Britludes NSX story

[britlude]

Aug 09… the double din dash mod! Now it’s always been a source of irritation that, although there’s a CD changer in the boot, there’s a cassette player in the dash.

Now I know mine is a early car, so it is forgivable, but to still have it fitted on later ones is just odd! What that means is there’s no factory ‘steal it out of a later car upgrade’ option, so more radical solutions are needed!

My basic requirements were no motorised screen (not sure why, just didn’t want one!) a cd player, and GPS! I had a 7” screen thing in the hotrod, and wanted the GPS as the radio/CD screens are sooo boring!

Anyway, I found a unit that fitted the bill and chopped things up until they all fitted! (ok maybe a little more careful than just attacking it with a chainsaw!)

Image1238640x480 by jon sutherland, on FlickrImage1238640x480 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

Image1241640x480 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

Anyway the upshot is NOOOO cassette ! hurrah! Ironically, as the unit has a SD card slot, I’ve not even used the CD player part!!!
Image1247640x480 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

Here’s the full lowdown! http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/showthread.ph...nit&highlight=


...see told you i'd jazz it up a bit

[britlude]

Sept 09… a whiff of steam under the engine cover glass gave me the clue that there was the need for a new milk bottle header tank, as a split had formed just above the flange for the outer 2 mounting bolts. A couple of failed attempts to rectify the problem weren’t doing the trick, but bought me enough time to get a new header tank ordered.

When it arrived it was given a quick going over with a scotchpad, and painted to match the intake covers (dark met grey) with a masked off stripe to give an area to see the fluid level. Once refitted everything was fine (obviously!!! Pretty pointless doing it if didn’t fix it!)
z2012-06-23-858800x600 by jon sutherland, on Flickr
this pic was taken june 2012 so no worries about durability!

While I was tinkering, I removed the spare wheel, bracket and blower motor, and had a go at cleaning out the aircon evaporator as best as I could, and fitted a filter on the air intake to stop any more debris finding it’s way into the system…
Image1404800x600 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

Oct 09… all was well, but with a plume of steam, I was stopped at the side of the road, a stream of water running across the tarmac. Whilst waiting for the recovery truck I stripped the rad out to see just what had happened, and the plastic part of the radiator header tank had split.... not good. Once recovered home, a shot of jb weld was splodged on, and a replacement rad was ordered… so the new all aluminium replacement rad was duly delivered and fitted, and subsequent coolant/antifreeze refreshed!

Whilst waiting for the rad to arrive from afar, I made up some stone shields, just to offer some protection for the new matrix!
Image1554800x600 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

More details here….http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/showthread.ph...ks!&highlight=

[britlude]

Nov 09… getting bored with the damp inside the screen!! its still happening….

Feb 10… getting really fed up with the screen fogging up, so replaced the top door rubbers, to stop water getting in
Image1697800x600 by jon sutherland, on Flickr
All covered in this thread….http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/showthread.ph...9852#post69852

March 10…. finally got around to taking the climate control unit apart, and changed out the CCU electrolytic capacitors. These are notorious for leaking after years of service, so a check is in order. Lucky I had a look as there were 2 corroded tracks, so these were repaired and the unit put back together!!! While I was playing about with the car, I thought the brakes were a bit spongy, so bled the brakes!

April 10… even though I’d bled the brake system, it still didn’t feel right, so new brake master cylinder was ordered (rockauto.com), along with a calliper overhaul kit (bigg red brakes) with all the callipers stripped, old rubber parts replaced with new seals, and a new master cylinder fitted, I bled the brakes, now it all feels a lot better! (can’t find pics to bore you with, sorry)

On the screen condensation front, it was still ongoing, so new lower door seals were ordered and fitted, really getting fed up with scraping the inside and the outside of a frosty screen… i must be running out of water sources soon!!!
Image1817640x480 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

The abs pump seems to be working more often, so the fluid was changed and the solenoids exercised…. Again!!! I even asked for a replacement unit that I could service and swap in!!http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/showthread.ph...nit&highlight=

[britlude]

May 10…101k oil change! New battery and a set of floor mats (ebay special!)

June 10… another set of rear tyres! ....again!

July 10… definitely fed up with the ABS pump, so I ordered up a new accumulator
Image2282800x600 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

and gave the system a thorough going over, making up a little widget allowing me to backflush the solenoids.
Image2290800x600 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

If the ABS accumulator fails (its half gas/half fluid like citreon suspension systems), it allows more fluid in until the pump switches off when the set pressure is reached. This leads to the commonly reported problem (at least on prime) of the abs reservoir overflowing. Also once it activates, it needs to pump sooner to refresh the pressure, so the pump runs almost as soon as the ABS triggers. When the solenoids release the pressure when ABS is needed, the fluid goes back to the reservoir.

leaky solenoids will show as the pump running more often, accumulator on the way out will show as ABS pump starting almost as soon as the ABS is triggered, and reservoir overflowing, or very close to overflowing.

when i replaced mine, i filled to the max line and switched on the ignition, this activated the abs pump as the pressure is low. as per manual, i refilled to the max line and cycled the ABS a couple of times then refilled again to the max. when i got back home, i exercised the solenoids to release the pressure, and the expelled fluid doesn't reach the top of the reservoir! Hurrah!

another thing i did notice was when the ABS activated with the old accumulator, the fluid came back to the reservoir, fast at first (as expected) fading down to a slow 'dribble', whereas the new one came though fast at first, fading a little but to a definate 'stop'.

