mazdeuce - Seth said:In reply to slowbird :
Helps that it's a V6 engine bay holding a four cylinder. The K motors are quite a lot tighter in Civics.
just the other weekend i went to change the drive belt in my 8th gen Si when i had a free hour. popped the hood, thinking "i can just de-tension it, yank it out and pop the new one in." yeah...that's freakin tight and ain't nobody got time fo dat today. forget it, i'm drinking beer.
In reply to ScottyB :
I changed the serpentine belt in my 996 Turbo in 15 minutes. Porsche jammed a ton of stuff back there but the basic maintenance stuff they did a good job of making accessible
In the manufacturers defense, modern serpentine belts are "life of the car" for almost everyone. I seldom change them unless I'm in there for something else.
Sent here from the homepage and I just spent a good portion of my work day catching up on the whole build. I'm not sure what your current goals are for the car it went from comfy street car easy button that can lap to race car . Can't really figure out what the budget is now but hopefully some of this information will be useful to you.
I looked into these heavily when deciding on my next car after finding out how much I gave up with struts. I found one small forum with good basic information specific to this chassis (elitecm.net). I ended up with a TSX because my mechanical ability is lacking and most of the upgrades seem to come from a TSX. Here are ideas to keep you up at night
In reply to lnlds :
I've been thinking about how to reply to you post. First off, everything you said was useful and true. Thanks for that.
I'm getting close to being two years into this project. Two years. That's about how long it takes me to get bored with things historically. At this point I will have hit all the low hanging fruit and all I have left is big money/effort items that require a lot of commitment to a particular car. I always ask myself if I want to get into things that deep. Do I like the car enough. Maybe I want something new and shiny? I'm there with this. The next steps are big.
This problem is that I like this car just how it is. A LOT. It's fun to drive. Comfortable. Gets 28-30mpg on regular. It's good looking enough (with the stickers on) that I still like seeing it parked in the driveway, but rough enough that I don't mind parking it in a crowded school parking lot on meet the teacher night. It's good enough as a driver that I can use it to teach autocross, but hardy enough that I can hand it off to people without worrying about them breaking it. As much as the kids don't like the coupe thing, it has a useful back seat, which is useful. It makes me want to get a trailer hitch and a small trailer and sell the truck. Insurance is laughably cheap.
Before it goes faster it needs more safety equipment. I've used CG locs and about every other type of "not a harness yet" system and I don't like any of them. Having put quite a few hours in proper seats with harnesses, nothing else quite matches that. So it needs a half cage. But that gets rid of the back seat and that needs to stay for a couple more years.
I'm happy driving it. Just driving it. Autocross a half dozen times a year. A couple track days. Backup One Lap car. Great daily. If I don't get bored then it's great cheap transportation. If I do get bored then I can start shopping for power and a proper transmission with an LSD and all that nonsense. Today I took Mrs. Deuce on a date in it. It was quiet and civilized and we talked at 75mph on the freeway and she commented on how good the wipers were. I'm just going to drive it for a while.
yes wipers were the order of the day today........
Ah man... Just read your post after putting a don't neglect the daily post on the meme thread. The daily is an 05, stripper model, 4 cylinder, 5 speed, Accord coupe. Now I feel like I must read this thread (in it's full scope as I've been following somewhat closely) again and start elevating "speedy 3" (my 3rd 5 speed Accord coupe) to it's true capabilities. As it sits it's totally stock with rear drums.
In reply to johndej :
Basically the same car but you should have the newer DBW throttle on yours, right? I think that makes upgrades a bit easier.
Making any level of power on K-motored cars is just a matter of money. How fast do you want to go? My issue is that I've owned a couple of 500+ hp cars and I'm kind of over big power. I'd rather chase "good", whatever that means. For me that means quiet and comfortable, quick enough, and competent at an autocross or on a road course. One Lap provides a great testing ground and it's the standard by which I judge good cars. 5000 miles and a half dozen tracks, comfortable with zero mechanical issues? That's a good car. There will be a time when good overlaps with fast though. 
