As much as I've looked through this forum, and hours of reading peoples build threads, it never really crossed my mind that I should start my own. Considering my situation, I'm not in the middle of a hefty "build" that's going to put out 500whp or become the next auto-crossing legend... This is just the story of my neck of the wonderful Prelude-World. Yes, I have plans for my Prelude. But being a full-time student and having an $8.00/hr job isn't going to get anything done with my car, so patience is the key for me. People such as prepreludesh, Built_5thgen, nordic97mist, and that crazy foreign guy who felt the need to turn a beautiful blue prelude, white.... You guys are all my inspiration. I plan on working full time this summer and hopefully getting a lot of cosmetic work done, but I'll cross that bridge when I get there. I've found Prelude enthusiasts to be really chill guys, and I've enjoyed a lot of my fellow luders work. So while I'm young and new to the game, I'm excited for where I'm headed with this car and I hope you guys enjoy what I have to offer. And I hope that I can come even close to where so many of you are today.
Last edited by nvroutgund; 04-17-2011 at 02:22 PM.
When I was 16 and was just getting ready to get my license, my grandfather (Pop, as I call him) sat down with me and discussed what I was going to be doing now that I was old enough to drive and needed a vehicle to commute to/from school. We chatted for a little while and then he offered to let me have his 1999 Toyota Tacoma, and of course I accepted. Now admittedly, I wasn't particularly thrilled about getting a truck; much less a manual truck, despite the fact it had only 85,000 miles on it and was in PRISTINE condition. I had learned how to drive on my father's GT Mustang and I had become quite fond of automatic cars. But hey, a vehicle is a vehicle. So after learning how to drive this little truck and getting my license, it was finally mine. And as I'm sure everybody knows, it doesn't matter how crappy your first car is, the fact that it's YOURS, makes it all okay. I fell in love with this truck.
So fast forward about a year, and it was early one Sunday morning and I was driving to the church where my football team was getting together for some activities. The road I was traveling on was a narrow road and up ahead a lady had parked IN the street, and was chasing a stray dog out of fear of it getting killed. As I made my way down the street the dog darted into the road, and the lady wasn't far behind it... So, I swerved... Into the parked car. End of truck.
I was so ashamed of myself. I had hoped that I would be different than all the statistics about teenage males getting into accidents blah blah. Thankfully, everybody was pretty sympathetic because I was "trying to preserve human life". Since the insurance on a 16 year old boy is stupid expensive, we just had minimum liability. So I'm sure you can guess what that means. Her car= fixed. My truck = S.O.L.
We had the wrecker dump the truck in our backyard, because we have a second garage we could store it in. And there it sat. For months and months.
My father owned an automotive body shop for 20 years, and had extensive experience so he told me I was going to "earn" my truck back and he was going to guide me through it. So we began working on it on the weekends. Tearing it down, cutting out the core support and right fender apron and re-welding the whole front end, painted the entire front clip and re-assembled everything. Thats a VERY rapid summation of about 6 months of work. I had wrecked my truck in August and got it back right before Christmas.
I was so proud of myself. Most of the time young kids get in wrecks and the insurance companies handle it. Not I. I was out there every weekend working on that truck, I had learned quite a lesson, and also learned a lot about automobiles in general. It was a crappy experience, but a very valuable life lesson. Obviously my dad was a huge help in this whole process, he taught me so much, and mainly paid for all the parts
After having my truck back for about 4 months, I was driving home from school one day and this girl I went to school with was texting and didn't see the light change to red.. And she rear-ended me doing about 50, my neck hurt for a f'in week. The truck was driveable, but when assessed by a body shop the damage would've been more than the value of the truck itself. So it was totaled and I received $5300. All that sweat (and yes, some blood and even a few tears) and effort put into that truck, just to have it ripped away from me again. I was ready to murder that rich b*tch.
