Kurt Bosnell's 1978 Honda Civic
The car is a 78 Civic trunk model that was brought up from Bellingham, Washington. I love the trunk models (more retro) and they seem to be harder to find then the hatches.
Funny that the hatch was the option? The car was apparently parked under some trees, hence the layer of green. Once I got it home I completely gutted it and pressure washed the interior along with some bleach to get rid of that mildew smell.
I actually found a nest up in the dash on the top of the glove box. Once the interior was stripped and washed it was sanded for paint (I then put the interior back in so it could pass inspection before the shell was painted).
The engine was next. The stock one was pulled, the bay was pressure washed and then sanded and primed for paint. I ended up buying a unique green (like Heinekin green) from a 98 Volkswagen Golf. I have never seen the color in Canada. The bay was then painted.
From there I installed a Canadian EL 1600. The motor has a reground camshaft, header and downdraft Weber along with a Chromed valve cover to spruce it up.
I am currently looking for a dual side draft manifold for dual carburetors. I will be using a radiator from a Volkswagen. and a Mallory CD Ignition module and an MSD blaster coil.
The brakes were upgraded to a set of 'custom' cross drilled rotors (done on standard Brembo rotors). The suspension has been lowered about two inches and a set of front Addco rear sway bars were obtained to beef up handling. The wheels are a set of aluminum 13"x5" mag wheels with 185/60R13 tires. As for interior, I have gone with a set of prelude seats, a rare dealer option leather Honda steering wheel, a Momo shift knob and Type R pedals modified to fit the skinny stock pedals.
I have deluxe gauges and am in the process of removing the wood grain for some faux carbon fiber. As for the outside it will be that cool green and I am fitting it with the bumpers, grill, hood and all red tail lights from the earlier models (I had a 77 parts car).
The bumper mounts are also 'shortened' so the bumpers don't stick out so much. I will be using the all chrome 78-79 mirrors (yes, I have a passenger side mirror too!) and have converted the sealed beam headlights to those new H4's. I still have to have 2" exhaust fitted to the car and finalize some bugs. Once its running I can then have it inspected and register it
here in Canada. From there I will strip it (minus the engine bay) and send it away for paint.
I was also able to get a hold of a rare GL emblem from Hiroshi Kawai from the Civic SB-1 club in Japan. The GL and RS emblems fit in the 'Hondamatic' spot on the rear.
From Roadsailing
'78 Honda Civic RestorationThe car was located on January 25, 2003 near Bellingham, Washington sitting under some trees. A layer of dirt and moss had grown on the outside of the car and the Washington plates showed that it was last on the road in 2000. Despite the rough appearance the floor, sills and rockers were solid making it a perfect base to start my project. Kyle, from www.civic1200.com was kind enough to import the car through Canada customs and a few weeks later I trailer ed it home to Hope, BC - Canada.
The interior had clearly seen better days. Fortunately Kyle cleaned most of it out for me prior to bringing it home but I still found a rodents nest was up under the dash on top of the glove box! Once it was home I gutted the rest and scrubbed it down with bleach and 'Comet' toilet cleaner to rid it of the old stagnant car smell. The interior was then pressure washed and allowed to dry. Upon reassembly the only piece of the interior that was reused was the main portion of the dash.
The engine was a stock EB-1 (1200) motor that someone had swapped in as opposed to the stock EB-3
The motor was pulled, the bay was pressure washed and then sanded and primed for paint.
The bay was then sprayed with a Heineken green paint which is actually 'bright surf metallic green' from a '97-98 VW Golf. I have never seen the paint colour in Canada (European?)
The motor is an '81 Canadian (non CVCC) EL 1600 from the early Accord and Prelude. The transmission is a GK designation transmission (5 speed) taken from an 82-83 model as it has the cable clutch as opposed to the hydraulic clutch found on the earlier models. The transmission has slightly higher gearing than the Civic 5 speeds but seems balanced well to the power of the car.
The motor, as pictured, has stock internals except for a Shadbolt camshaft. Add ons include a Pace Setter header, Weber 32/36 carburetor, Taylor 8mm wires and a polished distributor and chromed valve cover to spruce it up. The block was also sanded down and painted with a high temp metallic grey paint. More specs here
With the motor installed and running the car was put back together 'temporarily' so that I could get it through inspection. I tracked down a few sets of deluxe gauges in wrecked cars so I added these. The leather steering wheel is actually a Honda dealer accessory that I acquired when I bought the motor. At this point it needs recovering. I also modified some Type R pedals to fit the skinny stock ones. For comfort I installed a set of Prelude buckets and a Momo shift knob.
A tracked down a bunch of mint condition body parts that had been sitting in a loft of a barn for years. I found them through the local Buy & Sell Paper and were only listed as old Honda parts. I scooped the lot and a motor for $80! Unfortunately there was only one fender so I had to have two good fenders shipped from Calgary, Alberta. The shipping cost as much as the fenders. To preserve the body the under body was completely undercoated (for the second time!)
The wheels on the car are a set of polished 13x5.5 Shelby wheels wrapped with 185/60R13 H rated tires. The stock springs were chopped down so the car rides a 2" lower than stock and is stiff enough for decent handling without the bounce of a lowrider.
