Car Rebuild – Part 20

A lot has happened since the last update although some days when I visit it looks like we are going backwards rather than forwards. This is because A-tech test fit things then remove them again. The upside to this is perfectionism. The downside to this is that the car is so clean it looks like it should go straight to a museum.

Team roles and responsibilities have been updated this week with each of the drivers having the been allocated the sole task of “DONT CRASH CAR!”.

Oh yes… the build..

First up we recently read on www.shgmotorworks.com website about their experience with steering rack failure and what was the cause (track rod slider) and how they developed a solution made from deralin. Evan from Shg (So Honda Garage) took the time to explain to us that the plastic slider wears and allows significant play. This not only causes bump steer by letting the tie rods shift up to 2* but also affects the rack/pinion gear mesh since the rack bar is able to rotate.

Evan designed  a Delrin insert to replace the oem part. It increases surface area, depth, hardness and tolerances have also been reduced to just a few thousandths. The cost is $65usd plus shipping and on the face of it seems a must have upgrade for anyone racing or tracking an Integra.

Next then is the infamous footrest. 2-years of moaning from Umair Khan prompted us to finally make something nice and fit for a king khan! I tested it and can confirm it is perfect for his code 60 exploits.

The drivers seat has been fixed in place with three fundamental differences over the old car. (1) It is much easier to get in and out of comparing to the corbeau revenge series, (2) The seat is much lower and (3) The FIA approved slider had to be fitted upside down so in otherwords to slide the seat you have to push the slider down as opposed to pulling it up. Thats a bit un-natural but nothing we can do and besides it still works fine.

The fuel cell that had some of you wondering about some time back has also now been fitted. We chose to fit dual fillers. The reason being we are not restricted to which side of the pumps we can go to in the refuelling station during the race. (Sometimes there are queues).

Below are two pics showing the installation along with the filler cap (installed within the rear 3/4 windows). It is also worth noting that the rear visibility has been hugely improved along with significantly lower centre of gravity.

Our doors this year a much lighter. They are not the crazy expensive carbon fibre doors but still pretty good at a fraction of the cost. They do however need some fettling with regard to final fitment which resulted in no end of moaning from Julian but for those of you who know him, he would be lost if he didnt have something to moan about! 

You can see the markings in the below image for trimming and painting. We ordered plastic windows (front/rear and sides) from plastics4performance in the UK. Due to the design of our doors the windows will need to be cut down slightly and fitted within the frame as opposed to sitting over the frame in the standard Integra.

We think it will still look really great and we ordered the pro-slider for the drivers side which is really an impressive quality product. More on this next time.

Last up for this update is the dash. The holes have been filled and sadly no room for the Alpine stereo I ordered.

Go on ask the question…. Whats the fuel button for?

Answer: I have no idea!

Not sure we will manage another update this side of Christmas and New Years so in the meantime Happy holidays from all at ZRT