toddxxx

Time for another update on the car. I just got back from an overseas trip so not much has been happening on the car in the past couple of weeks. I've just accumulated a lot of parts to go under my bed to be installed at some point in time haha

Before the track day a few weeks ago I got over my interior and decided it needed an update. Id always hated the red components of the interior and having already swapped out my red seats for black ones a few months earlier the rest of it was bound to go at some stage. I picked up some black carpet very cheap and got a set of black floor mats made to fit the s2000. I then traded my door cards for a set of all black variants and picked up an oem passenger floor mat for free in the process.

Next up came the swapping over. Pretty straight forward and only took one afternoon. Me being me I removed all 'unnecessary' things during the change ie, carpet padding, sound deadening, heat shielding and firewall mat. Probably another 5kg there

Before



During



After



It's been sitting unfinished since I did the change 3 weeks ago but I bought some black clips to replace missing or broken clips and finish the carpet change. They arrived the day I flew out so I still haven't finished it.

To add to the new interior I purchased an AP2 radio door. Again it arrived the day I flew out so still not installed.



If you remember from the track day post I installed the ultra racing rear brace. I didn't like the white standing out against the underside of the car and for a bit more subtlety I sprayed the brace Matt black. Stops people noticing it if the car is ever looked under.

Before



Todd's backyard spray booth haha



After



With a few parts planned for the car In the future I purchased a set of hardrace reinforced front sway bar endlinks



It was my birthday last week so I picked up a couple parts there. My sister bought me an invidia 70mm test pipe for later down the track when I get around to buying a bigger exhaust



Also got this done



Still sitting in my room haha

About 2 months ago I picked up an extra boot lid for when I decide to install a gt wing. Doing so means I don't need to drill holes into my existing boot and can just run the wing on track days. The boot came with a oem lip spoiler which sold in seconds (was contemplating installing on my existing boot but nah) so the boot ended up costing me a little over nothing



Good thing I did because I purchased this as a birthday present to myself!



I'd been after this wing for months originally trying to buy off the original owner and the new owner he sold it too. It got sold to third friend and I guess he didn't like it and it was bak up for sale 3 weeks later. I jumped straight on it and it was finally one. Unfortunately it was in Melbourne but big thanks to Alex (styleofhabit) for picking it up for me and storing it at his house for a few days, Josh from sleeping performance for bringing the wing up to Sydney with him and Vinnie for organising the transport while I was overseas.

Again it's sitting under my bed not installed but full details on it once I've got around to installing it which won't be for a week or so at least as I'm off to the snow for a week tomorrow.

Extra pic of the wing next to Alex hahaha

toddxxx

With my wing stands now here I wasted no time in getting around to installing the wing. The set up is as follows
Voltex type 1 1500mm wing
245mm brackets
Standard bases

Out came the spare bootlid. I measured and marked and played around with a few different mounting positions before settling on the current location. I was a bit worried looking at the stands and felt they were a bit small but once mounted and on the car I'm very happy with the end result. I may opt to buy larger 275mm brackets in the future though.

It all came together really easily and took about 1 hour to measure, mark, re measure, re mark, re measure, re mark, drill and bolt it all together and get to back on the car.

And here is the end result









shitty photos but shitty weather atm so bad lighting for iphones
will take some better ones when the weather is a little better

Now to even out the front

toddxxx

Bought an ap1 oem lip
had to touch up a few areas on the lip because of scrapes. luckily i had some original silverstone touch up paint that came with the car. this stuff is probably 13 years old



got it mounted on the car and pulled it out for the first time in almost two months for a wash inside and out.



also fitted my half size antenna that has been sitting around. the old stock one was all bent



finally with the help of steven i got the final issue with my defi advance fixed and it now diplays rpm (if i make it) and i have a shift light!
thanks again man!


should have some big updates over the next two weeks hopefully

toddxxx

big update number 1

ill start off with a few of the smaller changes then move onto the main one.
its the long weekend and i had a few mods planned so the car went up onto stands and sat like this before the fun began



ive always hated the orange haze/reflection the amber indicators make within the housings of the ap1 headights. one possible fix is to buy osram or phillips chrome bulbs and i was actually searching online when i came across an article where a guy simply said "take out your amber indicators and spray them silver..." surely this couldnt work? decided to try it before buying a $40 set of phillips indicators and well it worked haha

before (with orange reflection)


after (without orange reflection)


already had a can of silver spray paint in the garage so cost me $0 and got rid of the annoying orange haze. stoked!