As far as brakes, the stock brakes are fine until you start pushing it on a road course, including the rear drums. Upgrading to disks in the rear is really for maintenance and being able to source good track level brake compounds without paying absurd money. The big disadvantage to upgrading the rear drums is that it bumps you into dumb autocross classes if you run with people that are serious enough to call you on it. Good pads and fluid will take care of almost anything you want to do with the car. What it really needs is a bit of lowering to get the geometry better and a good stiffening to reduce body roll. I did it with springs but I wonder sometimes if getting a set of big sway bars wouldn't accomplish the same goals more effectively.
They're cheap fun cars.
Fix the 964.
Been watching your thread and enjoying the build. I got my feet wet at the track in a '84 E30 at a Lemons race. Bought an '01 Miata to fine tune my skills, and replaced it with a 2003 Accord coupe, V6, 6spd MT. I've dropped about as much weight as possible, still wkng on exhaust cleaning, added BC coilovers, and will add a tranny from an Acura for LSD. Still hunting for the right tires. It's already much faster than the Miata and E30 and alot of fun to drive. Thanks for all the info.
The Camoccord
In reply to PanhandlerMotosports :
That's awesome. The more people do this the more exposure the idea gets and the more the knowledge base grows. Keep driving fast.
In which the Traccord becomes a tow pig.
Exactly one week after purchasing my 6-6 sedan, I installed a tow hitch to tow my Jon boat to the local lake. My wife was a special kind of pissed seeing me spend money on my car so soon after the purchase price was also extracted from the bank account.
All that to say, Accords make surprisingly competent tow vehicles.
In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :
Watching deucekid#3 roll that bike on with relative ease really makes the trailer hit home. I'm amazed at how you have made this Accord do damn near everything.
In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :
Towing with a car is the best thing ever.
In reply to spacecadet (Forum Supporter) :
Yea, in that picture she's figuring out that rolling down the ramp and keeping the bike straight is harder than going up. Everyone who rolls things up and down ramps eventually learns that.
To me the most amazing thing about this car is that I started this thread in January of 2018. I'm two and a half years into owning this car and don't even have the tiniest thoughts about selling it. I like driving it, I like owning it, I like towing with it, I like that there is still a bunch that I can do to move it forward as a project, I just like it. It is such a boring pedestrian car and somehow I can see myself owning it long enough to properly wear it out. Very strange.
Professor_Brap (Forum Supporter) said:In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :
Towing with a car is the best thing ever.
The funny thing is that I know that, or I knew it anyway. One of my favorite cars ever was my Volvo 240 wagon and the 5x10 utility trailer that I bought when I owned it. I did EVERYTHING with that car and the trailer and it was great. I sold it for real reasons (too much glass and too little AC and babies and Texas) but I kind of wish I hadn't. Towing with cars really is the best.
mazdeuce - Seth said:Professor_Brap (Forum Supporter) said:In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :
Towing with a car is the best thing ever.
The funny thing is that I know that, or I knew it anyway. One of my favorite cars ever was my Volvo 240 wagon and the 5x10 utility trailer that I bought when I owned it. I did EVERYTHING with that car and the trailer and it was great. I sold it for real reasons (too much glass and too little AC and babies and Texas) but I kind of wish I hadn't. Towing with cars really is the best.
We have renovated a house out of a 5x8 trailer.
In reply to Professor_Brap (Forum Supporter) :
Yea, this is kid#1 and I unloading lumber to build the second story on my house. I would have to make a few more smaller trips with the Accord, but that's mostly because I know better now than I did back then.
In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :
40 80lb bags of sacrete and some lumber.....
Things that shouldn't be done, but I do....
Are we doing tow car pictures now? Here's the very last photo of our Saab towing RallyMoto bikes through a blizzard before it got rear ended and totaled by a van a few miles down the road:
In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :
Picture not showing up, but yes, let's do tow car pictures. I like that.
I want to see pictures of cars towing the same car on a tow dolly now.
In reply to Dusterbd13-michael (Forum Supporter) :
I can make that happen
In reply to Professor_Brap (Forum Supporter) :
In my driveway?
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