A New Adventure - 1997 Civic Coupe resurrection

I've never owned a Honda before, so this one seemed like a good place to get my feet wet. 

This car went from sitting in a field in North Dakota, to sitting in my friends driveway for 8 months, to my garage. 

This is the story of how this stripped down shell of a Honda came to live in my garage. 

Last January I bought a 2000 VW Golf with lots of miles & some rust, but overall a decent car. I fixed the rust, put coilovers and oem wheels on it, made it look cool and drove it most of the summer as my fun/daily car. It got great mileage, and it was super fun to blast around in. BUT, having 3 cars and a 1 stall garage is dumb, so I sold it in favor of keeping the truck for our yearly camping trip. Fast forward and that trip is over, fall is fast approaching, and I'm racking my brain trying to decide what project I want to tackle next. I had a list of things I 'could' do to the truck, but none of them seemed financially sensible, nor did they seem like they would really increase my level of enjoyment. 

Frankly, I was ready for a change. I've been playing with carburetted American cars for the last 10 years. It's time to have a fuel injected project car! 

When I sold the VW in August my friend (who is a big Honda guy) mentioned to me that he'd sell this Coupe to me for the paltry sum of $300. I laughed and turned him down. Well, as time went on I could not get the dang thing out of my head. It haunted me (in a good way). So wheels were set in motion, the truck got sold, and I headed over and got my Coupe. 

Or should I say had my Coupe delivered; my buddy was kind enough to deliver it the 6 blocks to my house. 

Here's the details and overall plan - car has no engine, trans, engine harness, ecu, gauge cluster, hvac controls, back seat, etc, etc, etc. Originally it would have had a single cam 1.6 (d16y8- I believe this car was a vtec car originally) - it will now be a twin cam 2.0 non-vtec (b20b) from a CRV. It should make about 146 horsepower and hopefully give the car a little extra pep from stock. I will be using an Integra GSR transmission that should also be a little closer ratio than stock. I intend to try my hand at painting for the first time and spray the front clip & bumper covers, and basically just reassemble the whole car. 

In the end I hope to have an efficient and capable car for some amateur Motorsports participation and a fun commuter/toy. Hopefully a good combination of OEM and quality aftermarket parts will accomplish that. I'm trying to allow the budget to run a little rampant in an effort to just relax and have fun. Luckily my initial purchase price is pretty low so it still should end up being an inexpensive project. Frankly, if it looks half as good as Cousin Eddie's recent Civic (seen here ) when all is said and done I would be ecstatic.

It's not there yet. ha ha ha

I picked up a B16 swapped 98 Civic hatch this past March.  Looking forward to your progress.

Civics will get under your skin...

Here's some random interior cleaning shots. 

Baseline - no cluster, no hvac controls, dirty carpet etc. 

Lots of dirt & grime. Everywhere. 

So it all came out for a thorough cleaning. 

Boy is that carpet scuzzy. 

Much pressure washing & simple green ensued. That got us here. 

As an aside - I bought the car with the intention originally of stripping it all down and adding as much lightness as possible. Well, as usual for me I really struggle with making things less practical so instead of throwing this carpet away, it got cleaned. I'm not unhappy with the decision at all, it just makes me laugh how hard it is for me to even take a $300 car and gut it. 

Anyhow, carpet cleaned, interior plastics cleaned (simple green is amazing)

Ricky approved 

pinchvalve said:

Civics will get under your skin...

Like in a good way or like a rashy way... 

I worked on a couple when I wrenched for a living briefly and really liked them. 

In reply to chrispy :

Nice! I like the hatches. 

I am presently in the process of running new electrical to the garage, so this winter is going to be awesome, but in the mean time I haven't dug in too deeply to the civic in an effort to keep it mobile. I have however dug into my wallet plenty to get things rolling that way. 

Engine is coming - JDM B20B - from Hmotorsonline - supposedly a 50k mile engine. 

Transmission should be here from another friend tonight

Got some misc. items at the junkyard, and have gotten my engine harness, ecu (OBD1 P75 for ease of future tuning), gauge cluster, and the hvac controls are coming as well. Trying to do what I can until I can really start the "work" part of the process.

I am enjoying this thread. Hondas do get under your skin. 

In reply to Cousin_Eddie :

Thank you sir! I just revisited your civic thread, they're practically identical cars! Well, mine is way shabbier but, they were originally identical cars. 

