The 1989 Civic hatchback

Not really a build thread. More of a sorting/chronicling of adventures thread.

First I'm just going to try and figure out what I have got. It has 221K on it but is in pretty good shape. No rust anywhere that I can see. It does have a cheapie paint job on it but for now it's serviceable. The title check came back clear but I need to get it ready to pass the safety inspection before I can transfer the title in my name. Which I hope goes smoothly because the title is not in the name of the person I bought it from.

But first lets look at some pictures.

It looks a lot better in photos than it does in person.

Engine bay is pretty clean. It looks like nobody has really hacked anything under there. That's one of the things that drew me to this car.

The first thing I wanted to do was loose the roof rack but my son loves it. I guess it stays.

What is a Civic without a big tip? That is a Magnaflow muffler.

Once I get the PO's trash out and clean it up the interior looks pretty nice. The carpet is new.

Wink mirror.

Notice how dark the front window tint is. It's stupid dark and has to go. No way it will pass inspection and it's impossible to see anything at night.

I hate tinted windshields so much. My local guy will pass me which is why the van still has one, but they suck.
Looks like a nice clean solid car. Does it have lowering springs of some sort? Heat and AC?

In reply to mazdeuce:

Heat and A/C both work.

I'll get to the suspension in a minute.

Suspension.

I'm assuming those are cheap Ebay coil overs. It's pretty stiff. Some sort of adjustable link thing at the top.

The front has the same coil over sleeves but have these shocks which I found two more of in the trunk.DNA Motoring. I'm assuming cheap junk.

Kinda looks like ground control coilovers. I'm betting that's too much spring for those Tokico Blues.

To get it to pass inspection I have to fix the E-brake, remove that tint and replace the two rear tires. The fronts are pretty new the rears have steel showing on the extreme inside edge. I was just going to get a couple used ones to pass inspection but the place said they had new ones for $34 each so that's what I'll do for now. I don't want to sink a bunch of money in nice tires for it only to not be able to transfer the title. I'm hoping to score some E-brake cables at the wrench-a-part this weekend.

Some other issues.

Wiring mess and speakers all in the trunk.

Fuel ate some of the crappy paint away under the filler.

Drivers side door panel broken.

Passenger side window regulator stripped.

Wiring mess behind awful terrible radio.

Broken glove box lid.

Combine the stiff ride with all the broken bits and the wink mirror missing several nuts and it's a very rattly experience going down the road. That's really letting the driving experience down. Should be relatively easy to get it sorted though.

Underneath looks pretty clean without actually getting it in the air to really check it out. At some point they had it scraping the ground at the belly has been dragging, but it's not beat too bad. The rockers and all the metal is solid.

The exhaust has no cat. I don't know if they check for the presence of one when just doing a safety inspection. We don't have emission testing here. If they do that's going to be a big expense. I will put a cat on it anyway. I just don't want to have to put one on when the title is still up in the air. It has a resonator and then the Magnaflow. It's got a real nice sound too it. Not too loud.

In reply to Nick (Bo) Comstock:

I posted in your other thread, I've got a factory shop manual for '88 civic, yours for shipping. PM me your address.

I've never had them check for a cat on my cars that were out of the 25 year window. They even passed the RX7 with a full cage and no interior because it met the letter of the law. Technically legal is the best kind of legal.
Do you have any of the no pass no pay places by you? They're nice because they give you a list, fix A B C and we'll pass it.

In reply to mazdeuce:

I know a guy

In reply to AngryCorvair:

PM sent! Just let me know how much and a PayPal or whatever works for you!

How bad are the headlights and does anyone know how to make them better? The low beams on my 91 were thr equivalent of shining one of those old 2D cell plastic flashlights down the road and hoping you could sort of see.

Okay, onto the engine. I really need to brush up on my Honda engine knowledge. First off I think I have a bad engine or transmission mount. I'm not sure which one, I'll have to do some investigating.

I thought I heard some part throttle acceleration pinging coming from the engine. It was faint and with the rattly interior it was hard to tell. It revs smoothly (but slowly). From my other thread it sounds like the tach bounciness may be from a part in the distributor. I'm going to try to pick one up and see if that helps the tach and the pinging. The idle hunts a little at idle and the revs dropped enough once at a red light on the ride home that the engine stalled on me. Took a couple tries before it fired back up. It starts good from cold though. The PO only owned it for about 8months and he didn't do anything to the car. Don't know when the timing belt was changed, once the title is transferred that's on the short list. I'm thinking a full tune up is in order as well and do a compression test.

The clutch feels good and the transmission shifts fine with no crunchy syncros or whiny gears. The shifter feels okay.

The only other thing that is wrong is the temp gauge on the dash is pegged all the way up with the ignition on, when driving it'll bounce around sometimes. Someone installed an aftermarket temp gauge in a pod on the A pillar, that one seems to work okay.

mazdeuce wrote: How bad are the headlights and does anyone know how to make them better? The low beams on my 91 were thr equivalent of shining one of those old 2D cell plastic flashlights down the road and hoping you could sort of see.

It has HIDs in it I think, they are actually pretty good. Much better than the lights on the wife's Elantra. The only thing is the turn signals by the headlights don't work but the ones in the bumper do. I'm hoping they'll pass.

Those are ground control coilovers, they are the best. The shocks are not very good though, keep your eyes open for some used Konis.

