E4RTH WORM JIM

Looks so much better now that horrible Spoon half bumper is off! I guess the car hated it that much it started itself to get rid

Baldrick

Well back out of storage and the headlight is letting in water and the bulb is blown. Or so I thought.
So to strip the headlight out involves quite a bit. Wheels off, cooling panel off


Then the bumper off




Then the headlight out




Then remove wife from house, so she doesn't see the next step
Then bang in the oven like the internet says


But it doesn't fit, I cant split open like I was planning. So in the oven with a hairdryer on just to get the water out of it.


So change of plan and just seal around it like a hamfisted baker

Well, water has got into the hid unit. So I'll send off for a reconditioned one. But I won't fit it until I'm sure that it's properly sealed. So I'll be sure before it arrives. No point until it's definitely sealed

Taking the front off wasn't to difficult at all

Baldrick

Another copy and paste dump
The headlight ballast arrived a week late.... and it's the wrong one despite using the part number.

So back to Germany it goes. Pain!

The rear light is letting moisture in aswell. So o said I'd give it the same treatment as the headlight, since that worked.



But it didn't work. As soon as I applied heat to dry it and soften the existing sealant, the lamp deformed.

So it's off to a breakers to get another... what a load of pox!
It no longer sits flush and and it's gack looking... having no luck
Changed the rear light & replaced the ballast today. All done in piddling rain. All good for an nct now.

Changed the rear light & replaced the ballast today. All done in piddling rain. All good for an nct now.

Changed the rear light & replaced the ballast today. All done in piddling rain. All good for an nct now.

Nct failed on front shock imbalance of 42%

Tyre pressures were identical

So 2 new shocks are probably required


Changed the shock


And then enjoyed the weather


Haven't really done anything over the last 2 months. Including driving it. So took it out today, Nctd it.

Surprisingly it passed. The 2nd hand shock did the job.
It's killed another battery. That's one every year. The limited driving, small capacity battery on a high compression 2.0 engine doesn't help according the the tinerterweb. So I swapped to a forum recommended yausa gold battery with a 3 year warranty, high cranking power etc... it's a good bit bigger and was a mm tight fit. But it fit into the tray.

I'd managed to get the old replaced under warranty twice

Back out of storage today and on the 1st spon theres a knocking noise from the rear.... driveshafts or diff possible suspect... needs a lift and someone more knowledgeable than I

Ok, so I did my usual certified YouTube mechanic searches and the most common problem that causes a clicking to the rear is an undertorqued hub nut. It has to go to 220ftlbs and then 60 degrees... I was in wexico miles from home with no torque wrench. I arrived down to collect the car from storage and got stung to "pick stones". This was a new life skill for me... as a dub... but what else could go wrong this weekend.

I put out a call to the backroads massive (as nobody had one in stock nearby) and jk came up with one to borrow. So a round trip of one hour & I had the wrench, but now it was 9pm, so I decided to wait until the morning until i had light and a nights sleep to recover from 8 hours picking stones...

8 hours sleep, some chance, a vomiting bug swept the house. I got no sleep, I got up to go at the car and heard the dog yelping, vet called for the dog, doc called for the humans... now I can go at the car. Get the wrench and ask the bro in law for a 36mm. Socket, sorry he said I thought I had one. Que more driving around the wilds of wexford until a neighbour turns up with one, for a once inch wrench... doesn't fit the one I have, at this point I give up. I do another 1 hour trip to drop jk back his wrench and say feck it and drive home clicking away. But after about 20 minutes on the motorway it disappeared.

So I'm back home and I have ordered a torque wrench to do it at home on the driveway, now that the time pressure has elapsed.
I might order 2 new nuts as they look slightly rounded. Cant see them being to expensive
Nct passed 1st time, which is always a bonus

I also attacked the hub nut to fix the clicking. In fairness it seems to have disappeared. But for peace of mind I want to loosen and regrease it before any trackdays.

So I made the breaker bar a bit longer witha length of pipe. I couldn't get it loose. I lost my nerve when the breaker bar had an almightful bend in it. I've to concede defeat and get someone to give it a belt of an ugadugga or apply some heat.

