As means of an “official” introduction, I’m starting a thread on the restoration of my Integra. I say “official”, as I have been a forum member since nearly the beginning (original name is CincyG2). However, while I have lurked and posted a few times, I have never been too active.
The subject car is a 1992 Acura Integra LS. It was purchased by me in 1996 with ~37K and I am the second owner. The car now has ~240K miles on her and has been basically sitting for the past 3 1/2 years. The car was purchased in California, but moved with me to Ohio shortly after being purchased in '96. My daughter is about to turn 16 and has had eyes on the car “since she can remember seeing.” While probably not the most rational choice, I have decided to resurrect the car. As incentive, I’m hoping for it to be a bonding experience with my daughter.
Below are some pictures I took today in how it sits. The paint is faded and there are only some mostly minor dings and dents. There is what appears to be a few spots of surface rust (fingers crossed). The only areas that appear to possibly need rust patches are the rockers in front of the wheel wells. I have posted some pictures below so you can see how the car looks now.
Current mods include:
H&R Race Springs
Koni Sports
Energy Suspension bushings
Ingalls front camber adjusters
Thermal R&D Exhaust
Intake
B&M short shifter
First up on the restoration is to get the body back into shape. After that will be a thorough reconditioning of the suspension along with some needed engine maintenance.
That is the hope! There is a bit of a deeper rust problem on the lower inside front of the wheel wells that I couldn’t get a good picture of. I’m doing a deeper inspection this week as I remove interior and trim and hopefully don’t run into a bigger issue.
No updated pics, but I have been removing the interior and exterior trim. The bad news is I found a couple of additional spots that need some “band aids” behind where the rear quarter molding mounts.
I’m taking an “autobody” class at the local tech school. It’s basically a hobby class where you can work on your own car. It’s great in that it gives me a set time to work on the car each week as well as tools, a spray booth and a knowledgeable instructor. I hope to start serious work on the rust spots tomorrow.
I spent a little more time with the car last night at autobody class. I removed some more trim and hit the “trouble spots” with a wire wheel to get a better idea of what needs to be done.
The rust spots behind where the quarter panel molding goes are going to be a bit of a pain to patch due to the contours of the area. Fortunately, the shop has some Civic fenders that have a similar style clip and profile that I can cutout and should be able to be welded into a couple of the holes. The challenging one will be the left side. The rust goes into the pointed area and that could be a challenge to fabricate. The instructor noticed that the profile is similar to the front fenders (just opposite side), so I’m going to see if that will work to sacrifice for a patch.
I knew there was an area in the right rear that had been repaired before I bought it. Someone pulled out the dent with a slide hammer, but used filler in the holes rather than welding. Needless to say, the filler failed. I started to take some of the repair back, but it looks like I’m going to be chasing a good layer of putty. I’ll be stripping this back further next week to hopefully bang the metal into better shape and minimize the amount of putty I need.
The biggest issue is the left rear rocker in front of the wheel. It’s pretty eaten up, so I’m going to have to replace at least part of the rocker and inner fender. :sad:
Not showing is the rear bumper support. It’s pretty rusty and the screws are pretty well frozen. I have it soaking in some PB blaster to hopefully get the bumper skin off.
Anybody have a nice left rocker, left quarter panel, right front fender and rear bumper support they don’t need?
