November 12th, 2024 - The Year In Review (20 Summers in Canada for my JDM EF8)

November 12th, 2024 - The Year In Review (20 Summers in Canada for my JDM EF8)

A Rough Start

The 2023 driving season, and how it ended, stuck with me for a significant portion of the remainder of 2023 and seeped into the first little bit of 2024. It wasn't just the end of the season but the challenges throughout the year. The failed attempt to get the body work done on the car made the whole 2023 season feel "on hold" in a way. I didn't want to put all the good parts back on, only to take them off again in a few month's time. I mean, really, that's the big reason I chose the "assemble all the parts and install all at once" strategy. Like "Friends" says... it seemed like I was stuck in 2nd gear. 

In hindsight, maybe I was feeling a little bit sorry for myself. I'd gotten so excited over the prospect of having the body work done that I felt very disappointed when the car was returned relatively untouched. I think I had myself a bit of a pity-party where I was the guest of honor. 

2024

One of the first mods of 2024 started out while I was watching Instagram. I don't make it a habit of buying things from sponsored ads on social media but this one was just too interesting to ignore. I've been looking for a cell phone holder that will not use adhesives that will damage the interior, is easily removable or blends in so that it can remain in place at shows without taking away from the 1980s/90s aesthetic of the CR-X's interior and, of course, is functional and durable. This mount from a company called Carmount checked all of these boxes for me.

I bought a set of two during their Black Friday sale and it fit my dash clock block-off plate that I'd found at a wrecking yard in Vancouver way back in the late 1990s. It fit perfectly, and the weight of the cellphone doesn't make the vents shift position at all. And if the adhesive ruins the plastic, it's just the block off plate that's ruined.

One afternoon, I finally decided enough was enough. I needed to get the project rolling again and get more parts installed. I assembled a list of some "easy wins" - some pieces that I could install myself that would re-ignite the passion that had been waning a little bit. since the end of 2023. 

The first on the list was the Fujitsubo exhaust manifold install. I figured I could probably do that one if the rust wasn't too bad. And it wasn't bad. 

You can see my blog post about the details of the install here.

Yokohama Advan Neova AD09

The tires on my CR-X were the tires it arrived in Canada with... 19 years ago. Well beyond the acceptable age for spirited driving and not safe. It was time to replace them. New tires were something on my radar since 2019. Still long overdue even way back when Covid hit in early 2020 before the driving season it really didn't feel like a priority anymore. Plus I wasn't driving the CR-X and didn't for the next 2 years. I put the tire search on the back-burner. 

That delay turned out to be very fortunate for me. In early 2022 I saw that Advan was releasing the AD09 tires in Japan and eventually North America - and when I checked the sizes, they made a 195/55R15. The CR-X arrived with Yokohama DNA Grand Prix up front and AD07s out back. I've always liked the Yokohama tires so it seemed like a safe bet I'd like the AD09s as well. 

I picked up a set of four Advans, not only on sale, but with a $100 rebate on top of that. By the time I got them mounted and balanced, and took the car in for the wheel alignment, I was able to use the $100 rebate to help pay for it. And the alignment took care of something else on my To-Do list... I'd wanted to get one done ever since I'd switched to the Tein suspension and lowered the car. Though, technically, the Tein Street Advance setup actually raised the car by a few millimeters. 

Caution: Speed Bumps Ahead - The (Not So) Easy Wins

When planning out the exhaust manifold install, I looked at what other "easy wins" I could make while under the car. I didn't quite have enough room to squeeze under for the C's shifter installation and the Cusco front lower bar installation didn't go so well either. It was clear that the lower control arm bolts needed more torque than I could muster with a ratchet alone and the car wasn't high enough to use my 3ft breaker bar. I also struck out trying to get close enough to get the temperature sensor out of the OEM catalytic converter so I could install my test pipe. 

All-in-all, not the tremendous start to the season I'd hoped for, but getting the header finished was enough to keep me motivated. Setting those projects aside I looked for some more "easy wins". 