That is a DX model, the engine is a D15B2, 92hp 1.5l, medium set of final drive gears of the 3 available. Don't waste any time or $ on the current setup, at a minimum you need to swap to the MPFI setup from the Si, or most of the 92-00 civics. You'll need I take mani, TB, ECU, wiring. I have some of this around from old projects that you can have for shipping cost, I need to check inventory.

For performance later on there are many different motors that can swap in with varying levels of difficulty, anywhere from 108hp to 220hp stock.

At junkyards, keep an eye out for a rear sway bar on one of these, or get the suspension techniques bar. 90-93 Integra rear bars fit too, but the brackets are different, sedan bars are thicker than coupes. You can get big brakes using the knuckles/hubs/brakes from either a 90-91 Civic EX or the Integra again.

Look at your brake proportioning valve (silver thing with lots of lines going into it on the passenger side strut tower. You want one that says 40 40 with rear discs, if they didn't swap this with the rear brakes you can pull it from an Integra.

I think I may have some good interior stuff too, and have an aftermarket cat converter that should fit in place as well.

That adjustable link is aftermarket rear camber adjustment. The loose shifter is warn bushings that are cheap and easy to replace, the shifter should feel awesome if all were well.

Those are 89-91 Si front seats that have been recovered. The wheels are from a 99-00 Civic Si, 15x6, use a 195/50 or 205/50 15 tires.

Getting baseline good ignition components is a great place to start with the driveability issues.

I could go on and on...

In reply to Sonic:

Go on...

I really have zero knowledge about these cars. Every little bit helps.

If those are hids, look into a projector retrofit. It may look bright, but you're losing a ton of light due to lack of focus and cutoff, and it's not real fun for the guy in front either. Retrofitsource has a lot of cool stuff. Look there, get ideas, and then junkyard yourself something. Infiniti and nissan projectors are popular.

In reply to mndsm:

I don't really know what they are. I saw some ballasts or something zip tied behind them. I'll take a better look tomorrow. I know they are good, almost as good as the best headlights I've ever owned which where on my 82 320is.

In reply to Sonic:

Are these things finicky in regards to which brands they prefer when it comes to ignition parts? I know some cars are.

Nick (Bo) Comstock wrote: In reply to mndsm: I don't really know what they are. I saw some ballasts or something zip tied behind them. I'll take a better look tomorrow. I know they are good, almost as good as the best headlights I've ever owned which where on my 82 320is.

Most likely an hid swap then. Should be inyeresting to see.

NGK v power plugs, not platinums. The rest is like most cars, OEM is best, but as long as you are not using the super value brand it is probably better than what is on there now.

Where would you like this project to go? How do you want to use it? There are so many options with a Civic that it needs to be narrowed down a bit before you get overloaded with the potential options.

In reply to Sonic:

Basically I want a solid reliable car to have some grassroots Motorsports fun in. I will definitely be auto crossing it. I will definitely be rally crossing it. I'm in Texas so events are spread out, I want to feel comfortable that the car will get me there, play and back home reliably.

I'm not really concerned about being competitive in a certain class. I just want to go have fun. I think I'm looking for just a middle of the road suspension setup. Power wise, honestly I'm fine leaving it stock, but in all things reliability is key.

In my mind just a completely stock car that I would change wheel setups for whatever I'm doing that weekend. Obviously the car already had adjustable suspension so I might as well take advantage of that.

That is a very nice looking tin can! I really wish rust free ones like that were easier to find cheaply in Ohio.

In reply to eastsidemav:

Well, I think I'm going to break your and any other northern thread watchers heart right now. 1-20-17 it was 75 degrees as the sun went down and I was working on the car in a T-shirt. I was underneath, removing heat shields and covers and stuff and everything, I mean everything came apart so easy. No corrosion, no rust, not stuck fasteners. Take a look at the condition of these fasteners and eat your heart out Those have spent 27 years underneath a car. Yeah, I'm never moving back to the rust belt. Never going to happen.

In reply to mndsm:

Confirmed they are HIDs. I may be loosing a ton of light but honestly they really provide excellent brightness and pattern from my end. Can't speak for anyone in front of me though. It's far down the list but once I'm there I will have my wife drive the civic behind me in her car for a while and see if it's an issue. If so I'll address it. Here is a crappy picture I tried to take of the ballast.I haven't researched the brand to know if they are any good or not yet.

In reply to Scooter:

Confirmed these are Ground Control coil overs with Eibach springs. Looks like the rear is 7"-2.5"id 250lbs springs. That is too much for Tokico Blues? They may be blown anyway due to the amount of dampness seen on the right rear. I'll have to do some research on how the Koni's will work in the dirt. I still haven't pulled the front wheels yet to check them.

It seems like my 12mm wrench has walked off somewhere. I was able to get the parking brake cables completely loose and ready to drop out with the exception of one bolt that is too confined to get my adjustable wrench on. I'll have to pick up some wrenches tomorrow on my way to the junkyard.

Here is a picture of a bolt.

I also discovered that it has some Energy Suspension bushing under there. It's hard to see in this picture but you can just make out the ENE stamped on the bushings. They are red under the layer of road grime.

These are the tires that are on the rear. Look at the very inside edge. What would cause such extreme wear there? Toe? I don't know if they were on the front or not as the fronts are newish. Anyway they are 195/60/15 and the fronts are 195/55/15. The new tires I'm getting installed tomorrow are going to be 60 series because they are so cheap. I'll worry about proper tires down the road.

Here's hoping tomorrow is productive.