Anyway. After weeks of anxiously shopping for a car I had stumbled across a Honda Prelude, had never heard of it before, but it was cool as hell! The price on the car was $5800, and we had $5300. Since it was near the end of my senior year, my dad opted to chip in $500 for my graduation present and we bought the car. It's a 99, automatic, Milano Red.
I remember how I felt when I first got into that car and took it for a drive. Fooling around with the sport shift, being so low to the ground. It was nothing like that truck at all, it was amazing. I fell in love immediately. After driving it around blissfully all summer, I had finally accepted a challenge by this fool with a nissan maxima to race. I had blown him off for weeks because he was annoying as piss, but then I finally caved and decided to make him put his money where his mouth was. I called up my good friend who has an 09 Lancer, and he joined in on the race too. Because the Maxima was torquey, he wanted to do a 40-roll on the highway to try and get every advantage he could. So our three cars got up on the road, slowed to 40, blocked all the traffic and on the 3rd honk we let it rip. I killed that maxima by about 8 car lengths and was just barely behind the Lancer. We raced back and forth for a few miles and turned around at an exit and did the same thing on the way back. When I got back off the highway and slowed to a stop, the car lurched like a mofo and then I lost all acceleration power. After lots of research, long story short; SS auto came back and bit me in the ass.
After it spending about a month in a jack-leg shop getting the tranny rebuilt, I finally had it back was gleefully took my car back home. As I was going up a hard turning on ramp for the highway, something happened and I lost control and slammed into the guard rail. I suppose I was going too fast, but honestly, no clue how I broke free and slid. EPIC FAIL. The damage was very similar to the damage on the truck. Smashed radiator, condenser, core support, hood, fender, headlight. After a stern tongue lashing from my father, he "loaned" me the $2100 it cost to fix it at his shop. I still owe him about $1700 to this day. It spent two weeks getting repaired and after it was finished, this is what it looked like.
I had the car for a week or two after it was repaired and apparently the jack-leg transmission mechanic had bent something when he pieced the tranny back together. So it spent another 3 weeks getting rebuilt, and when we FINALLY went to go pick up the car, he had hung the bumper on the lift and ripped the bumper to pieces. He's picking up the tab on that repair bill. (This happened about 6 months ago, and he still has not paid for the damage to the bumper). At this point I'm so frustrated with this car that I decide I want to sell it and go out and pick up a 2001 Prelude Type SH. This thing is awesome! I love the way the 5spd feels and its MUCH faster than the automatic. I've been driving this car since October 2010 and the only thing that's gone wrong is the clutch needed to be replaced at 97,000 miles and the idle jumps up and down when it's cold.
I installed Xentec 8K HIDs in the headlights and fogs
Generic SRI, Mugen racing header followed by full magnaflow exhaust, megan tower strut bar
These two-tone leather seats came with the car, I'm not sure if theyre factory or not, but I've never seen anything like it on other Preludes so I think they're aftermarket.
Simple side-view
Smoked tail and spoiler lights
Magaflow muffler, I really like it cus it's not a giant can like so many exhausts
Blue floorlighting (both sides)
Call me ricey, but I love the underglow!
Most recent change to the car, I've seen many people put red in their interiors. But I decided to try out white! I think it looks good, it's certainly different. I used Duplicolor vinyl paint and completely disassembled both door panels and sprayed them. Theyre a little checked up on certain parts where I accidentally banged them when trying to re-install.
Birthday gift.... to myself. LOL! I like it, it's a Clarion NZ500, full GPS and all that nifty stuff.
Well, thats about it in a nutshell! I'll certainly keep this updated as I work on the car. Hopefully I'll get the red prelude sold and can get some cash to play with! This is my daily driver, I wish I could do all the craziness that so many of you guys are doing to yours. But that's simply going to have to wait. I love my car and I'm just going to keep it clean till I can get some major work done. This summer I'll hopefully get the OEM lip kit, a paint job and some Motegi's to dress up the exterior. I hope you enjoyed this. I'll update it when I have worthy material!
