun to you. 

In reply to cmcgregor :

Hear hear!

I used a ratchet strap

Thanks to Derick (for the door) and to Duster (for the delivery)!

Duster idled up to my driveway at around 8 Friday night, and it was like we'd known each other for almost a decade. I guess we sort of have. Anyway we very quickly started pulling off the old door, before he decided that we'd better wait until daylight and also give him time to go home and take the transmission I grabbed for him home - after all he had a three hour drive.

So we chatted until midnight about pretty much everything. What a neat guy! Also, sorry about not letting you go home!

Saturday I woke up early, having not driven until 3am, and started on the door. And then stopped. Kids, after all. Then started again, then got pumpkins, and groceries, and a thousand other errands, then started again on the door, then made dinner, then broke up countless kid-fights, then started on the door...

you get the idea.

Anyway, it's on. It's a mongrel. The bottom half of my old door panel, the top half of the donated door panel. The new door is on, but I need to swap the trim piece. The passenger window switch doesn't work, so I need to switch that with the old door one. I still have some work to do, but it does open and close, though of course this morning, during my moment of triumph, the door both froze closed, and the battery died, so the triumph will have to wait.

Also, apparently 80's Honda learned from 70's GM how to do panel gaps, so there are some clearance challenges to be figured out. The front of the door hits the fender, and the door/fender gap is wider than it was with the old door. Weird.

I figured out the door gaps, which may or may not have involved the use of a prybar.

I also got a chance to play with the new speedo board Derick send along, with the cruise control, and basically everything else which made sense for the idle issue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wn9tpZGwgrU

I did some things!

First order of business was to swap in my old window switches. The passenger side switch from Derick's door didn't work. That was 'easy'.

I then decided to go nuts with the speedo issues. I tried the following:

• Original cluster with the new speedo control board
• original cluster with the speedo board unplugged from the trigger thingie on the speedo needle
• new cluster with old speedo (no new speedo on the new cluster) and new control board
• just the old speedo, with no cluster. IT WORKED!

OK, so that means that the speedo itself is definitely feeding bad information back through the cluster somehow.

So I disconnected the speedometer from the cluster, but it is still attached to the speedo cable. I have not tested cruise yet, but this setup gives me a speedometer and good idle. YAY!

I had some help from one of the guys on the 3geez facebook page. This might be the fourth or fifth actual use I have found for Facebook.

Just so we're all clear, I am fed up with me idle issue. To re-cap:

Idle went to 3K when I was driving a long time ago. It stays there until you stop rolling and then goes to normal in about two seconds. Thus you cannot try to fix it while the idle is strange, because the wheels have to be moving, and I'm not crazy enough (yet) do do it on jackstands.

Right now I am driving with the speedo connected to the cable, but disconnected from the cluster. I get a normal idle and a functioning IACV this way, but no cruise and a CEL when I coast in gear for more then a few seconds.

I bought a replacement cluster and it didn't change anything.

Also along the way, for some reason, the fuel gauge and temperature gauge stopped working. Of course that could be fixed with another cluster, which I of course returned after finding that it didn't fix the idle thing.

I, you, or somebody else, may have already mentioned - are you absolutely sure you have all the vacuum lines going to their correct spots? One wrong hose can do strange things with idle.