Banger racing escapee! 1996 Honda Civic EK3
Discussion
What do you do when you're minding your own business tidying your kitchen and this pops up on your phone screen?
You investigate further, noticing that it's very much in danger...
Looking promising!
Looking less promising! Still, let's go and have a look, it's only done 56k, how bad can it be?
I rented the yard next door for years, to store my 'collection' of crummy old Hondas. Stayed in touch with the banger racing lads as they're always a handy contact to have. Anyway, he bought it as an MOT failure and one of his sons was going to race it, but they decided it was a bit too good so, knowing I'm partial to a bit of an aforementioned crummy old Honda, offered it to me first.
MOT-spec bodge, literally like a steel band-aid over some rot around the OSF jacking point. Bare minimum to get it through a test.
This is quite concerning! If you've seen the thread on my VTi-S Aerodeck ( https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&... ) (Make a brew, it's a doozy) you'll be aware of this era of Honda and their propensity to rot around the front footwells/jacking points.
This is what presented itself when the Aerodeck went under the knife (well, grinder)
There are multiple layers of steel meeting in this area, and I believe the scuttle drains into it. There are drain grommets installed, but they seem to hold water anyway and rot. All 90s Civics and Integras share this design regardless of body style (EG, EK, MB, Aerodeck, hatch, sedan, coupe, they're all pretty much the same underneath) so seeing those crappy patches stuck on the EK3 was quite a cause for concern.
This is how much metal had to come out of the Aerodeck (each side) before there was clean metal to weld to:
Anyway back to the EK3:
Still undecided, I went back to view it again armed with a jack. Jacked it up from that bodged jacking point and it was fine, no creaking or crunching. 95% of the underbody looks great.
You'll note on the screenshot of the MOT failure, there's a fail for rot within 30cm of a NSR suspension mount I assumed this was it:
Absolutely diabolical repair, really not sure what they were going for, and the random square missing?! Who knows?
Anyway, near enough agreed to buy it as it wasn't horrendous and I wanted to save it, but said I'd let him know after my welder mate had seen it. Went back up to view it later that day with Tim the welder (at night!) who said there wasn't too much to be afraid of from what was visible.
Looking again at the photos I'd taken to send to Tim, noticed this:
That'll be the fail then! Still, not as scary as it looks - the sills on this generation of Civic are just big cuboids so they're pretty straightforward to repair with no real complex shapes.
Deliberated over it for a couple of days, I really wanted to save it, but wouldn't be able to give it a permanent home on the fleet. I reckoned (and I've got my fingers VERY much crossed) that as long as I can get it on the road for £1500ish all in, I should be okay as it's worth that all day long once repaired and MOT'd (realistically it should be worth a good chunk more, but I don't wanna give myself too much budget just in case...)
Anyway, the seller text me asking if I wanted it, so we entered into some brief negotiations and I agreed to buy it for £450.
Insured it, booked an MOT (I wasn't sure what had and hadn't been fixed, it failed on an ABS light which wasn't on when I viewed it) and:
The few times I'd started it when viewing, there was no ABS light, as soon as I started it after handing over cash, it was on, ha
Anyway here it is on it's way to safety (my driveway) in all it's non-banger raced glory!
Safe and sound on my drive:
So how does it drive? Absolutely s
te 
Nah, it's pretty good aside from an absolutely catastrophically bad OSF wheel bearing, as mentioned on the MOT. That's not been sorted, then...Bearing makes loads of noise, and the steering feels terrible. Aside from that though, really good! Brakes are sharp (weirdly sharp for a Honda, actually) clutch and gearbox feel great, and the engine is spot on. Quite nippy actually! Think the thermostat is needing replaced as it seems to be stuck slightly open, the temp gauge drops with the heater on.
y0, and all that. Feat. dealer plate! May get a new pair of replica dealer plates for it, if it doesn't break the bank on welding and MOT repairs!