New air filter
Oil filter
Rear hubs
Rear wheel bearings
New air cabin filter
Some of the old parts. I didn't do the work myself. A press and some heat was needed to get the bits apart.

After everything was put back together, I've noticed a metallic dunk when braking at low speed only from the rear. It's not a loud sound. But I wasnt there before. Mechanic said it's a brake pad loose. I'm not convinced. I'll swap the pads with another set I have that are new to troubleshoot it myself.

The hum of the bearing is gone
Got the aligment done after the hubs being replaced. Just went with the factory specs. Havent done a track day since the last octane one, so didnt bother with a track focused one
Original aution sheet obtained, i used a link miller had posted. It has the mileage history while the car was in japan
53500 in 2004
67800 in 2006
75767 in 2007 where it was exported from caa chubu aution house and shipped from Nishimikawa on the 17th of october 2007.
No recorded damage. Grade 4.5/5 which is good seen as it notes the non oem bumper, wheels and exhaust.
I had a brake noise coming from the rear since getting the rear bearing replaced. So i thought it might just be the pad stuck due to the shims as that had happend the fronts before with the carbon lortaine pads. So i whiped them out and this greeted me. Pity the mechanic didnt notice when he did the work.
So i swapped out the pads and took it for a spin

Thats when i realsied i hadnt diagnosed the problem. Smoking


So id say its a sticking caliper. Ive replaced the front two for simialr reason before and i have a reciept for the 2 rears from the previous owner. But the piston on the drivers side rear looks weathered compared to the rest. So its the ibvious culprit now. So ill ring around during the week and get it sorted. I forgot to take comparison snaps of the pistons
And i touched up the watercap [emoji1787]

Before

After


At least something worked out
Drove it for 5 minutes and took a temperature reading... both we about 28 before starting

Left vs right
Ive ordered a new set of pins, boots and grease for about a tenner. All came in a kit. Should be here during next week. I wouldnt get the chance to do anymore work on it between now and then.

Process of trial and elimination by cheapest parts first....
So i got around to tackling the brakes again about 2 weeks ago. Friends of mine came ocer for moral support and tea as i removed the stuck pin. Which was well and truly wedged in there. When it was eventually removed it wasnt identical to the one i had as a replacement. It was the same length, width, groves along the body were the same, but the part that seats into the housing is about a mm or so different. It feels fone in the housing and was ordered using the chassis number. So in it went, it seems fine, its not leaking grease & the brakes are operating perfectly. But for piece of mind ill order one from honda this time as they are so cheap. If its the same as the one that went in, ill keep it as a spare. The one that came out had marks on it from being removed before. So it might not be original.



I also replaced the brake fliud with this, it gets good reviews on s2000 forums from people who run fast road / track set ups. The fluid that came out wasnt too bad.





A good few bubbles came out of the caliper i had been fixing.
With everything done, i picked the young lad up from school and some idiot opened her car door into it and gave it the only marks it has on the drivers side...


2nd hand oem exhaust headshield and new bolts. The heat shield was missing when i got the car. Its never caused an issue, but i was waiting on one to show up that i could throw in. I wasnt buying a new one. This popped up for 30quid.

Need to fire it away for the winter now. Not sure where to put it this year. All suggestions welcome.

Baldrick

Changed the aux belt, all the pulleys spun silent and no side to side movement
The wear indicator is visible here. The raised section should be parrallel to the recessed part. Not a great indicator but tis something

Theres the old belt on


Had to move the airbox back slightly to get access to release the tension. Ignore the dangly torque damper. Im doing two jobs at once



New belt on

The tensioner marker is in somewhat of a better postion. I have never changed the belt in my ownership, so it was definitely due. The old one once off had some age related cracking, but no tears.

Bought a 2nd hand oem heatshield piece that was missing. It had crusty leading edge. And was a bit bent.
So it got a good cleaning with a wire wheel

Then a cardboard template was made so i could hack a hole in it to allow the torque damper to pass through it



Then it was test fitted, seems to fit. Then sprayed with some high temp paint etc to stop further rust courtesy of jokercards shed.

