Magnus' ownership thread

[magnus_drives]

I just returned from a holiday with my wife - two weeks in Japan for our anniversary. I'm sifting through >4000 photos, and I'll share some of our car happenings when they're ready. In the meantime, I returned home to find that my personalized license plate has arrived.

Why "E9 CTR"? It's the plate that the car wore in the UK. Credit to the previous owner Mo for the second image below:

It's fun to think of the lives these cars have lived, and in the instance of this Civic it has lived on three continents and worn a number of different license plates. To be able to run the same plate on two of those continents is special and helps form a continuous thread. I did something similar with my Cayman, matching (as best as I could given California's rules) the temporary plate it wore during my European Delivery.

Two very minor adjustments today - fitted a Mugen oil cap picked up in Japan, and professionally re-died my faded steering wheel stitching. I.e., I used a red Sharpie on it.

^just a quarter of the stitches done in that image to show the before and after. The stitches soak up the ink and you can easily wipe away any overflow from the leather, great use of 5 minutes and the cost of a marker.

I went for a mid-day drive to break in the new license plate. I encountered a fellow Honda enthusiast, some rain, and some big thick clouds.

 

[Bart83]

Nice work on the stitching! great to wat keep the steering wheel original
And great pictures as usual.

Greetings from the Netherlands,

Bart

 

[Nathan Brooks]

I'm pretty late but man awesome progress, hope to see more photos of that sweet ek9

 

[magnus_drives]

Thanks chaps! I’ve been turning the wrenches and making progress over the past few weeks. My big box of parts from Blackhawk arrived, and I started with the Spoon baffled oil pan. I can’t say it’s a huge difference compared to the OEM pan - just two wings with nothing beneath. The Spoon badge is good for 5hp though.

Next up - since the header came off for the oil pan, I decided to reinstall the 5Zigen piece that came on the car.

I successfully ordered the Kansai Service low seat rail for the passenger side instead of the driver side. I don’t need it over there but I’ve installed it so that both seats will be at the same height when the driver’s side rail arrives. I haven’t measured properly but the drop appears to be on the order of 30-50mm and the parts fit well.

I decided to try a self-repair kit for a rock chip on the windshield I received recently. The kit instructions are adamant that you press down hard to make sure that you get a good seal between the windshield surface and the repair tool, so I did, and created more cracks. :-( On the upside, the epoxy filled the main area of the chip well. I’ll keep an eye on it, lesson learned for next time.

Before repair, from outside; after repair, from inside:

I’ve put about 1,000 miles on the Koni STR.T suspension and concluded that it’s not the right setup for the Type-R. My goal was “close to stock” since the OE EK9 dampers aren’t available, but the STR.T is too soft. It’s not R-specific, it’s just generic for 96-00 Civic. I probably should have gone for the Koni Sport “Yellows” instead. In any case, since I was ordering a bunch of Spoon stuff from Japan, I put in an order for the passive dampers.

The dampers came with bump stops, dust boots, and top mounts. I swapped over the stock springs. At the same time, I installed Spoon braided brake lines.

I’m happy with these dampers, they are a notch or two stiffer than OE but well-balanced with the stock springs. Also in the big box from Japan was a set of Spoon suspension bushings, mine are clunking and need replacing. I don’t plan to take that on myself, I’ll have a shop press them in, and once that’s done I’ll be able to comment on the whole package.

Mere days after taking delivery of the Civic I backed into a pole and cracked the bumper, ouch. I took the car to a body shop for quote, they’re going to take a look and see how confident they feel about repair vs. sourcing a replacement bumper. They wanted to set up an appointment so that I could come back… I told them to just take the bumper off then and there, so they did.

So I’m currently rolling around in Mad Max mode, which looks kind of cool! Shows off my new dampers.

On Saturday I replaced the OE shift linkage bushings with Energy polyurethane replacements, and swapped in a new shifter ball bushings. The bushing at the base of the shift lever was in great condition. The shift action wasn’t bad before but now it feels fantastic!

Last parts for now - I installed a Spoon braided clutch flex line (completely unnecessary) and a fresh slave cylinder, since mine was looking quite tired.

(Ignore the retainer clips installed incorrectly, I fixed it)

After bleeding the brakes and the clutch, I took the opportunity to scrub all the grime off of the rear body panels.

Next up - bumper repair, bushing replacement, and the lower driver seat rail.

 

[magnus_drives]

Good progress through July. First up was fitment of the Spoon bush set. This proved to be quite a hassle for the shop doing the work, but they persevered in the end. The owner of the shop is a friend and put the Civic on his dyno to see what the B16B can do.

161hp and 108 ft-lbs at the wheels. Not bad for a 26 year-old motor that has not been overhauled to my knowledge. I've got the CT icebox intake, 5Zigen header, and Spoon B-pipe.

Next up - the lower Kansai Service driver seat rail came in. I measured a 2"(~50mm) drop with the new rails, with the gap from top of seat to headliner growing from 7" (~180mm) to 9" (~230mm) with my seat back orientation. The change is considerable and driving felt bizarre for the first few days, but now that I am used to it, it's night and day. I am able to drop the steering wheel to a better position and there is clearance to my legs that did not exist before. I highly recommend this modification if you're having a hard time finding a good position in your EK9, possibly the best thing I've done for driving comfort and enjoyment!

