[firehawk618]

Subscribed for what appears to be a fantastic build.

 

[ZX1206]

Front Struts

Will the adjustable struts bolt to the Insight spindles or only to the Civic?

 

[ProAweMike]

ZX1206, right now they will only fit with the Civic/RSX spindles. I am working with Fortune Auto to make a lower mount that will work with the Insight spindle.

Thanks,

 

[ZX1206]

ZX1206, right now they will only fit with the Civic/RSX spindles. I am working with Fortune Auto to make a lower mount that will work with the Insight spindle.

Thanks,

Thank you,

I spent an hour or two trying to find info on my own answer. I think the info I found says the Insight bolt points are wider than the Civic. The person making the post said they milled 2mm off each side to make them fit. Does that sound accurate?

 

[ProAweMike]

ZX1206, Not positive on the measurement but the Insight spindles are in fact wider than the Civic spindles. I have both and can measure them and compare.
I thought about modifying the Insight spindle in my project but there are other issues that I would need to resolve that weren’t worth the hassle.

Thanks,

 

[ThinkFab]

Quite the build you have going sir! The total I milled of was 2.5mm from each side of the spindle, adding up to a total of 5mm. It really wasn't all that difficult, and took around 2hrs to do each side, including drilling new holes to accept the RSX tophats. The method I used was slightly different when it came to the tophat, as I had spacers cut out and anodized, instead of milling new parts to exact tolerance. Six of one, half dozen of the other I suppose.

 

[ProAweMike]

So its been a month since my last update and I have been working as fast as I can on the project when the Race car allows it. Race cars are worse than significant others and need way too much attention.....Moving on.

I started preparing the engine to go into its new home. I did some general maintenance and cleaned up the 80K mile engine the best I could. I put it up on an stand and sprayed down with engine greaser. I used a wire brush to get off the heavy soils and that seemed to do the trick.




All Clean



I stated my engine mods by replacing the stock K24 VTC that is limited to 25 degrees with one from a 02-04 RSX that allows for 50 degrees of actuation. This should help me make a little more power down low in conjunction with my other mods, with no determent to the rest of the system. This was as easy as swapping the cam pulley.



Pulley on and timing all lined up.

 

[ProAweMike]

moved this info to new post

 

[Buis02]

you make me want to drop a k in my car. Too bad I just got rid of the 3 blocks I had in my garage lol. All I know is that car is going to shake like crazy lol.

 

[Sigma Projects]

totally subscribing to this thread.

 

[ProAweMike]

So today's update is going to be the install of some S2000 seats. This is going to be relatively straight forward and just house a bunch of pictures. Here is a low miles AP1 S2000 seat.




To start I Took some 1/4 steel bar and cut 2 tabs out of it for the back mounts.




Then cut some slightly longer 3/16 plates for the front and bent them to match the shape of the stock cross bar.




I measured the sliders on the S2000 seats and outside to outside they are 18.75", So I cut some 1/4 bar and some 1' tube to that measurement. I bolted my tabs down and came up with this. The 1/4" is for the front of the seat mount and the 1" square tube is for the rear to get the seat off the floor.

 

[ProAweMike]

The rear mount toward the outside of the car was in a little divot, about 1/4" so I raised it up with a piece of 1/4" bar stock.





Next I laid the 1" tube and the 1/4" bar across the mounts and pushed them towards the center of the car as much as possible. The S2000 seats sit a little outboard naturally, so pushing them inboard is the only way to get them centered up. The S2000 rails are 15" long, front to back. The distance between the front and rear cross bars must less, around 13", in order for the sliders to sit on the cross bars comfortably.






With The cross bars tacked into place, I moved on to removing the stock mounts on the seats. Start by drilling out these rivets on all 4 mounts.



Drilled out.

 

[ProAweMike]

For the front, there is an extra little spot weld right behind the rivet that needs to be drilled out as well. For the rear you need to cut the 2 welds that run forward to back on the rails. Once those are gone just wack the tabs with a hammer and presto. Tabs gone.