A/T Engineering front and rear away bars were acquired from a former Civic racer and were later bolted on underneath to spruce up handling. The front bar replaces the stock one while the rear bar mounts to the lower control arms and wraps around the gas tank.
New lower control arms with new ball joints and new tie rod ends were installed. The brakes were also replaced. Cross drilled rotors are unavailable for the first gens so a template was made from Brembo Dodge Neon cross drilled rotors. Standard Brembo rotors were purchased and the pattern was center punched into the new rotors. A drill press was then used to drill the pattern out. The hubs were then sandblasted, clear coated and reassembled with new bearings and seals.
With the car passing inspection the interior was again stripped and the floor of the shell and trunk was sprayed with spray on truck bed-liner to further protect it from rust. The doors, hinges and all the windows (minus the front windshield) were removed and the interior of the shell and trunk was sanded down, primed and painted the same green.
Upon reassembling the interior I replaced the standard gauge faces with some custom white faces that were made wth photo shop. The stock would grain sticker on the dash was also replaced with faux carbon fiber that is commonly used for number plate backgrounds in motocross. New underlay and black automotive carpet was then installed
I had the 78 bumper shocks modified so that the all chrome 77 bumpers could be mounted onto the car. I had to drill some new holes in the Radiator support and make some rubber bushings (for height) to mount the 77 hood. I also used the earlier grill and all red tail lights. The standard grill mounted turn signals were ditched and the side marker lights were wired so that they would blink with the turn signal switch. The reverse lights were ditched completely and the red side marker lights and emblem holes were later shaved by the body shop.
Here is what was left of my parts car before it was towed away. It was a '77 trunk model but the body and floor was far too gone for restoring. OF course I didn't see this until it was time to remove the body filler and fiberglass. Someone had actually used heater ducting to pop rivet over the rust spots! The interior was mint though so I made use of it for the '78.
The car was then prepped for the body shop assuring all the holes were in place for the new mirrors and making sure all the body panels were aligned. I also removed the colour finish on the bumpers for an all chrome appearance and ditched the rubber bumper guards.
By April, 2004 the car was insured and upon airing up the flat tires the car made the 2 hour drive to Vancouver where the body work and paint was completed by Andre's Collision:
While the car was in the shop (1 month) I finally tracked down an A/T Engineering intake manifold from California that would allow fitting of a dual carburetor set up. After some research I went with a set of Dellorto DHLA 40's (32mm chokes) that I had shipped from Italy. Both the intake and carburetor were polished to match up with the chromed valve cover. As the car wold be driven on dry days the carburetor were mated with a set of chrome velocity stacks in the place of air filters.
With the paint and body complete I could finally complete the rest of the car. The interior was only half installed after the inspection so the headliner was replaced along with a rare overhead console and a rare set of roof mounted Pioneer Honda speakers. I also installed a Factory Honda AM/FM Radio and intermittent wipers out of a first generation Accord.
I tracked down a set of new door seals from on line auctions and had modified a NOS hatch seal for the trunk seal. I also mounted a set of chromed bullet mirrors on the doors as they were more practical than the stock mirrors (I found that the optional passenger side mirror faced the sky most the time).
The trunk was then completed. I installed a NOS seal around the trunk opening and installed a set of plastic panels from the hatch model that I had previously altered to fit the trunk. Honda had just left the trunk open but I wanted a clean look. A polished 12" factory aluminum wheel was used for the spare. I made a false floor that sat about 4" above the spare so that I could later install an amp under a sheet of smoked plexiglass to finish off the look. The floor and back seat of the trunk were then covered with the same black carpet as the interior.
With that the completion of the project was complete for 2004. I did have the alignment done and added a glass pack muffler to the exhaust (to act as a resonator). The car is now off the road for the winter. During this time I plan to install a stereo, factory air conditioning a roll bar behind the front seats and make a short shifter for quicker shifts. I recently bought some Panasport wheels so I plan on refinishing these in silver for next summer. Additional pictures to be added as changes are made.
75 - '77 Bumper Caps
If you want to make your car look as clean as possible one of the things to do is to remove the large rubberbump stops from the bumpers. The obvious problem in doing this with the 75-77 bumpers is the large
hole that is left exposing the nut that is used to mount the bumper to the mount. Justin and Twyla March
discovered a way to cover up the holes:
Here is a pic of the bump stop removed. Its not too bad ( I drove around with it like this for 2 seasons). The caps used were not readily available in Canada but I was able to find some.....
The caps I found are from Rona (here in Canada) They are polished stainless steel "Master plumber" caps
used for blocking holes in sinks when doing plumbing work. The skew number is 452 and they are 1-1/2" size
caps. I was never able to find them at Home Depot.
The caps come out of the bag with a blue plastic coating to protect the polished stainless. To install you have to very slightly bend in the metal tabs as they fit a little large. Don't bend them in too much or they fit too loose. Then just lightly tap in with a rubber mallet and they pop right in.
Done. It takes all of minutes and they fit perfectly. The bonus is they are stainless so like everything else
with these cars they will never rust.
