By Dan VanDurmen (152.163.197.68) on Tuesday, January 29, 2002 - 02:31 pm:

Great website! About ten years ago, I owned a "78 Civic CVVC. I bought it from the son of an auto mechanic here in Tulsa. It was factory silver with black interior, 5-speed, 12" slotted rims, '85 CRXsi seats, and four almost bald tires. When I test drove it it smoked just a little when I started it but idled good with the choke out half way until it warmed up, then you could push the choke in. The owner ran a paper route in it, so it had rubber bands hanging from the turn signal switch, the shifter, and the rear view mirror. Except for some axle hop, it ran pretty good for a car with 130,000 miles on it. The body was perfectly straight with only some tiny rust spots behind the rear tires. I only paid $800 for it and took it directly to the tire shop to find that all 4 rims were bent and needed replacement. So I called the local import salvage and got 4 stock 12" rims for $30 and went and had new Michelins put on them. I drove it for about 3 months until the head gasket blew. I took it to Four-Star Honda Repair and had the head reworked, rings replaced, carb rebuilt, and all new gaskets put in. I then drove it for about 2 years then traded it in on a '91 civic DX because I was tired of getting stranded. When I would park it and then go back and try to start it in 15 minutes or so, it would'nt. The exhaust manifold would heat the fuel out of the carburetor, then it would flood, then I would kill the battery cranking on it. It also gets pretty hot in the summer here as you may know, and the A/C never did work on it. Would you beleive I miss that silly car more than any car I've ever owned? I'm going to try to find a 1200 and hybridize it a bit. People around here mainly care about trucks and Camaros, so these things can be found in back yards, fields, salvage yards, and even in the paper from time to time. I run a sales and service route that takes me about 700 miles a week, so if I find any interesting ones, i'll let you guys know. Also, i'd like to know what kind of perfomance (specs) one could expect out of a 1200 with 11to1 comp., header, dual webber dcoe, 5-speed, limited slip, hot cam, ported and polished head, hp valves and springs, elect. ign., and domed pistons? Just a ballpark figure.