Sand all rivets back and the part of the weld that is left over and prep it to be tacked to the seat mount.

I put the seat in the car and did a test fit. Found my first issue. The bottom of the S2000 seat dips below the sliders. When the seat is moved all the way back it hits my 1" tube. The only reasonable thing to do here is cut the tube, so that's what I did.




But now there is a big hole in my seat mount. Have to fill that up.



All better. Now to put the rails back in the car.

 

[ProAweMike]

Next part is a little hard to show but I installed the seat into the car and put them on the rails. Centered it as well as I could and tacked it to the mounts. Pulled it all out and this is what I came up with.




Here you can see the clearance that I made in the rear tube for the seat. It looks bent in this picture but I promise its not. Haha



Test fit them back in the car and all was good. Final welded it all together.

 

[ProAweMike]

Final part of the seat install is the seat belt lower mounts. I decided to use a captive nut for this in the end of the 1" tube. Basically the whole tube and mount has to fail before this seat belt is going anywhere.

I made a 1”X1”1/4 plate steel insert and drilled a hole for the bolt.



Welded a extra thick nut to the plate.





Then the insert would need to be welded into the end of the seat rail assembly. I tapered the edges of the insert so that I would have good penetration on the welds.

 

[ProAweMike]

I put the insert into place and held it against the outside of the tube with a magnet.





Welded it all up and ground it smooth. Pretty



I painted the entire mount and it was ready to go back into the car.



I will post a picture of the seats and the whole interior once I get it all completed. Sorry to spoil the pay off.

 

[Rekt]

Fun fact: The seat belt bolt is 7/16-20 with a 14mm head. What is going on there. Crazy.

Another fun fact:

Further fun fact relating to idiotic dimensioning: all USDM vehicles contain at least 3 SAE 7/16-20 or 1/2-13 fasteners per seat. Why? Because USC 49 CFR 571.209 requires that by name rather than specifying a seatbelt fastener minimum shear or tension strength.

It then goes on to specify all forces as wacky *** numbers of newtons (40034N? WTF?) which just so happen to convert to even numbers (9000) of pounds force.

 

[ProAweMike]

I will jump around once again and move to the rear suspension. As Insight owners know that rear suspension on these cars suck. The travel is minimal and it has a tendency to hit the bump stops constantly. That is very true with my car because like the front, the rear springs were cut by the previous owner. They were literally doing nothing.





Here are stock springs next to the cut ones....



Thank you sketchy previous owner.

Along with the cut springs the shocks we blown and no longer being useful.

I needed new shocks and springs. I decided to go with GAZ shocks from the UK as they are one of the only people that make a performance shock for an Insight.

 

[ProAweMike]

These shocks have adjustable compression damping which will help when I am trying to match the front for best performance. The quality on these looks very nice. These are simple units but the added control and poly bushings should help the Insight feel a little more sporty.



For the springs I decided to go with a custom spring made by a gentlemen named Scott on the Insight boards. He had a bunch of springs made that were similar to a Daewoo Matiz. These should be close to a 2.7K spring if I remember correctly. With the GAZ shocks this should stiffen up the rear a little and help keep the car off the bump stops.

Here are the custom springs next to the stock stuff and the cut spring that was in there.



Its really easy to get all this stuff installed so here it is.




I have driven a bunch of stock Insights and I am excited to see how much this changes the car.

 

[ProAweMike]

Next on the list is the Transmission build.

Like I said in the intro, one of the main features of this transmission compared to others was the custom final drive. The stock final drive for the 02-04 RSX transmission is 4.389. My custom final drive by Frana vehicles is 3.4. This final drive in conjunction with my longer 6th gear will take my cruising RPM from 3,600 RPM at 80MPH to 2,500 RPM. Below you can see the comparison from the stock RSX transmission to the custom ratios that I have chosen. The goal is to lower my fuel consumption and achieve the goal of +50MPG.

Here is a picture of the Frana Final drive. Under close inspection it is a very nice looking piece.