Oh, and exciting exciting update, I have a picture of my new-to-me cluster installed. One more hole in the dash filled! 

I have been kind of casually looking for an earlier Civic to do next. I don't know the terminology very well, but one of those late 80s-early 90s ones.

Coming from German (MBZ) stuff, the Honda/Acura cars are just fun to work on, and much more forgiving.

There is just so much information on them out there, every possible combination of engine/transmission/ECU/harness has been tried, pushed to failure, and written about online. 

And they're cheap!

In reply to Cousin_Eddie :

The EF generation is pretty popular, those are boxy and from that era. You're lucky to live in a place where you'll probably find one. Up here they have all but disappeared to salt. OR they're still around but modified to death. 

In reply to CrustyRedXpress :

I'm super excited. Frankly this is the first big project I've delved into with this level of documented support. I come from American vehicles which is a lot of tribal knowledge and old timers thinking something can't be done. Seems like a lot of argument in that camp about what works and what doesn't. 

I owned a 98 civic ex for a little while and I could never get used too how you sit in them. Coming from old American cars and trucks they just feel weird too sit in. Otherwise it was a peppy little car.

In reply to dropstep :

Interesting, what was your complaint about how you sat? 

Following with interest! I've worked my way from an EF hatch, to a EG coupe, to an EK coupe. I've messed with D, B, and K series in them. Absolutely love the ability to build anything you want out of them. My '99 is my autox toy, i still have the '95 coupe but it's just sitting and has mostly returned to the earth.

In reply to Run_Away :

Excellent! The friend I got the car from has an H22 in his EG hatch that runs low 11's in the quarter. I was toying with an H or F in this one but it was a little more expense than I wanted presently. 

Last night I acquired a set of side skirts and my Integra GSR trans. Parts just keep flowing in! 

Gunchsta said:

In reply to Run_Away :

Excellent! The friend I got the car from has an H22 in his EG hatch that runs low 11's in the quarter. I was toying with an H or F in this one but it was a little more expense than I wanted presently. 

Can confirm that civics are fun. I had a '97 ex coupe with the stock D16 that I rescued/restored from rice/rough status and a really mint black 1996 B18 swapped hatch that had an Si front end. I think you made the right choice by going with the B series swap.

Having driven a 2001 prelude w/ H22 a handful of times and stock as well as heavily modified F series accords a fair bit I prefer the B series. I like the feel of the rod actuated transmission over the cable in the F and H series plus the overall parts availability for the B series is far cheaper and more plentiful. Your B20 won't do it, but the B18 redlining at 8k is fun.

FYI the S2000 steering wheel is a direct swap into the EK chassis. I wanted a better steering wheel than stock and still have an airbag in my DD so did that swap and was very happy with it. 

In reply to clutchsmoke :

If I were to do the H/F series it would have been an H to B deal, which is what shied me away - the adapter/mount kit was an additional $600, and there wasn't a great way to run power steering (aside from an electric ps kit that exists). Considering I'm starting from scratch, both in knowledge and pieces that exist on the car, the B series seemed like an easier way to go. Plus, like you said, lots and lots of options once it's up and running. 

Good to know on the s2000 steering wheel - I was already scoping stuff out on eBay so I'll ad that to the list. 

If you're interested I still have a perfectly mint S2000 steering wheel. 

Add a stainless steel yonaka cat back to your ebay list. I was very pleasantly surprised at both the quality and lack of loud when I put that exhaust on my civic. It was very comparable to the apexi ws2 cat back I had on my GSR. Certainly louder than stock, but with a nice deep mellow tone. No raspy harshness from it at all. Great for a DD. Hopefully they haven't changed in the last 6 years.

In reply to clutchsmoke :

Oooo good to know, good to know. I think right now I need to save the budget for necessities, but I'll keep that steering wheel in mind. 

Also good tip on the exhaust, I'm thinking I might put something together with a magnaflow muffler I have in the garage, but time will tell on that one. 

You probably won't go to this much trouble, but if you have cruise control you can cut/switch a couple wires behind the buttons of the S2000 steering wheel and it'll work like factory. 

I also have a 22mm ASR rear sway bar with the chassis reinforcement mounts, but no endlinks. 

Internet readings tell me I want a rear swaybar, I could be interested in that sooner than later. 

Always happy to see a Civic build on here. I've been bench building an EK or EG autocross car/canyon carver in my head for a while now. Can't wait to see what you do with it!