Anyway it did the trick, and here’s the full lowdown…
http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/showthread.ph...ent&highlight=


Aug 10... sub amp decided to give up the ghost, so a new sub amplifier was sourced from germany….
http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/showthread.ph...re-speaker-amp

Another rest… playing with the hotrod…

to be continued! again....

[britlude]

Jan 11… winter project for this year was a quick retrim of the gearstick/steering wheel/armrest bits
zImage2516640x480 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

a26122010031640x480-2 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

z03012011026640x480 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

here’s the lowdown on what I did.. http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/showthread.ph...or-trim-tweaks

After several years of running the inside brake lights as fog lights, I finally got round to sorting this! Technically you shouldn’t use brake lights as fog lights, so I worked out a centre fog light mod, using the unused centre panel!
Here’s the thread… http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/showthread.ph...s!)&highlight=

z31012011104640x480 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

ok, so the led look might not be to everyones taste, but the point is it’s a bright light to be seen from a distance! If they are close enough to make out led dots, then the light would be off anyway!!!

oh the days of the halford twin exhaust tips.....

[Problem Child]

Aug 09… the double din dash mod! Now it’s always been a source of irritation that, although there’s a CD changer in the boot, there’s a cassette player in the dash.

Now I know mine is a early car, so it is forgivable, but to still have it fitted on later ones is just odd! What that means is there’s no factory ‘steal it out of a later car upgrade’ option, so more radical solutions are needed!

My basic requirements were no motorised screen (not sure why, just didn’t want one!) a cd player, and GPS! I had a 7” screen thing in the hotrod, and wanted the GPS as the radio/CD screens are sooo boring!

Anyway, I found a unit that fitted the bill and chopped things up until they all fitted! (ok maybe a little more careful than just attacking it with a chainsaw!)





Anyway the upshot is NOOOO cassette ! hurrah! Ironically, as the unit has a SD card slot, I’ve not even used the CD player part!!!

Here’s the full lowdown! http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/showthread.ph...nit&highlight=


...see told you i'd jazz it up a bit

Very nice...who did all the cutting of the centre console. Was this the original or did you buy another one to chop up?

[britlude]

i did all the chopping up, and on the original console... it was already broken when i got the car, just above the ashtray one side, by some hamfisted muppet in its earlier years!

.... finding another rhd centre console proves quite difficult, and/or expensive!

the second pic shows the bottom half fitted without the head unit and ACC surrounds on.

[britlude]

More playing….

Inspired by the hugabuga thread on prime (prime can be a dangerous place at times) I made my own window regulator wheel mod, certainly makes a difference, as proven by the popularity of hugabuga’s kits, and his international tours fitting them!!!! see the prime thread here fpr the original idea... http://www.nsxprime.com/forum/showth...277&highlight=

Feb11.. just to be annoying, my dash cracked! Typically a hot climate fault, it was surprising to happen in february! Oh well, a quick patch sorted it out for the time being….
z22022011020640x480 by jon sutherland, on Flickr
more details of both of these tweaks…. http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/showthread.ph...lt!&highlight=

107060miles… Fitted a K&N air filter, because I could….

March 11… cleaned greased aerial! As I made an aerodynamic tweak to my aerial, I like to keep it greased, just to stop any water getting places it shouldn’t!
I always felt the original sticking up spoiled the lines of the wing, and not taken by the shark-fin type things, so made a new ferrule and sunk it down flush… mine also benefits from the JDM half-height option, so doesn't look quite so much like a bumper car!

z2012-06-23-860800x600 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

(i actually made 2 ferrules, the first beautifully carved in aluminium, which beautifully earthed the aerial and beautifully killed the received signal!!! ... oops, should have thought of that earlier!)

[britlude]

May 11…as my spare wheel was the best part of 20 years old, and looking quite cracked and unpleasant I decided to do something about it. So I set about getting my spare tyre replaced. Various methods had been suggested, but after managing to source a tyre, this was fitted (even though it’s not supposed to be possible!!!)
Before
z11052011529800x600 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

after…

z18052011604800x600 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

here’s the writeup….http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/showthread.ph...yre&highlight=

[britlude]

speedo died, so new speed sensor was fitted… fortunately I’d bought one in readiness as the speedo had died briefly once before.

All I can say is what a pain of a job! This is one of those things that’s fitted to the engine/gearbox/suspension assembly, then fitted into the car.. as getting to it with everything bolted in is a Mare of a job! Headers don’t help either! Needless to say it can be done in situ, just expect to waste a couple of hours getting 2 M6 bolts out, and another couple of hours to put them back in!

the offending article looks like this....


can you see it here??? the speed sensor is at the back of the engine, on the gearbox under the rear vtec solenoid (green connector)z12052011533800x600 by jon sutherland, on Flickr

in this pic the bright screw in the middle of the pic is part of the unit that was replaced, but not the mounting bolts, these were deeper still! (in this pic imagine the units arrow shape to be pointing down!)
z12052011534800x600 by jon sutherland, on Flickr


just to add the the mix, the speed sensor has a shield around it making the bolts only really accessable from the top. when i reassembled it, i slotted the mounting holes in the shield so that i could at least start the bolts from under the car, fit/slide the shield into place, and tighten up from the top. not an easy job, you have been warned!!!

PS the engine is cleaner now!!!