While the car was in the air, I decided to do an oil change on the CR-X before the driving season began. Armed with a flashlight and laying on my back under the CR-X, I just happened to catch a glimpse of something up on the intake manifold. It looked like coolant was leaking from the IACV. It does explain some of the rough idling I'd been experiencing. 

On a side note: I bought one of these screw-on funnels that attaches to the valve cover. Total game changer. I love it! Highly recommend it!

Next, I looked toward the Honda Verno windshield banner I bought last year for my CR-X's "birthday". 

I know that I'm not great at installing decals, so I got some quick over the phone estimates. The shops I called only wanted about $80Cdn to install it, so I figured with the cost to replace it when (not if, but when) I mess it up, it was a no brainer.  

I lined it up on the windshield and got inside the car to have a look and I wasn't all that pleased with how much my visibility was reduced. I don't know if I have a long torso or what the issue is, but I'm just not comfortable with how much the visibility has been reduced. Other folks online haven't complained about theirs, so I'm going to have to think about whether I want to install it or not. 

Undaunted, I moved on to the next item on my "easy win" list, adding the gas cap holder to my fuel door. Previously, I'd mocked it up and test-fitted the piece to ensure the placement wouldn't interfere with closure or accidental closure with the lid attached. Once I had it lined up I made a block to help with installation. 

Where it lined up crossed over the decals on my fuel door, and being the sentimental old fool that I am, I didn't want to do anything to interfere with that so I bought another fuel door from Yahoo Japan. My plan was to strip the decal using some 3M adhesive remover, a product I'd used before, then attach the gas cap holder, re-apply the JDM fuel door decal and then install the new fuel door. An "easy win" for about 1-2hrs worth of time. 

Wrong.

The 3M adhesive remover removed more than just the decal. All the paint came with it too. Very glad I didn't try to use this on something more visible first. 

I picked up a rattle can color-matched to the NH526-M code and some primer and went to work masking and prepping the fuel door for some paint. It turned out pretty good, the gas cap holder and decal installations went fine. 

The installation of the fuel door went less than perfect, but it's installed and opens and closes fine. She will need some adjustment from a professional, or at least someone with a little more patience than I have but for now it's a fantastic addition to the CR-X that makes it a little more enjoyable at fill-up time. 

I'm still not sure where I sit with the decal installation. Some days I want to give it a try and make a decision after I've had a chance to drive with it for a bit, and some times I don't want to bother with it. We'll see what happens in 2025.

For the IACV issue with the leaking coolant, I grabbed another PR3 unit off of eBay to clean and rebuild so I wouldn't have to take the CR-X off the road. The gaskets for the PR3 are available separately from Honda and, best of all, still available. 

None of these set-backs were a really big deal, and I know that stuff like this happens with every project. If it had happened a year earlier I might have been more bothered by all the set-backs lining up so close together after having the car returned from the body shop without having been worked on. This year was different and I was in a much better place mentally to deal with the adversity and rise to the challenges. Plus, there were a couple of "easy wins" that actually were easy. 

The (Actually) Easy Wins

My Spoon upper strut brace bolt had always been a tad too long. I attached some foam tape to the bar so that the A/C line running nearby wouldn't rub and get a hole in it. This year I went and picked up a slightly shorter bolt. I'm still running the foam tape to be safe, but the risk of damage to the A/C line is definitely a lot lower. Don't know why I didn't do this before, it's just one of those things you don't really think about, I guess.

Another easy win that ended up working out well was swapping the surround for the dash light dimmer switch, or as Honda calls it, the "key". I found a used one from Japan in much better condition and not as faded. Sure, I could have painted the faded one, but this one will likely take years to fade to the same condition seeing as my CR-X is a Garage Queen and painting is still an option.