Here it is drying


Then fitting it was a bit of a pain, tetris swivelling to get it in with the torque damper through the hole

Baldrick

Nct fail on a rear shock imbalance of 60%. The fronts are back up to 34%
Anything over 40% is a fail. So I probably won't go down the 2nd hand route again. I'll buy new Kong struts or coilovers. I want near oem ride and height.
I'm waiting on a few places to come back to me before I decide
The driveway maths begins. Old springs when I first got it coupled with the mugen half bumper brought the front down to 80mm from the ground. This caught the driveway upon entry.

The current oem springs with the oem bumper and lip now sit at 140mm and don't catch. But the coilovers coming drop the front by 15mm and rear by 25mm at their maximum height. Which would be 125mm if left at 15mm. Should be fine.

But one for the suspension guru's here, why would coilovers drop the front less on their standard out of the box setting? I'm guessing both with have to be set at 25mm so as not to upset the balance of the car.

Who here knows the black art of corner weighting?

Baldrick

But of a copy and paste update

Ordered a set of tein. Most Irish supplier's only have ebay style stuff. Can't be arsed going to the UK for stuff, most I contacted only reorder it after you order, so with covid delays, who knows how long that'd take. Plus these have Warranty Tein have mixed reviews, as do most stuff that isn't 3k. Most of the poor seems to be people chasing seconds on track. I'm not. Most of the good reviews are from casual track day peeps, which I am. It can only be a step up from the 20 year old shocks that have put up with a lot of abuse. The car will sit at 15mm lower, which I hope will still fit up my drive way step.
The driveway maths begins. Old springs when I first got it coupled with the mugen half bumper brought the front down to 80mm from the ground. This caught the driveway upon entry.

The current oem springs with the oem bumper and lip now sit at 140mm and don't catch. But the coilovers coming drop the front by 15mm and rear by 25mm at their maximum height. Which would be 125mm if left at 15mm. Should be fine.

But one for the suspension guru's here, why would coilovers drop the front less on their standard out of the box setting? I'm guessing both with have to be set at 25mm so as not to upset the balance of the car.

Tein flex z coilovers and a front left ball joint fitted. No pics yet as it's piddling rain.

It needs alignment still, but 1st impressions are it's handling really differently. Less body roll in a simple bend, feels nice over undulations in the road, but kind of bouncy over a series of dips and rises close together. It's a section of road that's in bits and upsets any car I bring over it.

But it's still has to settle, be aligned and not be driven in torrential rain to get a good feel for it.

Alignment , NCT and a dry day awaited.


Took some measurements today from the tyre lip marking to the wheel arch as this is constant on both sides. Matching tyres / same pressure. The garage that supplied them threw them in for me. Wish I'd done it myself now as the gaps are

Front left 68.04mm Vs Front right 72.41mm
Rear left 55.85mm Vs Rear right 64.07mm

So front is 4.37mm difference side to side
Rear is 9.22mm difference side to side

Which is fairly noticible, now maybe it'll take another few days to settle. But it looks like I'll have to adjust it anyway or give in and get some to corner weight it. But the driverside gap at 72.41mm looks higher than stock height. Or in unscientific terms I can fit 4 fingers in the gap on front right side and 3 in the other side. Or am I reading to much into this.

Ill probably adjust it to be equal either side with someone sitting in it and send it to alignment for the NCT. Or maybe it'll settle evenly in the next few days magically. I was planning on trying to drop in a few more mills anyway
Pic for example



After a few days of driving, it's settled 5mm or so out of whack each side, it's getting corner weighted and alignment on Tuesday. Yesterday being the 1st dry day in a while, i got to drive it properly and lean on the suspension a bit. The handles brilliantly on smooth roads, turns in nicer, pulls out of a corner better. The rear doesn't squat like it did slightly. I never noticed it did, until it was gone. It feels like it has a better pick up when I drop a gear for an overtake as it doesn't squat. Now it is bumpier over a road with dips, at first I thought it felt unsettled. But after driving for a while & getting used to it, if I keep the shoe in it's not unsettled at all. It's just different.

