Project Steph's 1978 Honda Civic 1200

[Steph]

A few more NOS parts I bought this week. I left my petrol cap at a service station years back, and I replaced it with a generic one I bought at the auto parts store. Only problem is that it's difficult to get your fingers in to remove it when filling up. Luckily I found a NOS one..

PetrolCap.jpg (14.64 KiB) Viewed 279 times

PetrolCapside.jpg (13.69 KiB) Viewed 279 times

I had some new brake shoes fitted to the rear, and they obviously weren't manufactured to be exact copies of the original shoes, as they make a strange scraping noise when braking. I tried replacing the drums to fix it, but to no avail. The only thing that it could be is the shoes, because it started when they were initially fitted, and obviously it's not the drums, as it made the nose with the old set too. I managed to find some NOS brake shoes, so I figure that will be the best way to eliminate the noise, or the possibility it's the brake shoes causing it. I wonder if they have good old asbestos in them, I hope so :P

BrakeShoes.jpg (29.01 KiB) Viewed 279 times

Finally, I found an odd bumper end and snapped that up as a spare...

[TREVORM]

steph I know what the noise is man,. when I did the rear brakes last week or so,. I had that same problem and I changed everything,hardaware, bearings shoes, drums. what it is,.. is the hardware springs is rubbing on the inner bearing sleeve

check for marks around the housing. I think the after market drums where the inner bearing goes on the out side of it, is like 1mm wider causing it to rub on the spring.

[Steph]

We checked the drums and there was no sign of any wear other than where the shoes make contact. The noise was there with the original drum as well as the new drums. But maybe the springs were put back on incorrectly the last time the brakes were done? It's not major, just a quiet on-off scraping noise wjen the brakes are applied.

[TREVORM]

I see, just though I'd let ya know

[Steph]

I see, just though I'd let ya know

Thanks Trevor, I'll have a closer look, to eliminate that as a possibility.

[Steph]

I've started stripping pieces off from under the hood/hood in preparation for the new paint that I'm getting done just as soon as our spring weather kicks in (it's spring here). I plan on stripping off all the parts like the grill, bumpers, lights, as well as all the parts from under the hood that don't affect the drive-ability of the car, as I still have to drive it to the painter. So I've progressively been taking parts into work and using their glass bead blasting cabinet to strip them back to bare metal. I have to say, the 30 year old Honda paint comes of pretty easily, and all that is left is a perfect surface for applying primer and paint. I did a part yesterday and painted it with VHT paint, which I then baked in the oven for an hour, as per the instructions. The only thing was, I wasn't happy with the finish, so I took it back to work this morning and proceeded to blast the new paint off so I could start all over again to get a perfect finish. Only thing was, the VHT paint was tough as nails, and it took me ages to get it off again. Like 4 times as long as it did yesterday when I stripped the old Honda paint off. So thumbs up to the VHT oven baked finishes, although it was a PITA finding out just how good it really is.

Fresh out of the oven, here are the; hood/hood lock, cover for the cabin vent intakes, and voltage regulator fuse bracket...

[Blackbullet]

I'm just wondering what my wife would say if she found honda parts in the oven. :evil: She's already caught me with honda parts in the dishwasher

Good work Steph 8)

[Steph]

Thanks Jay

Hey, a bit of sulphamic acid in the dishwasher will clean all your parts like you wouldn't believe. The trick is to run through about 2 or 3 cycles afterwards to flush out the system properly. Once you've done that, the dishwasher will look like new. Sulphamic acid is often used for descaling dishwashers, and is an excellent metal cleaner. I bought some at the local hardware store, although it was specifically to descale my dishwasher, but once I saw how well it worked, I did some reading and found that it had been used for cleaning engine parts as well. Ideally you'd want an old dishwasher I think, but I'm fairly certain nobody would ever be able to tell, as the acid removes everything. :P

Steph

[bob78cvcc]

I would get thrown out of the house if I ever got caught putting parts in the dish washer. How long and at what temp do you bake on the paint? The parts look great.

[Steph]

I would get thrown out of the house if I ever got caught putting parts in the dish washer. How long and at what temp do you bake on the paint? The parts look great.

I use the lowest setting and turn the heat off after 10 minutes, then leave the parts in the closed oven for at least an hour. The finish ends up being as smooth as glass.