Long time readers of the blog may remember that I had my headlights sort of "custom built" from a combination of RHD EE8 glass headlights from the UK and LHD glass headlights from a German EE8. Well, some of the sealant had oozed out when the glass and plastic were assembled, and when the headlights were on it heated the sealant which stuck to the hood seal and damaged it. Not destroyed but caused a small tear where the plastic tab sits in a couple spots. I think I can repair the rubber, but for the time being I removed the hood seal. I did that in 2023. This year I took a razor blade and carefully trimmed the excess butyl sealant from around the headlights, then drove the car around at night a few times and re-checked and removed anything else that seemed too sticky. 

I think I'm in a good spot to be able to repair and re-attached the hood seal without any further problems. 

As summer turned to fall, I didn't like how many of these supposed "easy wins" were still left unresolved from the To-Do list. I didn't want to leave 2024 with so much left undone and so many loose ends to tie up. I knew that I could do the remaining installs myself, but I didn't have the ability to get the car high enough in the garage to do it. 

I took a random Friday off of work, packed up a bunch of tools into the CR-X and went to a place called U-Wrench about 15 minutes from my house, and rented a hoist for the morning to finish off a few things.

To give the exhaust a little more time to cool down, the first item on the list was installing the Cusco front lower brace. The bolts came off using easily with the 3ft breaker bar, and to my surprise, were not rusted on at all. They looked in amazing condition considering the age of the car, and how long they were (potentially) on for. I replaced the bolts with brand new Honda ones anyways to be safe, and the installation took only about 30mins or so. 

The exhaust was still warm but could be touched and held easily with bare hands, so I moved on to the removal of the catalytic converter. I soaked the sensor threads with the WD-40 rust penetrant, but I wasn't comfortable with the grip I was getting from the 19mm wrench I had brought. The wrench is fairly long because I wanted decent torque, but that caused problems clearing the body of the car, and I ended up having to to hold it at an awkward angle and risked rounding off the sensor. 

I erred on the side of caution and chose to table the test pipe install for next year. 

The C's shifter was the third and final project of the day.

According to the instructions for the C's shifter, the counterweight on the shift rod would need to be cut off for proper fitment. Not wanting to create additional downtime by removing the counterweight from the shift stabilizer rod already on my CR-X, I found a replacement shift rod set for a cheap price on Yahoo Japan. 

Earlier in spring of 2024, I went to visit an old friend for the day, and he helped me cut off the counterweight on the replacement shift lever. Again, this was per the instructions for the C's shifter. I sanded it down a bit more to make it more rounded and then painted the bare metal to help prevent rust, and had to enlist some assistance to get the round bushing installed in the end of the stabilizer rod. 

The C's shifter installation took by far the longest of the jobs to complete that day. In hindsight, I should have installed the C's shifter onto the rod before I went to the shop, but at the time I thought it would be easier to transport separated so I wouldn't get lithium grease everywhere in the interior of the CR-X. 

I had picked up some Mugen shifter bushings to go along with the C's shifter and had them installed prior to going to the shop, and I also picked up some new hardware from Honda. 

Speaking of the new hardware from Honda, here's where we are going to have to go back a little further in time to explain something odd about my CR-X that I will need to have fixed in 2025... 

In 2005, when I first installed the B&M dual bend shifter, I was tightening down the stabilizer rod to the transmission when the bolt suddenly got quite loose before it was properly torqued. I'd thought I'd done something wrong, so I added some loc-tite and tightened it down as far as I'd dared, and I drove like that for 19 years. 

Later, in the spring of 2025 when I was under the car working on the header install, I decided to check on that stabilizer bolt situation, knowing that the C's install was something I was planning to tackle this year. What I found was that it wasn't my fault the bolt stripped. Not at all. It was one of the previous owners of the CR-X who had, in fact, damaged the threads on the transmission housing, and then used a longer bolt and a washer to try and "fix it". When I ordered the hardware from Honda, I couldn't figure out why the replacement bolt was much shorter than the one that was on my CR-X, and why I had a couple extra washers that shouldn't be there. You can see the extra washers in the photo below:

I chased the threads with a tap and again, tightened the proper sized bolt as best I dared, this time, minus the loc-tite, thinking the C's installation was going to be a lot sooner than it ended up being. Long story short, I will fix it properly with a Time-Sert but some other things will need to done first before I can get to that. I'm hoping for sometime in 2025 or early 2026. 