Figured I'd post some pictures of the cars together, while I have both of them. Of course it's looking like the red one is going to be sticking around for quite a while, nobody seems interested in it...
Good story. Sounds like you've more than an average share of collisions along the way. And then getting ripped off by the transmission mechanic just tops it off. I know what it's like to get jipped (my ERL block).
Glad to see that in the end you've aquired a clean SH. And thanks for mentioning my name in the first post. Reminds me, have you decided on any future plans for the new prelude?
I think they look pretty cool on the Lude but i've heard mixed reviews.
How do you like them?
They work great. No complaints at all. Theyre not projectors though, they're the normal yellow-ish lights with bright white angel eyes. I tied the angel eyes into the parking light wires and took out the bulbs, so when I flick the parking light switch I just get the angel eyes on. They look sick.
Good story. Sounds like you've more than an average share of collisions along the way. And then getting ripped off by the transmission mechanic just tops it off. I know what it's like to get jipped (my ERL block).
Glad to see that in the end you've aquired a clean SH. And thanks for mentioning my name in the first post. Reminds me, have you decided on any future plans for the new prelude?
I know, I've had pretty awful luck with accidents. But things seem to be going well *knock on wood*. The transmission guy just pisses me off so much, he's done a ton of work for my family and all of a sudden he just sh*ts his pants when he gets my car and has it for like a combined 6 weeks. Yeah, I love the SH, theres a few minor issues I've been sorting out with it. Mainly the electrical wiring was completely jury-rigged with the speakers and such. It's a mess, but it's all functioning fine. And I think the IACV needs to be replaced. But other than that she's a great car. It's always fun to put back the sunroof down here in the Sunshine State and go hit the roads.
I have quite the wish list of stuff I'd like to accomplish. As I mentioned before I plan on working full time this summer and I make an estimated measly 3 grand to put towards the car. Pretty much all I want to do at this point is get a full paint job and some rims. I really want some racing camshafts and a tune on a hondata but I saw your compression issues with the Pro 1s so I'm not sure what to do. But it doesn't matter because finances won't allow such shenanigans for many months
Cool story, bro. But seriously, that's a pretty intense story. I'm glad you finally got a decent car (don't fuxk it up this time ). I love the seats, and the header. I'm not a fan of those door panels, but to each their own. Enjoy your lude!
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Originally Posted by bouckarooo
^i wonder if a turbo would make my gf look better??
Cool story, bro. But seriously, that's a pretty intense story. I'm glad you finally got a decent car (don't fuxk it up this time ). I love the seats, and the header. I'm not a fan of those door panels, but to each their own. Enjoy your lude!
Thanks man. Yeah, I understand that the white door panels won't blow everyone's skirts up, it's definitely different!
They work great. No complaints at all. Theyre not projectors though, they're the normal yellow-ish lights with bright white angel eyes. I tied the angel eyes into the parking light wires and took out the bulbs, so when I flick the parking light switch I just get the angel eyes on. They look sick.
Does it have the LED's on them too? What I've heard is the LED's are cheap and they burn out.
I think the red one would look much better with just a solid red hood, drop and either OEM or retrofitted lights. The 2 tone hood and lights might have been the main reason it didn't sell, most people want something closer to OEM looks.
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New Formula Red 93 BB2: JDM OBD1 H22a/T2W4 Accord Euro R transmission
I think the red one would look much better with just a solid red hood, drop and either OEM or retrofitted lights. The 2 tone hood and lights might have been the main reason it didn't sell, most people want something closer to OEM looks.
I just have met my first fellow Jacksonville luder! I'm in Mandarin, off of Greenland road. How about you? I wish we could get a north florida prelude meet going on
Oh yeah? I've seen a few nice/decent ones. Most of them are just beaters, it's a shame... I go to school at FSCJ south campus, so I'm probably not too far from you. It'd be cool to meet up sometime, your prelude looks very interesting!
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). I love the seats, and the header. I'm not a fan of those door panels, but to each their own. Enjoy your lude!
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