moving on over to the engine bay and i installed a couple more things there

my cusco bmc stopper came and got right onto installing that. quick and easy to assemble/install and should help with brake pedal feel at track days. keen to test it out by itself before i upgrade the whole brake system next year.



if you look closely in that pic youll notice the js racing heatshield is missing (as well as another crucial part that hints wha my next update will be ). its there to stop direct heat from the header hitting the abs unit/brake and clutch masters and affecting their performance. i bought gold reflect-a-tape for another job and decided to give the heatshield some treatment too.



queen street 24k gold dipped engine parts?



and now onto the main update
exhaust time!!!

since buying the car i had a specific exhaust in mind and was pretty much set on buying it when the time was right. the exhaust in mind was the js racing 70rs c304 stainless version.
the time came and i looked around and found a place to buy it from for a good price, checked reviews etc and was happy with my choice until i came across a post by vyets about his experience with the c304 exhaust. basically he wasnt happy with the quality of the stainless version and reordered the titanium version instead. this was an option but the titanium version is well over $2000 and with titanium being harder to fix etc i was kind of turned off that idea.
then by chance and some late night lurking a second option came up. straight away i fell in love and knew i had to get that specific exhaust instead of the js.
i loved the look of it (very similar to js 70rs but no dolphin tip), the sound was amazing, the price for what it was was amazing and seeing one before buying showed that the quality was amazing too. best of all it was a semi local product.

and here it is
BYP 70mm titanium single exit exhaust





ordered it and it arrived a couple weeks later (much better than the estimated 8-12 weeks delivery for the js exhaust) and i got straight to installing.
if youve been following my updates youll remember back at christmas my sister got me a 70mm invidia test pipe well i could finally get around to installing that too.



side by side comparison of the stock exhaust and the new exhaust. by rough calculations (online searching) the stock exhaust and cat come in at 22.5kg and 5.5kg each for a combined weight of 28kg. the new titanium exhaust sits at around 5-6kg and the invidia testpipe weighs 1.8kg for a combined weight of about 7.5kg so a huge weight difference.

it all bolted up nicely and everything was where it needed to go. a bit of adjusting of the hangers etc was required to get the exhaust to sit where i liked it and with any exhaust made for the jap s2k (which has an extra hanger) ill need to make an extra hanger to secure it nice and tight. nothing major though.

how it sits on the rear bar now



youll notice the gold reflective tape again (still need to trim/neaten up but you get the idea) on the rear bar. pretty much every aftermarket 70mm exhaust ive seen on the s2k sits really close to the rear bar and over time/when tracking the bar starts to warp/melt from the heat. hoping this will help make that not happen and protect the rear plastic a bit.

underside all covered too



and thats where were at atm

toddxxx

There's been a bit of a wait on the second big update as there was a delay on the shipping of my coils.
I was hoping they would arrive before the long weekend so I could spend that time tweaking the height etc. Of course that didn't happen so to occupy myself a bit on the monday of the long weekend I decided to install my hardrace driveshaft spacers I've had sitting around for a good 6 months now.





I originally wasn't going to install these until my driveshafts started showing signs of wear (vibrations) but boredom got the best of me and I threw them on (I guess I'll have to buy new driveshafts a little bit sooner now). Only took about half an hour all up. They're the 2 piece design so it makes the job easy.

All installed



Also trimmed up the heat tape/heat shield on the rear bumper.



Finally on Tuesday morning my coils arrived and I got straight to installing them!