Back in the U-Wrench shop, I was able to quickly remove the old B&M dual bend shifter/shift rods. Using the recommended 8mm pin punch from the OE Honda shop manual, the notorious bitch pin came out with relative ease using a few taps with a rubber mallet. 

I installed the C's shift lever onto the replacement shift rods, one of which I had the counterweight removed from, per the instructions. 

I wanted to install the spacers on the OE heat shields as recommended by the C's instructions. Again, in what I can only describe as a miracle, there were NO RUSTED BOLTS on the underside of this 35 year old CR-X -- from Northern Japan! My understanding is that Northern Japan gets a decent amount of snowfall annually and therefore uses a lot of salt on their roads. Moreso that in other areas like Central and Southern Japan. I'm very happy that my CR-X is so easy to work on. I'm sure it also helps that she has barely seen any inclimate weather in the past 20 years in Canada - only a couple of rainy days, and never winter driven.

I have to admit, though, I spent far too long trying to get these heat shield spacers installed. I just could NOT seem to get them to fit right, even with the provided washers. 

Eventually, I took a break from trying to install the spacers and used the opportunity of the dismantled heat shields to squeeze the lever and rods up into place and bolt it in. 

With the lever and shift rods in place it was very apparent that using the stock bolts without spacers would cause absolutely no issues to the operation of the shifter whatsoever. That said, I just HAD to try one last time to install them before giving up on them for good. 

The bitch pin and retainer went back on just as easily as they came off, and the rubber boot that covers them didn't tear so I didn't need to use the back-up I'd bought at Honda. Into the spare parts bin it goes!

All in all, it was a great day. I felt very accomplished and it took 3hrs and 45mins to install both the Cusco front lower bar and the shifter. Originally I'd planned for 4hrs to do all 3 tasks, but it had been almost 20 years since I'd done a shifter install, so I was slower than I used to be. Overall though, despite the challenges, I think I did pretty well. The way I figure it: how "rusty" I was at doing the shifter installation offset how "rusty" the CR-X wasn't. haha  

Miscellaneous Easy Wins

Another thing of note that I did this year was to rattle can paint the ViS front bumper. 

I knew I wanted to run the ViS Mugen rep front bumper this year but I also knew that I didn't want to be faced with driving around with a primer gray bumper again. I definitely wasn't about to give up more of the driving season to having my car in the body shop, so this seemed like a pretty decent compromise. I only put on two light coats of color-matched NH526-M and no clear because I didn't want to cause too much extra work when I eventually get it in for paint and body work, but I wanted it painted so it wouldn't stand out like a sore thumb like the primer gray did. 

Again, it's not perfect, but I think it looks much better than the primer gray until I get the final fitment and paint done.

I had a lot of luck one night back in May when, late in the evening, I loaded up Yahoo Japan and discovered a super rare part at an unbelievable price. I actually had to check a couple of times to make sure I was doing the Yen conversion properly in my head. 

A Honda Access Glasstop Sunshade for 20,000¥ or $175Cdn (~$125USD at the time)

Forever the skeptic, I read the listing twice to make sure I wasn't missing something - It felt too good to be true. Still not quite believing what I was seeing, I took the chance and bought it. What I didn't realize until after I bought the sunshade was the the listing was only "live" for seven minutes from the time I first saw it until the time I clicked Buy It Now. Truly a story of being in the right place at the right time. 

A Glimpse Into 2025 Plans

In September, I noticed that a Powerstop brake package I'd had my eye on kept going down in price on Amazon. 

