Totally newbie would like to mod his Accord

God damn Fast and Furious.. now I SO wanna start ripping apart my Accord and turn her into something special and unique. But my problem, I don't even know how to change my own oil. Less mostly of my fear of ruining my $8000 machine. How do I go about learning tricks of the trade, getting started, tools, ect... Anyone got ideas or suggestions for a totall newbie in the CAR side of things

I have no plans of racing, period. All I want is to seriously upgrade the engine, style, paint part and performance of my car into something completely unique and unlike any other Honda out there. Shes my baby, and I want her to be one of a kind. Heres a list of what I would like to do to my 92 accord LX

1.Completely Stripped and redone paintjob in white with with blue and gray stripping of sorts *love that color combo*

2 Tinted windows to max legal tint

3 Spoiler *not the huge ass ones, just for looks*

4 Lowered ground clearance

5 Wider wheels *something that actually grips!*

6 Chrome rims

7 Rebuilt front end *taken some damage* New grills, Blue Headlamps, extra lamps on bottom. With better looking cowling for air intake

8. Redone suspension system for better turning ,accleration under high speeds

9. Hood with turbo intake if needs be.

10 Engine completly rebuilt with turbocharger, oil pumps, and all that other stuff Im not familiar with on engines. Bottom line, engine horsepowered increased 3 fold.

11. Redone Interior with racing seats and belts. Redone dashboard with newer techno lighting and instruments

12. Blue neons underside, interior of front cowling, glow wiring outlining interior.

13. Nice sound system, with woofer and amp. Yet nothing completey outrages. Can be put in trunk.

So, whata think? Im guess im looking at $20,000 in mods no? Actually when I think about, thats not much more then a newer car. And when I graduate from College and start my career, I'd have no problem affording it, being single with no kids. Only problem is I have no idea how to personally do this, unless there are places that I can take my car and have them do it for me. Yeah, its the wimpy way, but hey, thats just me, don't have to like it. Also, is 92 getting a little to old to mod? As far as difficult to find parts for that model year or not? Thanks for helping a totall newbie

OK man, first things first. Forget about doin all that stuff to your engine. If you want more power and not have to worry about the miles on the engine, you need the H22 (prelude engine). Im thinkin about gettin one myself. It'll give u about 200 hp to start and its more upgradable than the accord engine. Probly cost ya about 3k or so plus installation. Hope that helped. As for your first mod, only one thing to say "Drop it like its hot"

yo man, if your looking for the h22 or any other engine you might wanan check out this website..... http://www.specjdm.com/ just go into motors at the bottom and it will bring them up and give you the details about them. good luck man. im just like you, dont know much, but im trying to learn. haha. good luck though.

chris:flash: :flash:

Hmmm...yeah go with the H22a, good stuff there. I think you should scale back your visions to a timetable, because i was just like you once. I learned as much as i could about cars and what makes em go, and what is good, bad and just plain fugly. The thing to keep in mind is, if you like it, more power to ya.

As long as you take care of your car with scheduled maintenance an all, you should be able to add a few upgrades here and there. 92 DX hmm...It will probably take an intake, header, exhaust, spark plug wires and plugs tuneup and time. Which you seem to have a lot of. Go for what you like and your dream car can become a reality, grasshopper.:D

Whats up! First of all don't get the Chrome they are too heavy!! Go to www.tirerack.com and look for some lighter weight wheels! They are less expensive also! Next loose the spoiler... The only time it is good for any thing is over 140mph!! It is a waste of weight and paint! And beside that (most) of them are UGLY!!!! If you don't want to go through the motor swap thing and stay with the original motor, go ahead with the intake, header, exhaust, high flow cat, port and polish, forged alluminum pistons and rods, and a head job!!! All depends on how much you want to spend$$$$$ Then paint! Move the battery there are tons of things you can do to make it different!!! :D

Oh yeah!!! A set of fully adjustable KONI struts and fully adjustable coilovers!!! :D

ShockJon do you have any pics of your quarter mile beast? If so, can we see them?

:eek: SORRY!!! I din't mean too mislead!!! That is what I would do!! But things like that require $$$$$ which is something I don't have but I know how to tell other people how to spend theirs!!!:D My car is a 93 automatic 2dr accord..... 1/4 time is a whoping 17 flat... 1/8 time is a whoping 10.9... WOOHOO!!!! I NEED MORE POWER!!! :D

i wouldnt mind a litle power as well. just got my accord bout 3 months ago. pretty much i started aesthetically with clear bumper lights, corner lights, modified stock taillights, DIY type R grill (looks pretty good if i dont say so myself). the only enigine mod was an exhaust and the removal of the resonator for the intake. getting my body kit some time soon. *hopefully*

yea get the H22. it is an easy swap in a 4th generation. and dont waste ur money on paint and shit and chrome wheels. and yea go to tirerack.com. dont get a damn lighting show. cuz it seems like ur leaning toward performance before show which is the way to go.

Hmm, if you only want to do it to be unique, go pick up the Attack kit. It costs around $16,000 for the kit alone and than installation, but there are probably only a handful in the world. Basically you only use the engine, axles, transmission and chassis of your car. Go to Google and type in "Attack Kit Car" and look for some pics.

