Prior Proper Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance

      I've been on a kick of ordering then double and triple checking to make sure i have all the parts I need. Its more bookwork and shop keeping than anything. Theres so many small details that require research before committing too that its easily to get overwhelmed. Now imagine those details effecting future details..  you end up with information paralysis.  This is even without mentioning the money thats involved. 

 There quite a bit of time and effort and cash invested even before the parts get on the car. 

  There have been some "turn on a dime" changes that are inevitable when in a build like this. Things pop up, You come across a deal or you shift your expectation one way or the other and have to adjust for it.

I've said before that this has been an exercise in "while your in there, you may as well" this can quickly snowball into a monster and cause you to lose heart.

   When I bought the car it purpose of it was track beater; I would take care of it, but not wax and polish. had it showed up in better condition (re: actually drivable) it certainly would not have be the build it is today.

 As I pulled stuff off of it I realized there was more and more 'stuff' that i couldn't not fix. 

  The whole arrival/realization/tear down I could categorize as 'Phase 1'

Phase 2 started when I was forced to re-imagine what i wanted this car to be, I was no longer building off a platform but starting from scratch.

  Herein laid the quandary.

The goodnews is: "You can do anything" 

The badnews is: "You can do anything"

So what do I do? Do I take the garden path to la-la land and wait for super rare unobtainable parts and build a gilded chariot that my conscious wont let me drive 10/10ths? 

eh, No. After all Ive got the NSX for that.

  Its not a matter of cutting corners but rather treading into territories not on the map for very minimal return. 

 I took a step back, considered, and reaffirmed my original plan.

If it wont increase safety, reliability or make driving any more fun then, eh. 

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While I waiting on more parts and fab-work I decided now was a good time to pull off the valve cover and check was was going on below

Valve train looks extremely good, cams look brand new and all the factory markings are are still lined up. I was told the motor was 40k old and I am inclined to believe it from the looks of things up top.

Plugs on the other hand.... yikes

Sure enough, the AEM tune was causing the car to run like total CRAP. I felt this the very first time I sat in it.... and again when i tried to do hoon some doughnuts in front of my house for a victory celebration after I got it registered... It couldn't even brake the wheels loose. pitiful.

On the pic below you can see from the grounding strap how far down the carbon starts to build, that is a sure sign of too much advanced timing. The thick black carbon build up around the ring indicates lots of unburnt fuel. The fuel is unburnt becasue the plug fires before all the gas had a chance to mix in the chamber, some ignites but most doesn't and you get this.

This can also be caused by the plug temperature being too low, but I can rule that out for two reasons:

 1- The plus is an OEM honda part, they tend to know what they are doing.
 2- You can see some heat discoloration on the threads themselves, also if you you look at the stem of the plug under the lettering you can almost see some bubbling. That wouldn't occur if it was not getting hot enough.

Im going back to an OEM ecu so I don't have to deal with these types of problems anymore.

You can also see that the plug has an (s) on the end of the NGK partnumber- that means that the motor is out of an 03+ or the plugs are newer and were replaced well under the recommended service life. I know this because Honda had an FSB (basically a recall without calling it a recall) on spark plugs on 03.  They replaced them with plugs that have stainless crush washer and the "s" on the part number. I've yet too run the motor VIN and verify the info but its nice to know, initially at least, the story i was told is adding up.


After poking around and coming up with yet another parts list of stuff to order I remounted the new valve cover. I know I said I wouldn't until the motor was in the car but there was no way I was going to put the old one back on. I figure ill just strip and paint the other one too in another color and figure out which one I want to end up running down the line.

 After admiring that pretty sight.  Moved the transmission outside so I could clean it. it been bugging me how filthy it is. The process is straight forward and its nice to see results.

Its hard too see in the pictures but it was filthy where the filler holes were leaking and where oil had whipped up under the car into the crevasses. There was also what felt like road salt on the top in some of the groves.

Clean and fresh!

still drying in the pic but it looks almost new again.

I got more parts in the mail to go over and things are heating up on the chassis side. Ill post a couple pic but expect a proper update on this soon..