My 1983 Deluxe 1500 Wagon- Fun times with a carb :)
RutRoe
Band Wagon
UPDATE !!!! NEW PICS ON PAGE 2
What's up gang...
I'm working on my 1983 Civic Wagon Deluxe. It's a 5sp, 233K on the ticker, and it runs great. Still has AC on it...drives great really. When I bought it, it was dumped...so much so that I couldn't get it in my driveway. The front was lowered in a neat way I thought, which was using DC Integra factory shocks and struts on the factory Civic top hats. The back was ghetto fabulous...
Previous owner was a cool guy and creative, but the car couldn't handle his plan. He flipped all the leaf springs and inverted them in on themselves. He drove it briefly that way then drove it almost 2 hours to me. I drove it maybe 20 miles total before my mechanic pointed out that the leaf springs were totally cracked because of the pressure of being forcibly inverted.
SO...I picked up a parts car, swapped the suspension, and now I sit back at factory height with some blown out struts wishing it was lower. Hopefully through this board I can find some good ways to properly get the car back down a bit.
Here's some pics !
Here's how it looked when I first got it. Looked great, but wasn't lowered properly and rode like hell...cracked leaf springs and all.
What she looks like today:
The new wheels are Rota RB 15x7 35mm offset. I really like the wheels...they look sharp on the car up close. One of the pictures doesn't pop like they do in person.
I've put a brand new windshield in it, plus a nice new Magnaflo exhaust with new piping. I really would love to make the brakes a little stronger, and I need to do a tune up for sure....I've learned how to shift so to not have it backfire, but that's something I need to fix before I drive it to the airport every week.
I'm really tempted to have the car swapped to a B-Series with fuel injection and ease some of my fears but I guess we'll see. It's going to the body shop the first week of 2010 and should be sporting a nice new paint job a few weeks after that. I'm super pumped.
I'm open to all suggestions and I'd love to see other pics if anyone else has one. Thanks for looking !
What's up gang...
I'm working on my 1983 Civic Wagon Deluxe. It's a 5sp, 233K on the ticker, and it runs great. Still has AC on it...drives great really. When I bought it, it was dumped...so much so that I couldn't get it in my driveway. The front was lowered in a neat way I thought, which was using DC Integra factory shocks and struts on the factory Civic top hats. The back was ghetto fabulous...
Previous owner was a cool guy and creative, but the car couldn't handle his plan. He flipped all the leaf springs and inverted them in on themselves. He drove it briefly that way then drove it almost 2 hours to me. I drove it maybe 20 miles total before my mechanic pointed out that the leaf springs were totally cracked because of the pressure of being forcibly inverted.
SO...I picked up a parts car, swapped the suspension, and now I sit back at factory height with some blown out struts wishing it was lower. Hopefully through this board I can find some good ways to properly get the car back down a bit.
Here's some pics !
Here's how it looked when I first got it. Looked great, but wasn't lowered properly and rode like hell...cracked leaf springs and all.
What she looks like today:
The new wheels are Rota RB 15x7 35mm offset. I really like the wheels...they look sharp on the car up close. One of the pictures doesn't pop like they do in person.
I've put a brand new windshield in it, plus a nice new Magnaflo exhaust with new piping. I really would love to make the brakes a little stronger, and I need to do a tune up for sure....I've learned how to shift so to not have it backfire, but that's something I need to fix before I drive it to the airport every week.
I'm really tempted to have the car swapped to a B-Series with fuel injection and ease some of my fears but I guess we'll see. It's going to the body shop the first week of 2010 and should be sporting a nice new paint job a few weeks after that. I'm super pumped.
I'm open to all suggestions and I'd love to see other pics if anyone else has one. Thanks for looking !
Comments
these cars are "mucho" very rare in France or europe...
I'm open to suggestions....especially if anyone has any knowledge on this.
I've been reading a lot, but I still don't know how I'm going to lower this thing properly. If anyone has any good ideas, please let me know.
Did you ever get another wagon Parker ? Where did your first one end up ?
My original wagon was sold for parts once the ZC blew up, but I think I still have a spare windshield and hatch glass in the shop that you can have if you want them. Maybe a few other random parts. It was an '80.
When I lowered mine, I made extended top hats of sorts that BARELY cleared the hood and cut the progressive coil off the springs. In the rear I did a monoleaf like you did, but it wasn't quite as slammed!
Who did the ZC swap ?
So on the rear, you just had the one big one correct ? And that sat it down a bit ? I'm thinking up front I'm just going to cut one whole coil off and see if that gets it down enough to be happy with it. I'm open to any suggestions you have though
And here's my update for today. I think when I bought the 15'' Rota RB's, I may have gone too big. In an effort to find out if that's true or not, today I picked up some old school reverse offset 13''x7'' 5 stars with 175/70/13's on them. Hopefully I can find my lug key and switch the wheels in the next day or two and see how they look.
Yeah, I did a dual-cam ZC, but that was back before I knew things about motors and it only lasted about 2 weeks before coolant was coming out of the wrong places whenever the engine turned over. I did the whole swap; apparently the 2nd gen wagon axles will fit into the D-series differential. You never really got to see it because I was driving the car that shot flames while the swap was happening.
I just had the one big leaf in the rear. It did lower it some but it didn't quite take care of the fender gap. My wheels/tires were too wide and low offset and rubbed all over the rear wells but they were 15x7s. How was the car lowered before?
I'd love to make my wagon look like that and actually, that's pretty close to the paint color I'm going with.
I'm trying to figure out the swap thing, but since I'm on the road so much, I have to find a shop to do it for me, and I don't know how many shops around ATL can handle that and be able to afford it. It still runs and drives great now, so I guess we'll see.
Thanks you guys for the help. I really want to it be a fun car....
I don't think anyone besides the ATL guys know who you are Rut. (RutRoe is in the green - anyone know who he is?)
Kyle actually really likes the wagon. He laughed his ass off when I bought it, but he knows I'm crazy so it's normal to him. Now I just have to figure out what to do with my '75 Bricklin SV-1.
Thanks for the tips everybody.
Old Skool, any suggestions on what model to get coilovers for ? The springs seem a little wider than most civic's or integra's I've had before, and Tom's shop won't touch the car since it has a carb, so I'm on my own.
Brian's Paint and Body down here in Sharpsburg,GA is doing all the paint and body work. It goes in to the shop the first work week of the new year. Brian came over today to check it out and we're both really pumped. They're going to take care of all the dents, remove all my side trim and weld up the holes, plus swap a few things from my parts car...plus the jams will be done, so this sucker will look better than it did from the factory.
I promise to take lots of pictures ! Thanks for the support
Keep reppin the old skool!
Justin
The front was probably ok, but a lot of washers were used and I just wasn't that comfortable with not knowing what was done to it.
It rides much much better now, but I'd still like it just a hair lower if possible, and I could use some new struts.
Thanks for looking
Brian's Paint and Body in Sharpsburg,GA is taking care of the paint and body work. Brian is a friend of mine and a great guy. I'll stop by the shop and get some pictures as it's being finished.
very nice
have fun with the project!
after reading and reading again this thread, im so tempted to buy this 83 civic wagon on craigslist for $500. the only problem is a bent valve due to the timing belt broke. is it easy to finds parts for this gen? if you know something please let me know. Thanks
wagon..........................4ever...................