Modifying your car can get really expensive, really fast. The best thing to do is to find what your taste is, this way you don't waste money on stuff you hate. Attend car shows, make friends with people in the import scene, and basically just get your hands on some of the nice parts. If you're interested, you should do what I'm considering: trying to get an internship at a performance shop. You'd be working for free but it'd be great experience.

Other than that, you'll need to do a lot of research and find out a lot about your car. Read all the articles in www.howstuffworks.com to get an idea and than start jumping into more complicated stuff. How-to's and DIY tutorials are good also. If money isn't a super big problem, buy stuff and try to install it yourself. Follow instructions as best as possible and check everything over 10-20 times. It's time consuming but you'll become acquainted with your car. Hope this helps!

And damn, $8,000 for a 92 Accord LX?

OK man, first things first. Forget about doin all that stuff to your engine. If you want more power and not have to worry about the miles on the engine, you need the H22 (prelude engine). Im thinkin about gettin one myself. It'll give u about 200 hp to start and its more upgradable than the accord engine. Probly cost ya about 3k or so plus installation. Hope that helped. As for your first mod, only one thing to say "Drop it like its hot"

Nah i thought he said he wasnt in on that racing stuff so an engine swap isnt really necessary. But i agree with him on the h22 plan because opening an accord hood and seeing that DOHC VTEC letterings on the valve cover is a dope thing. U get the 200HP and the cool looking letterings. U must have a lot of money for 20Gs of mods. hahaha for me it took me like 2 weeks and $60 for intake in my car. That is my fo' sho' mod. Plus i got my small decal that says *butigroove* on my rear windows on each side.

Oh you should go to accordracing.com and look for there windshield decal that says *accordracing.com* Looks pimp to me and one of a kind. Good luck with ur accord and

As for learning about ur car... thats what the forums are for. Changing oil is a breeze and u'll pick it up one day. Just make sure u change it every about 3000 miles on ur car. Some people change it every 2500-5000 but its all up to u. Main thing is make sure it has oil LOL. I didnt kno much about my car but i installed my own intake but it took me like an hour half hahaha. Yea sad... i kno but its a learning process and i dont do that kind of stuff often like changing oil. know what i mean jelly beans?

Have fun with ur accord and the same to all accord owners and fads.

Ok...here's my opinion on tuning Hondas, especially in your case. First off, forget all that "fast and furious" shit. This is mainly why most Honda owners get a bad rep. Most of what happens in the movies is just that, cinematics. Although there are some fast cars in the movie (or at least they're portrayed that way), it's not the best handbook for tuning.

As for the spoiler, don't waste your money. There are only two real reasons for a spoiler. (1)They're designed to keep therear wheels on a rear-wheel drive vehicle on the ground, more especially in big hp/torque vehicles (a.k.a. muscle cars). (2)They're designed to keep your rear tires on the ground during high speeds (around 140 mph). If you've ever driven that fast in a car with a small spoiler or no spoiler at all, the rear of the car seems to "float" or want to "fly". Seeing as you're driving a front-wheel drive vehicle which will most likely not see 140 mph in a practical application, a spoiler would be useless to you, aside from a mere cosmetic effect.

As for the engine...Increasing horsepower 3 fold? Why would you want a 300+ hp accord if you don't want to race it? I have seen a civic (with a b-series engine, mind you, smaller than your accord engine) beat large-displacement muscle cars consistently. It can be done, I know, but there is something to be known about cars like this. They're not the most ideal daily drivers. Also, there was a great deal of both labor and money involved in this car. Tripling the hp of your car is a lot more than just putting stickers (again, the "Fast and Furious" mentality), adding CAI, or anything you can just bolt-on. A turbocharger or nitrous oxide would increase the hp quite a bit, but involves more maintenance. Shooting nitrous raises your compression ratio, which just puts even more wear on your engine components, causing them to wear out quicker. I'm not experienced much in the use of turbos, but when you add a turbo, that means more hardware to maintain and more stuff that could break.

One more thing about increasing hp. The stock parts on your car are designed to withstand not much more than the hp your car produced stock. For instance, suppose your car is bone stock, with an F22a4 engine. It would produce around 140 hp (I could be wrong). This means your parts could not hold up to increased hp. If you increase your horsepower to 420hp (like you said, 3 fold) without changing these stock parts, they would basically be destroyed. If you're car has a manual transmission, the clutch might snap or blow through the firewall, possibly taking your left leg right off. Other parts would be destroyed of course, but that's just an example.

If you're looking just to make your car look good, do the paint job, wheels, window tint, etc. You could make it look good if you do it right. I noticed you didn't mention a body kit. You might want to look into it. They can make your car look loads better. Good luck.

p.s. I didn't mean to piss anyone off with the "Fast and Furious" comment. I have seen the movies and liked them to a certain extent. I did not, however, like how they made street racing look "Hollywood". A quarter mile dragrace shouldn't take as long as the movie depicted them, especially when they said their cars were running 10s (highly unlikely, also).

Please..."Don't be hatin"