It started out at around $450 Cdn, and it kept dropping in price every week or so until it finally hit $182 Cdn. At that price, I couldn't pass it up. I can't buy OEM equivalent brakes for that price, let alone slotted/drilled rotors with ceramic pads. 

I had to triple check that the 1990/91 Acura Integra from North America used the same brake pads and rotors on all four corners as my non-ABS EF8, which they did. I used a combination of sources including the Honda Japan EPC and Brembo's OE cross-reference and put all my work in a spreadsheet for easy reference later on (I'm such a nerd).

This will be one of my first projects for 2025. I will be getting some OEM hardware to go along with, and have my eye on either a set of Endless or Feel's steel braided brake lines. Will be a fun little project, and while I have flushed the brake fluid quite a few times since 2005, this will be the first time the brakes will have been done under my watch. While doing that, I thought about swapping my e-brake handle for the new in box Honda one that I bought years ago. 

One of the other items on the list for 2025 is to get the time-sert replacement threads for the stabilizer rod end, and also find someone to install them. I need to get some replacement gaskets, hardware (nuts and studs) for the Fujitsubo pipe first to have on hand just in case, but I think it should be an easy job with that pipe removed.

Another item on the list is getting a rear lower bar, similar to the front lower bar that I installed this year. I've heard that there's a company called M&M Honda in Japan that's quite reputable and they make one specifically for the EF8. 

I'd like to get the 3D printed auto climate control replacement panel and swap the parts over. I wanted to do that in 2024 but the timing just never seemed right. If timing permits in 2025, I'd like to look into replacing the O-Rings in the AC system and recharging it, swapping the R12 for R134a, though I suspect I'll need a new compressor with my luck. 

I really want to take another stab at swapping to the test-pipe to see how it goes. I'm not 100% sold on it, since I've heard some stories online about exhaust smell and about the exhaust note becoming significantly louder with a test pipe installed. I guess we'll see. I think if nothing else, I'll have removed and reinstalled the sensor so I know it won't be rusted on too badly.

The hood seal replacement/repair is another small project I'd like to tackle, as well as the replacement of some discolored piece of windshield washer tube. 

The headlights also need adjusting next year. The beam is not angled correctly at all and it makes it a pain in the butt to drive at night. One of the challenges to adjusting the headlights is that I have to remove them from the car every time I want adjust the beam, then re-install and test. Not a lot of fun. 

The glovebox that came with the CR-X from Japan is actually from an 88/89 and as any CRX/CR-X aficionado knows, the 88/89 interior black (NH83L - Off Black) is slightly different color than the 90/91 (NH167L - Graphite Black). 

That means that the globe box on my CR-X is a slightly different color than the dash, so I'm wanting to swap the glovebox with the new-in-box 90/91 one that I've had for a while now. I've bought new rubber stoppers for it, I just need to locate some spring pins from a broken glovebox hinge and I'm all set. 

Over the winter months, I will be contacting a local company that works with fibreglass to assist in repairing the botched repair on the rear Mugen bumper from the previous owner and to help with the fitment of the front bumper. They think they may be able to help with the fog light installation as well. I'm hoping to check in with them in the coming weeks to see when they have space available for me to make an appointment.

Show and Shines

So many Show and Shines, so little time. I put the car back on the road in July, and with the IACV acting up, I wasn't comfortable driving very far with it. This limited the shows I could go to, even as a spectator. 

I managed to make it to the Village Honda show, a perennial favorite of mine. I really enjoy the atmosphere and the quality of the cars is really good as well. 

There's another show called "Wild Wednesdays" that happens every week and is put on by a local company called "Lift King" who sells vehicle lifts. 

This one can get a little rowdy at times, but it's really pretty safe and what I like most is that it's a really interesting mix of vehicles and therefore is just so much fun. They also have replicas built of a lot of the key cars from the Fast and Furious movie franchise, which is always a treat to check out. I made it to 3 of those shows this year. 

Remember, this blog was written in chronological order so, you will need to click OLDER POSTS to move forward in time, and click NEWER POSTS to go backwards.