Part numbers for these rails: KIH003 = driver side; KIH004 = passenger side

Back at the body shop, they successfully repaired my bumper and sprayed out a test panel for review.

I brought them my spoiler base to be refinished, since the black looked ratty. While the wing was off, I took the opportunity to clay and lightly polish the wing to get rid of some stubborn grime.

before

after

With paintwork wrapping up, I came back in to have the bumper re-fitted.

I'm happy with the way this turned out. The damage wasn't big, but it was an eyesore on an otherwise tidy car, and I wanted to correct my mistake. The wing base was refinished in Glasurit semi gloss black and also looks good as new.

Poor lighting for this photo, I'll try to capture one outside later.

Last thing - I went for a drive and took along my GoPro, Insta360, and external microphone. I stuffed the mic in the engine bay next to the intake. Please enjoy this short driving clip of one of my favorite local roads.

With the bumper and wing looking better, I'm starting to eyeball my tired trim.

 

[spikeyhairdude]

never knew there was a gasket between the wing and baseplate.

Loving the updates

 

[JEFU]

I recently met the OP (magnus_drives) on a business trip to California. Nice guy, he gave me a ride and convinced me to finally buy an EK9 myself.

Nearly 20 years ago, I had a USDM '96 EK with the d series (cx model, 13" steel wheels and no options). Always wanted to do a Type R conversion, but I was too poor. Feels nice to have achieved the dream all these years later.

Thanks to OP for helping get me started and for sharing this site with me! Your updates here are great.

 

[Nathan Brooks]

never knew there was a gasket between the wing and baseplate.

Loving the updates

Ye spikeyhairdude i have a typeR wing and i was blown away how it ia but it feels so secure once iy's in

 

[Nathan Brooks]

Good progress through July. First up was fitment of the Spoon bush set. This proved to be quite a hassle for the shop doing the work, but they persevered in the end. The owner of the shop is a friend and put the Civic on his dyno to see what the B16B can do.

161hp and 108 ft-lbs at the wheels. Not bad for a 26 year-old motor that has not been overhauled to my knowledge. I've got the CT icebox intake, 5Zigen header, and Spoon B-pipe.

Next up - the lower Kansai Service driver seat rail came in. I measured a 2"(~50mm) drop with the new rails, with the gap from top of seat to headliner growing from 7" (~180mm) to 9" (~230mm) with my seat back orientation. The change is considerable and driving felt bizarre for the first few days, but now that I am used to it, it's night and day. I am able to drop the steering wheel to a better position and there is clearance to my legs that did not exist before. I highly recommend this modification if you're having a hard time finding a good position in your EK9, possibly the best thing I've done for driving comfort and enjoyment!

Part numbers for these rails: KIH003 = driver side; KIH004 = passenger side

Back at the body shop, they successfully repaired my bumper and sprayed out a test panel for review.

I brought them my spoiler base to be refinished, since the black looked ratty. While the wing was off, I took the opportunity to clay and lightly polish the wing to get rid of some stubborn grime.

before

after

With paintwork wrapping up, I came back in to have the bumper re-fitted.

I'm happy with the way this turned out. The damage wasn't big, but it was an eyesore on an otherwise tidy car, and I wanted to correct my mistake. The wing base was refinished in Glasurit semi gloss black and also looks good as new.

Poor lighting for this photo, I'll try to capture one outside later.

Last thing - I went for a drive and took along my GoPro, Insta360, and external microphone. I stuffed the mic in the engine bay next to the intake. Please enjoy this short driving clip of one of my favorite local roads.

With the bumper and wing looking better, I'm starting to eyeball my tired trim.

Just subbed to your channel brother

 

[magnus_drives]

Car week has arrived in Monterey, California. The featured brand/marque/category at the Laguna Seca historic races this year is "JDM," and the Civic will be on display at the track Friday and Saturday. I decided to install new headlights that have been waiting in the shed.

I didn't think the originals were too bad, but side-by-side, they are certainly showing their age.

First time having the front bumper off - just a few fasteners.

I took the opportunity to scrub away the accumulated grime/undercoating.

New lamps in

Looking 10 years fresher!

I'll be back next week with a report from Laguna.

 

[Bart83]

That is u huge improvement! Nice fresh looking clean end Keep up the good work.

Greetings from the Netherlands,

Bart

 

[fretchh]

Very clean! Also picked up an EK9 in december and been working my way through similar maintenance.

Where in the world did you find the CT airbox? Have been looking for one for a while and no dice.

 

[terry_em1]

Very clean! Also picked up an EK9 in december and been working my way through similar maintenance.

Where in the world did you find the CT airbox? Have been looking for one for a while and no dice.

https://www.heeltoeauto.com/comptech-icebox-kit-99-00-civic-si-for-use-with-cold-air-intake-kit-320-020-330-120.html

They have the moulds from Comptech. I bought mine from them. Just Google man

 

[magnus_drives]

That's the place!