mikeyds

...you should probably just buy a sports car...

Boy did I!

Hi everyone! My name's Michael, earlier this month I bought myself a black 02 s2k! Been lurking the info/FAQ threads here (holy cow the amount of information!) and decided it's time to introduce myself.

Life long Honda fan, I started out driving in an automatic 93 4 dr accord. Over the I years tuned'er up with a JDM H22A/5 speed swap, did a bit of autocross and had a lot of fun, but after an accident (and a lot of rust) slowly lost interest in the car.
I always wanted to make the CB accord my fix'em-up project and about 5 years ago bought an 07 accord coupe as a DD. Big mistake; I mean not huge, the 07's a great car (I still have it). But in my opinion, it is the definition of a pedestrian vehicle, especially with an automatic trans.
After failing to fix up the 93 for several years I sold it and started saving money, living with the fact there was no joy driving the CM accord; it was actually quite a depressing time!

So I'm browsing the web one dark night and found a "life's too short to not enjoy what you drive" thread on reddit's r/cars and though to myself; "dang right, what the heck am I doing in an automatic 07 accord!?" and got to browsing used car ads.

It was that night I found her. Everyone, meet Jenna:


Already in the short 3 weeks of ownership I've done quite a bit of work to her, but there's so much more to be done (those corroded wheels, that hole-y hood... I want a hardtop, etc!).
She's far from perfect, but boy, I am in LOVE. Never have I experienced a vehicle like this and I am so happy there's a community of people who I'm sure share many of the same experiences.

A little about me, I'm 25 and live in Columbus, Ohio, I work as a software support engineer. I play a lot of PC games (well used to, now that I own an s2k ) and dabble in electronics engineering, I love anything DIY and hope to contribute back to the community by making DIY threads in the future.

This was a fun find, anyone ever seen 225 tires mounted on the 6.5" wheels and 205s on the 7.5"s? Yep, sure explained the squirrely handling!
I mean, have you ever tried putting the rear wheels on the front hubs? They don't even fit over the hub, yet whomever mounted those tires must not have seen that as a problem.
Fixed now though, that along with the sticking S2 alpha TB and leaky testpipe, seems like the previous owner just lost interest in her like I did with my CB accord.

Anyway, I'm glad to be part of the s2ki community, here's to years of fun!

-Mikeyds

NNY S2k

Welcome to the site, you're going to enjoy the summer.
Levi

Laxhero2

Welcome and congrats!

Tougefactory

Welcome and solid pick up!

Chuck S

Dig thru the maintenance threads. Complete fluid change (including brakes, clutch, coolant) is recommended. Lots of engine oil recommendations (spec is 10W-30). A couple of guys recently have insisted on burning up their differentials with Honda Differential Oil -- not what should be used in our cars, they use gear oil. Not sure what the throttle body will do for you unless you have an aftermarket ECU.

A complete set of OEM 17" wheels from the 2004 and later cars may be easier than having yours refinished. Lower profile tires on these add some cornering ability. No need to bugger the car to mount these either.

Enjoy the car. Mine is registered in Franklin County but she's in storage right now. May see ya around this summer.

-- Chuck

rpg51

The first change I made with my ap1 (purchased last spring/summer was a set of ap2 v3 wheels and new max performance tires. If you need new tires or wheels - it is something to consider. I'm happy with the ap2 wheels and tires.

mikeyds

Thanks for the warm welcome guys!

Yeah! I that's how I spent v-day, . Oil, differential, trans, clutch, coolant, air filter, I changed everything (besides brake fluid) using information here.

I'm not a fan of the S2 TB that's on there, intake's not even port matched so who knows what good it does, but it was already on when I bought the car. Even after scrubbing with seafoam and a toothbrush it would stick closed, tried adjusting the throttle stop screw to keep it from doing so, then had rev hanging around 2-3k coming to a stop, super annoying plus it would buck like crazy and nearly stall just trying to get rolling (everyone on the road must have though I was a manual trans. noob or something.)
I took if off the car a couple days ago and lightly sanded the entire bore plus the edge of the plate, set the screw to where it won't stick and set the TPS correctly, after resetting the ecu it finally works as I'd expect. I was considering buying a stock TB from ebay, but so far so good after giving it some attention.

I like the idea of AP2 wheels, will have to start searching.

You guys should have heard the brakes. I'm not joking when I say I had four corner dolphin mating calls. Not the normal little "squeeeeeeeeee" noise, more of a "ERRRRRRWWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHEE E". Holy s*** it was bad. Hawk HP+ pads, again how I bought it, rebedding helped a little, but a buddy and I chamfered the material edges and put some squeal stop gook on the backs which solved it for now. I'm putting Honda pads on it when the time comes unless there's something better which doesn't call flipper.

Vacuum lines for the air pump got destroyed so I'm getting a cel for that now, gunna try and reverse engineer the Ballade emulator from the pics... we'll how that goes.

I think the past owner was running an AEM EMS. It had a cel for primary o2 voltage high, which was the result of the OE o2 sensor being depinned from the ecu. It had a wire ran from a uego wideband gauge, plus there was one of those AEM serial data gauges in the pillar pod I took out. Wish they left that ecu in the car, heh.

I still wonder if the previous owner posted at all on this site cause the car does/did have quite a few mods. K&N plastic intake, s2 megapower header, s2 springs (those are getting replaced with AP2 OEM springs) test pipe which I already replaced with a berk HFC.

Really the only bad parts, the drivers seat leather is wrecked and paint below the fuel door has its clearcoat stripped. I haven't driven the accord in weeks

Tougefactory

HP+ do make some noise when they are cold. Not a bad pad but not noise or dust friendly. If you want some good street pads that are better then OEM (and cheaper) feel free to PM me so we can talk about G-Loc.

Nice start so far in for more updates.

jonner