Project Steph's 1978 Honda Civic 1200

[amifsud]

Pete, Here's what I did to shroud the top of the struts. It makes it look sort of factory.

They are 110 mm inner diameter PVC Storm water pipe end caps. When I bought them, they were the same size as the outer edge of the hole for the strut top. I heated the PVC cap with a heat gun to make it fit over the strut top lip. When it cooled I sanded off the markings on the top and painted them with Vinyl dye.

[Steph]

My plan is to find a small C-section rubber moulding to slip over the 'sharp' edge.

When I was at uni, they had a vacuum former in the industrial design workshop that we had to learn to use. We all had to use it. Anyway, making a wooden mould, or former is really easy on a lathe. I vacuum formed a vinyl LP once to make a mould to pour a chocolate record... hey, it was uni, we were having fun! I even made a cover up and had it printed professionally. I still have the cover somewhere, it was Hot Chocolate's Greatest Hits. My point is, vacuum forming is super easy, fairly cheap to do one-off jobs, and a clear cover would look not so bad, but I couldn't live with it. It just looks super custom and 'race', so I couldn't bear hiding it. In fact, it's going to be one of the best features, sitting alongside all the other glary bits :P

[amifsud]

I didn't make them to hide the camber plate. I put them there to stop dirt and dust dirtying the engine bay and hood. I wanted to leave them open but I hate cleaning things.

[Steph]

For the record, I'm card-carrying supporter of the anti-cleaning movement!

I was just explaining this to my mum the other day. We are all (supposedly) made up of learned behaviours, and stable traits. IMO being messy is a stable trait, not something that can vary with time. I also like the idea of being stable in at least one aspect of my life! That said, I have no aversion to having my home cleaned for me, quite the opposite, I 'sub-contracted' the work out for years, when I could afford it!

There are soo many places for ingress, I can't see this making much of a difference in normal conditions ('normal' not being UK roads and weather!).

[amifsud]

Going from Adelaide weather to Melbourne weather. Adelaide is usually more stable weather wise than Melbourne. On Thursday it was 22 degrees and Sunny in the morning then it bucketed down in the afternoon. Today it's 5 degrees with a top of 13, it's freezing and it's raining. Where I am the roads are all dirty so if it rains when I'm out the car get filthy. And with me keeping the car clean on the outside as soon as I take it out it will rain, even if there are no clouds around. :D

[Steph]

Yeah, Melbourne's weather does have a reputation for being on the wet side.

I've been thinking, I have these snazzy battery terminals that come with perspex covers. I don't like them much, but I can see how they are better than having grease smeared all over the terminals. Anyway, if I were to vacuum form a clear pair, it would likely tie in with the battery terminals, and not look too out of place. The only downside would be the paint on the edge of the strut tower would chip off as it was removed and replaced, so the perspex would need to be thin enough to allow some level of stretch.

[Steph]

I managed to get the right-hand side (front) done today. It took all day, and my back is screaming at me, but I finally got to see my car semi-slammed.

It was waaay less stressful the second time around, but I wished I had pressure cleaned everything before I did the job! :P

One good thing to come out of all this, I finally have some confidence in my back. One thing with a back injury is that your muscles develop around the spine to limit movement (and pain!), so you build up rock-hard muscles from walking and protecting the raw nerve from being pinched. The abdominal muscles become super hard too, like they cramp/spasm as you walk because they're clenched so tight. One time I tried to ride the cramp out, figuring it was a bit of a break from having to concentrate on clenching the muscles all the time, but it just got worse and I had to stretch it out. The thing I've always notice when I've worked on cars is that my abdominal muscles will get sooo fatigued from all the under-the-car work, where you have to use you abdominal muscles to lift your head up, etc. Anyway, this time I didn't notice it at all, and I was able to hold myself up in positions for ages that I would have got shaky doing in the past. Even after doing both side, I have no soreness in my abdominal muscles. That's never happened to me in my life, and it's nice not to have to feel like I got punched in the guts for the next day or two! :P

So that's long winded lead in to the fact that I'm going to pull the engine and gearbox out now. All this has made me feel heaps more adventurous, so I'm going to go for it. I'm leaving the air conditioner compressor, evaporator, and hoses off for now, so I can concentrate on the engine bay, and I'll re-install it once everything is up and running. I also want to get the compressor bolts chromed, or replace with stainless, and I'm going to make a dress-up plate for the top of the compressor that will make it look really tidy. I can't believe I didn't think of it before, because I've always hated the look of it, but with a polished top-plate, and polished fittings, and polished hardware, it should look pretty cool. I also want to get the hoses remade, with the pathways chosen to keep them out of sight. The hoses are super expensive to get made up, but it's the only way I can live with keeping it in the engine bay, because I'd prefer not to have it in there at all. I love that clean, uncluttered 70s engine-bay 'look'.

It's great to finally get keen about things again, and exciting to contemplate a new engine and gearbox.

[TREVORM]

nice steph, hows the BC coil overs feel?

[Steph]

nice steph, hows the BC coil overs feel?

umm... no idea, I damaged an axle seal installing the coilovers, and rather than fix it, I just started pulling everything out of the engine bay, the motor and trans are next. I just had the guy over from the paint shop for a quote, and he's coming to pick the car up just as soon as I've finished stripping everything out, then I'm getting the engine bay resprayed, and the engine will get rebuilt at the same time, then I'm going to take my time putting it all back together. I can catch a single bus to work, and all the shops I need are local enough to ride my bike to, so I'll be without a car for a month or three, but it'll be totally worth it.

[EvoCivic]

My plan is to find a small C-section rubber moulding to slip over the 'sharp' edge.

Were you thinking of a smooth rubber moulding or maybe pinchweld? The pinchweld is textured and a little glossy but should hang on well. Here's what it will look like (ignore the lumpy bits as there are stitch welds around the outer edge of the lip pushing it out). I'd never thought of doing that but I actually quite like it.

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