For ages I was tossing up which coils to buy. I was looking at kW club sport, ohlins dfv, Cusco zero3. Pretty much every coilover kit I was interested in was around the $3000 mark. I didn't mind paying for good coils but still $3000+ is a fair bit of money and takes a while to save. One night a friend tagged me in a for sale post on a set of coils (I usually wouldn't even bother reading as I've never wanted to buy second hand coils before) but I saw who was selling so I paid a bit more attention. The more I read the more I was being swayed into buying the coils. They ticked all the boxes -They were a good brand -They had spring rates I was after -They were put up for a good price -Even though they were second hand they had only recently been checked over and rebuilt by heasmans -Most importantly I knew they were capable of achieving my desired lap times and performance needs as the car they came off is incredibly fast (1.39 round winton on street tyres fast)

The purchase was made and I was now the owner of amuse s tyre spec coilovers. On the rebuild the rear 14kg springs had been replaced with 12kg springs so the spring rates stood at 12/12 exactly what I wanted when looking at coils.



Install was easy and straightforward. Unfortunately due to time constraints with work etc I haven't had the time to properly tweak the height but this is how it's sitting atm.

2 finger gap all round (wheel to guard) 105cm front and rear (measured along sidestep extension)





It's booked in for an alignment today so I'll get that done for the mean time and adjust height when I have time next week and get another alignment done then.

For now that's probably how the car is going to stay until the start of next year. Hopefully get 1 or 2 more track days in before the end of the year and go from there.

toddxxx

okay so this past week has been track day prep

i had a few little issues i had to attend to before the day.
first of all after getting my valve cover painted i put it back on with the old gasket and it developed a slight leak in the back corner. any sort of fluid leak is a big no no at track days so i purchased a new OEM honda f20c gasket kit and good as new with no leak now

obligatory engine bay shot


went round to my mums work (where some of my larger parts are kept) and grabbed my spare boot and wing and installed them on the car. ill be testing top see how much difference the wing makes to rear end handling this track day. hoping itll help me keep higher speeds through sections.



got my orange tpms (early xmas present from my girlfriend) installed.
you can see in the pics that ive modified my centre console by removing the headlight washer button section and painting the gearknob surround silver to match the other silver highlights in the interior.









did the usual oil/oil filter change, coolant check, brake fluid/pad check and just a general check over of all the important bolts on suspension components and whatnot.

lastly i messed around with the ride height and raised the rear about 10mm to give the car more rake.
once it was all right i took it around for a wheel alignment.

car now looks like this.







finally got a new go pro hero 3+ as well so now ill be able to record my track days! yay! did a bit of playing around to find the best position to film from and quality wise.
now that all that is done time to go racing on monday

toddxxx

Third and final track day for the year done and dusted. Again it was at wakefield and this particular track day was run by EXE-Crew from melbourne. It was a very well run day with a relaxed vibe so full credit to those guys and girls. Got to race with a few friends so that always results in a fun day

Going into the trackday expectations were high. My previous pb was a 1.13.8 but since then I had got an exhaust/test pipe (weight reduction too), coilovers and of course the voltex wing. It was safe to say that I wanted to get into the 12s.
My OEM brakes were just hanging onto life though so I knew this was going to restrict me a little.

The drive down to wakefield provided me with my first issue of the day. Each time I would cruise around the 120km/h mark I'd get a vibration. If I went above 125km/h it would disappear. if I dropped down to 115km/h it would disappear. If I accelerated through the 120km/h bracket it would be non existent but as soon as I sat in that bracket the vibration would come in and out in waves.
Solution until I got to the track...don't speed

Upon arriving at the track I removed and refitted all four wheels hoping maybe they just weren't seated properly when I got my alignment and pressure sensors fitted during the week.

SESSION 1
Headed out for my first session and just cruised around trying to figure out what the issue was. Nothing. No matter how i drove the car it felt fine. Maybe it was the rims? maybe it was my rotor issue i suffered later on in the day?
Even though I wasn't pushing this session I still put down a 1.14.0 so I knew the day was going to be good regardless.

SESSION 2
I removed the wing to test the coils by themselves. This session was horrible. I was Sliding everywhere, the car felt like rubbish. I just couldn't link it together and get a clean lap. Despite this though I got a PB in this session with a 1.13.6. Nothing crazy but I was still going faster despite everything going wrong.

SESSION 3
I went back out without the wing again but had changed tyre pressures a bit and finally the car started to feel a little better. Still sliding everywhere and not getting smooth runs I again got a PB in this session with a 1.13.5.

