10sec got a car but it might not be a Honda...?

10sec

I haz dat teddy bear smile.
TCG Premium
Jul 26, 2008
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Yeah, it is, it's a Honda.

I've been working on this thing for a whilst now, trying to get it to be as reliable as it was when i owned it 5yrs ago.

Story time. I bought this from my friend about 7yrs ago and loved it. Daily'd it and tracked it a few times, and it was great. It has a swap that's still pretty fresh, maybe about 80-90k miles now. Well eventually that same friend had a 4DR GSR (integra) I always wanted, and it was FS. So I sold my beloved Prelude (to buy the GSR) to a kid I didn't know, but kept in touch with him over the years and told him if he were to ever sell it, LMK.

Well, he PM'd me about a month ago and said it was FS, but it was really fucked up. I won't go into details on why it was the way it was, but it sat nearly 4yrs, outside, and just wasted away.

So, I told him I'd buy it back for cheeeeap that's the only way. As I got it, the car needed...

- Power steering pump. He took off the stock one because one of the PS lines was leaking and couldn't find it. :ugh: That was A BITCH in itself because the one I got from ebay had a leaking o-ring and wouldn't stop making noise.
- Power steering pressure line. WTF of a job that was, GD-it.
- AC compressor. He took the stock one off and gutted it because it was making noise. I got a used one, of course it wasn't the right one so having time as an issue (I'm moving in 2 months to no garage) I just bought a new one from NAPA.
- EVERY brake caliper was seized to shit, needed pads and rotors, luckily I still had the pads the car had back when I owned it.
- Drivers side tint was FUUUUUCKed so bad, I had to take out the GD window in order to scrape off all of the tint, what a bitch. I of course re-tinted it.
- Driver side door handle was broken, had to take that off and modify it to work again. Stock handles are expensive AF, so fixing that was important.
- Still needs tires, I have them but they're not on yet.
- Of course with it not having working AC or PS it needed both belts.
- Needed turn signals, marker lights, and new fog lights.

It needed a bunch of shit, I can't remember everything and there's still stuff I have to do, like tires, AC re-charge after I replace a line, o2 sensor, and for some reason my oil light is on and won't go away (it has plenty of oil pressure) so there's another GD hurdle. Whatever, on to the pictures.

This is the condition it arrived in, pooooor AF. Sadly I am not good at making these threads as I don't take enough pictures, I just want to get the shit done and enjoy it. But the car was far worse than these show.

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At least here you can see how bad the roof was, it was basically white.

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The engine bay was nasty AF too, this is AFTER I power washed it and already cleaned up rusted parts. Again, I suck at remembering to take pictures, but I would say between 0-10 of how much better just these pictures are, it would be a 7 from what it was and it still looks like shit.

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So, I was waiting on base coat and clear coat, so I decided to clean it up a bit.

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Started getting the car ready for paint.

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The hood was just fucked, it would have taken me a month to flatten the thing out. He used a grinder to take off the rust (the first time, 4yrs ago) and well, I wasn't about to spend all of that time trying to make it perfect, so sadly it isn't. It's also got weight dents on it (from being leaned on) that I didn't want deal with, I can find an OEM hood some other time down the road or something. I just YOLO'd with this GD thing.

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Some primer action. If I could do it again, I wouldn't have rushed and used any rattle cans for this, they left lines that I am not sure I will be able to hide. Oh'well?

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Ohh, yeah and I tried using body filler to blend some of the dents out, yahhh that sucked and I just don't have time for that shit. Maybe some other day, but they came out OK on this side.

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First shot of base coat. I had to do this fast before my neighbors got home because the over spray goes EVERYWHERE and I live in a townhouse. TBH a lot of this was rushed because of that, there's only so many open windows I can do stuff like this without raising shit with them. I guess that's just what you gotta do when you're painting an entire car in a garage.

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2nd and 3rd coats of base.

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And 2 solid coat of clear, probably should do more but IDK. What do ya'll think? Does it need more? The gun I am using is not intended to make glass shots of clear, it's a cheap piece of shit and the clear shows it. I am pretty sure the pictures look better than in person.

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That's where I am at as of now, I still have a ways to go but hopefully I can make this a really nice car and my dependable daily again. :dunno:
 

10sec

I haz dat teddy bear smile.
TCG Premium
Jul 26, 2008
25,942
5,810
Damn. That looks like quite a handful. And props for doing all this in your townhouse garage :rofl: What are your ultimate plans for it? Get it running/driving like it used to when you owned it and just enjoy it?

Yeah, I have a very reliable Accord right now, but it's really boring. It IS a reliable car though and perfect for everything I need it to be. IF I can get the Prelude to be just as reliable I will keep it and a co-worker of mine really wants my Accord for his son's first car, so I'd sell it to him. IF I can't get it to be what it was (doubtful) I will just sell it and keep the Accord and check this as a fun ass project.

Kudos on painting in your garage. That had to be a bitch. Good progress.

Thank you :bigthumb: and it was a bitch, especially with neighbors always walking by with their judging faces and dirty looks. Also, big thanks to the association for making sure this weekend was the weekend to lay down FRESH mulch, the dust from that was extremely fun to work with. :rofl:
 

Rent Free

TCG Elite Member
Jan 26, 2015
24,407
20,261
Nowheresville North Dakota
Do you have any ventilation or fsn in the garage and did you hose the floor down?? Wet floor really helps dust.

Garage paint jobs are awesome. I love seeing people do their own work. I envy that and wish i had the time akd patience to paint that thunderbird i just got.

Itll be cool to follow this thread too.

Kudos to doing something thats not a fucking mustang or camaro or dodge whatever too!
 

cap42

Restoration Hell
Mar 22, 2005
2,763
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Bolingbrook IL
Nice work, kudos for doing this in your garage!


You can get a show car paint job in your garage but it requires a lot of work and time. I would have done 3-4 coats of clear. No gun will lay down a perfect glass like finish and there will always be trash in the paintjob. But with additional coats you can cut and buff it to a glass like finish.

Looking forward to seeing it all done.
 

1quick

TCG Elite Member
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Jan 29, 2008
26,554
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coal city
If you put the clear on thick enough so I have something to work with I can make it look like your a really good painter lol, I have a friend that paints race cars and random crap in his garage all the time he has me come and fix one once a year or so, cool project
 

10sec

I haz dat teddy bear smile.
TCG Premium
Jul 26, 2008
25,942
5,810
you're painting a vehicle in your own garage.

that's 100x more patient than most would be.

:rofl: I should thank my neighbors for not bitching at me with the clouds of red shit going past their windows for 2hrs. That was the hardest part, trying to find times to do it when they're no paying attention and trying to do it right at the same time. If I could have actually been patient, I could have done such a better job.

However this comes out, I'm crazy impressed ?

I wish I bought yours when it was less rusty. I wanted that car pretty bad but you were a jerk. :squint:
 

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