Today at Atelier Kaz - ex-Honda R&D, F1, Indy/CART engineer

Started to work on another NSX from around Thursday this week.
The service menu is to upgrade the 1st gen ABS to the latest spec, refresh the door window system, etc.


As I’m not going to touch the eng, gbox, suspension, brake calliper, etc during this service, only carried out brief test driving session before start removing any parts.
Some feedback to the owner.


1. Suspension and alignment
Just about 1 year ago, installed Bilstein damper with the OEM spring and later, carried out the alignment service once the new OEM parts and the dampers settled.

Very impressed with the way the tyre bites into the road surface.
The tyre pressure was way too low on arrival for street driving condition and as the car was equipped with the Neova AD 08R, used bit lower setting than the recommended OEM tyre pressure.

Depending on the road surface, the steering was tiny-tiny bit pointing to the right but majority of the time, it was straight.
Just keep driving.

By the way, the ABS pump triggered on leaving my place and also it triggered again even while cruising on the dual carriage way.


2. CL pedal feeling
There was no slip on the CL so no urgency and although I don’t know whether the CL was replaced or not in the past, I felt the CL pedal was bit heavier than normal.
If you look at the CL pressure plate structure, you will understand that the more the friction discs wear, the heavier the CL pedal gets.
If the CL covered lots and lots of mileage, then once you started feeling any slip at high rpm shifting, that’s when you want to start scheduling for the CL service.


3. Brake Pad
Not a problem and just a comparison.
I believe it is using the OEM or similar characteristic brake pad at the moment.
While the pedal is rock solid, I prefer bit more initial bite. It all depends on one’s taste and there is nothing wrong with the OEM pad.
Next time when replacing the pad and disc, may be want considering the aftermarket options as well. Again, up to one’s taste.




Started with the ABS upgrade.

The 4ch ABS on our NSX is the first of its kind for Honda and based on my test session on the closed test course skid pad and icy long-long down slope, in my personal view, there is a serious design issue with the classic ABS.
The driver would feel as if the pedal went to the floor and the car just didn’t stop if certain conditions were met.

Many owners reported the same feeling while driving on the public road and unfortunately, some of them were not lucky enough and damaged their NSX.

It’s not cheap to upgrade the ABS to the latest system so each owners have to make their own decision by balancing the cost, benefit and obviously the damage if you couldn’t stop the car before hitting something.

I converted the 2nd gen ABS to the latest spec on my NSX long time ago because I drive it every day and the cost of upgrade is much lower than replacing even just one body panel and you will end up re-spraying part of the body which will result in accident history in Japan lowering the value of your NSX even though I have no plan selling it.

The owner doesn’t drive his NSX like I do and although his ABS was regularly flushed and exercised, it kept triggering the ABS pump from time to time and not happy with the question mark on the ABS so he justified the cost and decided to go for the upgrade.

This was about 1 year ago but we had to wait until now.




The ABS upgrade loom from T3Tec. Thank you to Mr Toyoizumi for the continued support for our NSX community.

It’s manufactured by the same people and the same materials that builds the robotic arms so high quality and reliable. By 10 years ago, I think more than at least 300 of them were isntalled in Japan with no issues reported so far.

It’s the same as the one from KSP Engineering that I use on my NSX and even it was originally designed by Mr Toyoizumi while in his previous employment, probably in order to prevent IP related complication, the relay module is different from the KSP one.

I will modify the SCS wire so that the owner can easily diagnose any issues rather than just a single wire coming out of the big BLK/ORG connector.






I carried out exactly the same test on this new modulator about 1 year ago using my NSX and since then, it was never powered up so just to be sure, carried out another test again.
The latest ABS is powered up through IG2 so while cranking the engine, it will reset itself and as soon as you release the IG key, it will start the initial check sequence again.

In P2 and the ABS light check mode starts as in left photo.
After about 2sec, the light disappears and initial check passed as in the right photo.

If you don’t have the ABS upgraded system nearby, you can still test the new ABS modulator on the bench if you study the workshop manual.
For me, it’s much quicker to just test it using my NSX rather than setting up the bench system.





Will be restoring the original windshield washer system during this service but for now, I need to move this washer tank somewhere….. It has full of washer fluid in there......




The ancient classic 1st gen ABS.
As you can see, the area behind the caution label was wet so it confirmed that the ABS fluid overflowed despite the accumulator was flushed and exercised regularly.




Looks like I’m going to have fun removing this heavily corroded bracket bolt with limited space around it.


And yes indeed, I had fun…..




By the way, looks like someone had big time trying to replace the expansion valve for the A/C system in the past.
Lots of damages were done to the A/C condenser fins.