I've not really explained what this is! The EK Civic comes in various guises. In the UK, Civics of this generation are as follows:
EJ9 - 1.4i 16v single cam - 90bhp
EK3 - 1.5i LS 16v single cam VTEC - 115bhp
EK4 - 1.6 VTi DOHC VTEC - 160bhp (the proper one)
These 3 codes apply regardless of if it's a 3dr hatch or 4dr sedan (the 5dr hatch and Aerodeck don't come into this, they're MB/MC and based off Integra floorpans etc)
Anyway, being a 1.5i LS it's an EK3. The vast majority of these in the UK are EJ9s. This generation of Civic is becoming seriously thin on the ground in the UK so the fact it's a manual EK3 was quite appealing. The D15Z6 engine is quite interesting, the car is badged VTEC from factory but it's an economy VTEC rather than power. The performance engines have 2 cam profiles so that when VTEC engages you get higher valve lift and longer duration. In this, it simply switches from 12 valve below 2500rpm, to 16 valve above it, if a certain throttle position is also reached. It has a cute little green 'ECONO' light on the dash when it's in 12 valve mode. On my admittedly short drive back, it felt very healthy and responsive, genuinely a pretty nippy little thing. It has very long gearing to aid its eco credentials, doing 70 in 2nd, and trundling along at 30mph per 1000rpm in 5th. With a 1.4 gearbox I don't think it'd be a million miles off a VTi.
As you may or may not have seen on the thread on the Aerodeck, I'm not afraid of getting stuck in with the welder, but due to the time of year, I have zero inclination to do so! I have HAVS, meaning my hands don't work in the cold and I'm in agony when I do try, so I've outsourced this one to Tim.
He made a start ripping off those plasters on the front jacking points the other night:
Tell me that wouldn't make an excellent album cover! Very atmospheric mid-2000s vibes I reckon...
No photos unfortunately, but it was a fairly pleasant discovery upon getting the outer skin off - there is rust on the next skin, but it's nowhere near as bad as it was on the 'deck. Didn't have much time on it the other night as it was after he finished work, but it definitely looks like the rust stops fairly abruptly and turns into clean metal, on this corner at least. Hopefully he's gonna be able to crack on with it for a full day this coming weekend and really get the worst of the rust cut out, then we can properly assess wether it's worth continuing. I'm quite mentally invested in it now, I really want to save it, and if there are no nasty surprises that we don't already know about on the other 3 corners, it should live on...
As for plans, I want to just get the rust repaired to a nice standard (definitely a cut above standard bare minimum MOT welding) get it roadworthy and then put it up for sale. Hopefully it'll stay with me for a couple of weeks once it's on the road, as I'd really like to drive about in it for a bit! My first car is an EJ9 and I've had a few of them, so I've got lots of memories of doing thousands of miles in these cars but haven't driven one since 2014!
We took the OS sill cover off, which revealed:
That'll do! The crusty bit at the back is to be expected, the poor repairs on both sides told us there'd be something hiding. But the sill is otherwise very good, there's a rectangle on the sill next to the jacking point that's a bit soft, but that's a super easy repair so no worries there.
TBC (hopefully!)
Edited by Jaaack on Friday 6th December 04:41
Edited by Jaaack on Sunday 16th February 19:47
It's good to see it is being saved by a serial Civic owner!
With that mileage it seems far too good to die banger racing.
Interesting about the EK3 engine too. Years ago I was looking for a cheap daily in the low Road Tax bracket (up to 1,549cc) and bought a Mazda 323F 1.5 but that only had 90 bhp. But it was gutless and only lasted 6 months - one of these may have lasted longer!
With that mileage it seems far too good to die banger racing.
Interesting about the EK3 engine too. Years ago I was looking for a cheap daily in the low Road Tax bracket (up to 1,549cc) and bought a Mazda 323F 1.5 but that only had 90 bhp. But it was gutless and only lasted 6 months - one of these may have lasted longer!
Mr Tidy said:
It's good to see it is being saved by a serial Civic owner!
With that mileage it seems far too good to die banger racing.
Yes. The banger racers are smashing up the remaining EK Civics (mainly five door hatchbacks and Aerodeck estates) at quite a rate. It's the weapon of choice in the "under 1600" class.With that mileage it seems far too good to die banger racing.
OP probably has the right idea, making contacts within the banger racing crowd, and grabbing the good Civics that are too nice for the oval track.
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