SESSION 4
I said screw it and I put the wing on and again adjusted tyre pressures. (Having the tyre pressure system is great! Monitoring pressures and temps on the go really helped make quick adjustments which greatly benefited the car and times). I was speaking to my friends renel and david before the session and expressed my thoughts on not pushing the car as i was worried about the brakes which i knew were nearing their life expectancy. I basically decided at this stage that i would push the car hard this session and hope for the best.
The lap times started falling
1:13.5
1:13.4
1:13.2
1:13.0
then BOOM!
1:11.9

I couldn't believe it! The cars balance finally felt good and the brakes were holding up fine (to my surprise). Still i knew there was more in the car.

SESSION 5
Left tyre pressures the same as last session but adjusted the angle of the rear wing down one step.
Headed out with the same mentality as last session and pushed the car hard again. Again i watched lap times drop.
1:13.2
1:12.0
1:13.0 (messed up a few corners)
1:11.5
session cut short after this by a red flag

Upon slowing down from the last lap my whole car was shaking and vibrating. coming back in the pits the drivers side rotor had 2 slight cracks in it and due to the shaking its safe to assume the rotors are warped. Front pads are also down to right on the metal.

SESSION 6
no changes made and just took a friend out for a passenger lap. Little to no brakes and tyres didnt want to work with me so just went around and got constant 1.14s/1.13s.
i left after this session as i was happy with my times and had work that night.

All in all was a great day! Got home in one piece and nothing broke (minus brakes)
Pros
-New PB
-coils were great
-wing definitely helps with the rear end and holding it down.
-tpms is super helpful and a great investment
-still more adjustability in the wing

Cons
-brakes dead/holding me up
-limited grip of stock wheel sizes even with the rs3
-running out of gear on the back straight so having to let off earlier than id like
-slow down the straight (final drive)
-go pro overexposed the windscreen so video is pretty shitty

video below of my PB lap (lap number 2 on the video)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4CEEDEOYUo

toddxxx

okay so i went to jdmst eoym tonight so its only a matter of time before my new rim setup gets posted so ill update now.

for a while ive been tossing up rim choice regarding sizing, stagger vs square set up, colour, style etc and finally a set came up for sale that i knew would work well with the car, were light and strong (good for my tracking duties), were a square setup, already came with 245/40 rs3 so pretty much they were perfect. put a deposit down and picked them up last week once the owner had his stockies put back on.

*drumroll* haha

17x9 +40 all round
Mag blue ce28n



near new 245/40R17 hankook rs3



i got straight to work doing the bumper tab relocation needed to fit the wheels in the rear. pretty straight forward
these are the tools youll need lol



trimmed part of the plastic bumper, moved the bolt as far back as possible and redrilled a new hole, bashed the inner skin out flat to the bumper and cut the rear quarter strip all the way back to the new hole. i may cut more out at a later day before my next track day but for now its fine.
picture of the bumper tab relocation done



i was then faced with this...



time for guard work haha
the car went off to my friend frans kasuma who also does guard rolling (would highly recommend) to get my guards rolled, pulled and flared
fronts were rolled then flared 15mm out from stock
the rears were rolled then pulled 10mm out from stock.
the results were great allowing the rims to tuck into the guards even with no lowering done at this stage and both fronts and rears have almost zero ripple through them. impressive when getting the fronts that much wider.







took it home and played around with height which involved lots of measuring, remeasuring, lowering, fitting wheels and dropping to ground, wheels off, lowered more, wheels back on etc etc haha
spent like 4 hours doing all the corners to get the same height and whatnot.

got a bit crazy at one stage and decided to go hellaflush stancenation lel



meanwhile i sprayed my spare bootlid $3 spray can silver haha
looks a bit better



took the car to the movies with my gf pre alignment in the rain. was an alright drive haha



took it to get an alignment today at dst garage in castle hill. again highly recommend these guys. did a great alignment at a great price. took superb care getting the low car on/off the hoist and even got a mini photoshoot afterwards hahaha
ill post up those photos then post more of the whole set up later on with pics from tonights meet

bouford

looking good sir! in for more updates!

toddxxx

few pcs from an end of year meet back in december. Ill run this set up for a while. no new updates atm. just more track days
joe killed it with the photos as usual as did justin and steven. thanks guys