I assume on track it's going to be way better. I haven't lowered it more than the 15mm at the front yet, as this is the gap upon entry to my driveway
So after watching the latest juicebox episode and his car hunting history. I went back to the car fax report I got and threw part of it up on Reddit for translation. Within a few seconds I got a reply. God bless the internet eh. So 所沢　Tokorozawa as the correct prefecture, followed by 300 across the top of the plate The hiragana isす and the two numbers were 20-00 So it had a personalized plate back in the day. For posterity and jdm scene points, I'll get a plate made up. Just need to find somewhere that will do it right. I think I'm going down a rabbit hole on Google now.

Baldrick

The car now handles better than it ever did. Stone motorsports set it up brilliantly. The last time I went for alligment, the garage said we can only do what the machine says and couldn't use the specs I had. I had brought the UK service bulletin which is supposedly more aggressive than the jap one. I was happy enough at the time on OEM suspension.
I brought the UK service bulletin to stone motorsports and he red them and explained that in his view it was still too neutral a set up and explained why I should have 1.5 degrees more toe on the front, slightly increased camber than what I was suggesting. He said he would set it they way he recommended and if I didn't like it he would change it to my specs for free.

The turn in is quicker, than car sits lower than it did. Now 30mm all round. There's definitely a difference on the road, so I can only assume it'll be better on track. Very professional set up.
Well versed in s2000s and all things motorsports. Some amount of interesting things in the workshop.



So the NCT was passed 2nd time round, as it had taken a wonky headlight beam to fail. But that wasn't before 3 missed ncts due to covid screening / isolation in our house. So that was a bit of an ordeal.

Then the roof split.




So a new one was needed. Karl conlon coach trimmers done a savage job
Well this little battery isolator stopped working. So I supposed I killed a kill switch. Ironic

The motor factors standard size was slightly to big. So a replacement was got courtesy of eBay and it's good to go. 3 bolts, easy peasy.

I've a apexi neo to fit, so instead of drilling a hole in the dash to mount it, I ordered a modifry bracket

It can also be used to mount a phone etc.

Before
After (I did get the bracket flush)

With no storage, covid, winter etc.... The car has been hooked up to a trickle charger. It's a cheap one, so if I have to disconnect the power lead to it as it's in the way or one of the kids plugs it out, I need to go get keys, pop the bonnet, hook it up, wait a few minutes, click buttons, close bonnet, lock car. Slightly laborious task at least once / twice a week.


So I upgraded to a ctek charger and mounted box on the wall to hold it.




Then I put a comfort charger port on the front so I can now plug it in / out without needing keys. A much easier solution. The connection is waterproof and has a battery charge indicator to tell you if you need to charge it.
You can see the port on the grill. I was originally going to place it in the boot, but that'd defeat the keyless idea





So after the car had its first winter outside due to covid...

The paint had little blisters where it was resprayed. Company who did it wanted nothing to do with it as it was 2 years old. It's kind of hard to make out. But I am annoyed over it. Alot of the blisters have disappeared during the good weather. Anyone any ideas how to get rid of them.

Following on from that these popped up today. If you know, you know.... They're a rare jdm only optional extra forged wheel made by BBS for the s2000. These go for about 1k second hand if they ever come up. I've only seen one set for sale in the country ever. Last night a set popped up on Facebook marketplace for the price of a good meal. I thought there was a digit missing. So a prompt 5 hour round trip to ~steal~ I mean buy was done. I'll swap these for the OEM 5 spokes I have for track days.

I also ordered a few other bits online that should land in 2 lots. One this month and one next month hopefully.

unclefester

https://www.hmgpaint.com/knowledge/k...inter%20months.

Sadly there will probably need to be a repair to fix it - i guess i was lucky, the chap who painted my car said "any issues pop it back down" and there was. His AC unit in his workshop had packed in and there was moisture in the spray lines resulting in micro blistering on two of the panels, the 2 he'd painted prior to the unit packing up were fine.

He repainted both the affected panels and all have been fine since.

Nottm_S2

I think that is the longest post I ever read
by a factor of about 50

Good work on the cat fettling