dark3630 (96 LS SE) DD

dark3630

New Member
I decided to start one of these, mostly as a journal, but to get feedback as well. I'm not sure what all I'm going to be doing with the car, but I'm sure I'll figure that out as I spend more time here. I won't be going super crazy since I need the car for my daily driving. Most of the work will be done by my dad and I in his friends garage.

The car is a 1996 Acura Integra LS Special Edition. Bought it on 10/12/12 with 190,600 miles. It's a 2-owner, never smoked in, with maintenance records going back all the way to 1996. I even have the original paper in the window from when it was sold new off the lot! Here's some pics from when I first bought the car.













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Today, 12/29/12, I changed the spark plugs and spark plug wires. Oil was leaking into the wires, so I replaced the gasket and grommets, and bought a midnight blue B20 valve cover from Charlie Moua15. Here's some pics. The smoke is from burning off the oil after fixing the leak before putting in the new plugs and wires.





Future plans:
Lower car a bit/Suspension (haven't picked any specifics yet)
Wheels (unsure of brand, looking for a dark gold finish)
Fog lights
s2k antenna
Engine rebuild, light turbo, i/h/e

Finished Plans:
New radio and speakers
Viper 2-way Alarm w/ remote start
Strut bars
 
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covert_Con

Senior Ricer
Wow, that interior is so minty!! Even cleaner than mine was when i bought it

Can't wait to see what you do with it!
 

XjoEnX

Active Member
I remember seeing your interior pics awhile ago and thought it was the cleanest tan interior ever. What did you end up doing with your original valve cover?
 

dark3630

New Member
XjoEnX said:
I remember seeing your interior pics awhile ago and thought it was the cleanest tan interior ever. What did you end up doing with your original valve cover?
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Yeah I got really lucky. Found the ad for it on craigslist 10 mins after it was posted :D

I still have the original valve cover. The garage has a parts cleaner so I cleaned it and wrapped it up. I was thinking of maybe selling it on here since I don't have a use for it anymore.
 


dark3630

New Member
I finally got a radio in, the current one stopped playing CDs and there's nothing really on the radio here. I got a Pioneer DEH-X6500BT. When I'm driving I have it hooked up to my iPod in the glove box.



I set it to an amber color so it looks like this at night:


I also bought some 194NA bulbs so I can change my gauge lights to amber. I'd like to redo all of the lights on the dash to be amber color. I should be ordering front and rear strut bars tomorrow, I'm really excited about that :D

EDIT- I'm also selling my original valve cover and a subwoofer if anyone is interested [link]. Going to use that money to help pay for my alarm.
 

dark3630

New Member
Got my gauge lights changed over to amber, now I just need to do the rest of the dash and then I'll get a picture of it. Currently talking to someone about buying their DC Sports CS-2 front and rear strut bars. Once I get that it might be a month or so before I can do anything else. My hours at work are cutting down now that the holidays are over. Looking for a new job just in case which is always fun.
 
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dark3630

New Member
Alright, got my DC Sports CS-2 front and rear struts coming in as well as Energy Suspension shifter bushings. There's a lot of play in the shifter when in gear so I want to fix that.

Also bought a ClubIntegra.com lanyard and stickers. I'm not a sticker person, so I'm not sure if I'll put that on the car (if I do it will be the only one). Oh and 12-month premium membership. Love the website and plan on staying here for quite awhile. The community is awesome and I've learned a lot already.

In the next week or two I'm going to be getting my security system in finally. I want to start looking at wheels soon too, but I'm not sure what to get. I need to do a lot of reading in this area because I don't know much when it comes to wheels and tires, lol. From the little looking around I've done, I like both of these:
Drag DR-41 Gold w/ Machined Lip
Enkei92 (Gold w/Machined Lip)
I like the look of gold or bronze on green. Kind of on the fence about about machined lips though. Any opinions or advice?

EDIT- I almost forgot, the antenna is broken so I'm trying to figure out what to do there. Can't decide whether to just plug it or put in one of those little ones like the S2K antenna. :\ Tired of looking like an RC car, lol.
 
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Swerve

Shawn
Gold looks great with Green IMO. And you have the ugliest Teg wheels ever made. Its ok I have them too :)
 

dark3630

New Member
I'm at Best Buy right now getting my alarm installed. I got my strut bars, shifter bushings, drain plugs, and ci merch the other day. Hopefully I'll be able to put those on in a few days and I'll get some pics.

After some thinking I decided to wait on the wheels. I'm going to get a subwoofer, put that in, then work on suspension. Once I've got the suspension going I'll get some wheels. Gives me time to find a good deal too.

Once I've gotten to that point I'm going to look at i/h/e. Going to take a bit of time to save up because I want to do everything right, I'm only putting quality parts in my baby :p I've also been spending a lot of time reading discussions on turbo. A light turbo setup might be fun, but I need to do a lot of engine work before that. Who knows maybe I'll just leave the engine as is, save up some money and do a swap first before turbo.

Swerve said:
Gold looks great with Green IMO. And you have the ugliest Teg wheels ever made. Its ok I have them too :)
Click to expand...
Yeah they are! Could be a lot worse though, lol.

Sent from my Samsung S3
 

dark3630

New Member
Been pretty busy lately, but I've finally gotten some stuff done in the past week. Got my shifter bushings and the two strut bars put in a and the car feels great! I got my 2-way alarm set up with remote start, use it every morning before work and I definitely feel better sleeping at night knowing she's gonna let me know if someone touches her :p

Last thing I did was hook up a sub and amp. Took me 4-5 hours to wire it all up really nice and proper. Cut out a piece of wood to mount the amp to, and it's going to sit in the trunk under the strut bar in between the wheel wells. You can see that being set up in a couple of the pics. Sounds great, but the trunk is still a bit of a mess. Once I get it cleaned up I'll take a pic of it.

















 

Ryan659

Active Member
Looks good dude. My initial thought was black interior swap but then I took a second look at that interior and changed my mind :)

Personally, I'd work on the suspension before anything else, including rims. You'll want to spend good money on suspension more than anything. And if you are seriously thinking about a turbo, skip the IHE because you'll have to replace those anyways and it'll be a waste of money.

Edit: and get a s2k antennae, or whatever the other brand is, they look nice :thumbup:
 
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