Acura RSX, ILX and Honda EP3 Forum banner

Burst Craft's Time Attack DC5 Build - THE BEGINNING - @burst_craft

6K views 37 replies 7 participants last post by  avinad 
#1 ·
I figured it was time to give back to the community that helped me start this RSX addiction all those years ago. I took a break from these forums a few years ago as life got busy starting my shop and going to college so my original account was lost to my memories. Figured it was also appropriate to have an account to match my business now (no promoting anything obviously, I know you admins are watching).

Anyway, a little background on myself, my shop, and what all has brought me to where I am today and why this thread is getting started.

2011: Young punk me got a 21k mile 2006 NHBP Type S as a first car and I went on and modified and improved it from its OEM form, only doing mods that could be reversible if need be. Still kept the miles low as it's just how I am. I'm not one to randomly drive. I like to see purpose in my destination.


2014: Opened up shop here in the Bay Area and the RSX became a bit of our shop demo car. I got a pickup truck to use as a daily and the RSX really got to become the garage queen I wanted it to be after it took me to and from high school for 3 years.


2017: Car was roughly where I wanted it. Interior was simplified, suspension dialed in well enough for me to enjoy it to its fullest. Halo bucket seat, 6pt harness, etc. Basically a nice dual duty car. 2 days after Christmas, it all got totaled by a 70+ old man crossing 3 lanes of oncoming traffic. 34.4k miles and the car was dead. I was uninjured physically, but emotionally it took some time.


2018: And now, this is where our new forum journey now begins. We ended up keeping the car since the mileage was so low and the insurance wouldn't give us much extra for letting them take the car. Everything mechanically is perfect from the old Type S but the frame is trashed. It would have to be replaced from the firewall forward, so we began to search for a new shell.

A good friend of ours in southern California just so happened to have a 2006 NHBP base shell as he blew his 314whp k20/24 Frankenstein for a second time and wanted to focus on racing his Miatas instead of investing money back into the motor. We made a deal and he trailered the shell all the way up from Santa Ana to our shop in Fremont and the build began.

 
See less See more
4
#3 ·
Now to into more detail now that I've set aside some time to really get this thread rolling.

Day 1:
Car was pulled off the trailer and rolled right into the shop.
Obviously at this point (about early/mid July) I'd been without a driving RSX for 7 months already and the itch to work on my own again was really kicking in. In the span of about 3 hours we pulled every piece of interior minus the door cars and dash.


We ended with a nice pile! You'd be surprised how much all the little pieces add up to a good chunk of weight if you're willing to go without an interior.



Again a special thanks to the friends that helped me knock out that chunk of work in a matter of hours to get the ball rolling on all this.

Day 2: Out with the dash! One of the things I've learned over the years of putting together performance oriented cars is that sound deadening is HEAVY. RSX and most other modern cars have sound insulation between the dash and firewall to keep heat and noise to a minimum. This always comes out whenever I pull a dash on a car I know will be a dedicated track car. I've yet to weigh it but it fills a whole trash bag and my guestimate would be about 10-15lbs (~5.5kg) of useless weight.




With the dash out of the car, it was also time to start on another part of the weight reduction process and that was simplifying the entire wiring harness in this car. With this being a dedicated track car, we wanted to simply the electrical system as much as possible so HVAC, SRS, and ABS are all being removed. In regards to those components on the dash, this meant removing the SRS brain from the chassis and all the wiring integrated into the dash harness along with all the wiring for the audio system and climate control. This is how the entire dash harness looks outside of its frame. Not too insane until you pull all the plastic casings and electrical tape away and see all the individual wires.



In addition, we also went ahead and removed the airbag, although we're keeping the airbag cover on the dash for now, just for the sake of aesthetics.




I'll be posting another update tomorrow to show more of the process and slowly catch everyone up but I hope you all enjoy this update and a bit of a deeper look into the project. I'm also always happy to answer any questions that anyone may have!
 
#6 ·
Thanks for supporting man! Guess you've already seen a bit more of this than the thread shows if you've hopped around on Youtube haha.
Ego_death has been a friend of mine for awhile now and we've been chatting a fair bit more now especially that I've gotten neck deep into this project. Loved (and still love) his RSX especially all the nice noises it makes on track.
 
#9 ·
Continuing where we left off yesterday, the dash progress continued. I went ahead and completely resprayed the dash frame a black similar enough to NHBP that it wouldn't clash later down the line when the cage is installed and the interior is resprayed.


While the paint dried on the frame, I also went ahead and got some carbon fiber pieces I've had sitting around for a year or two installed into the car. I purchased these some time ago from Josh at Anointed Aero and it was good to finally see them in what I hope to be their permanent home.


Remember what I said about the plastic casings being less intimidating than seeing all the wiring inside them? Here's just a look into that.


Fun bit of info though, the dash SRS harness is entirely independent from the rest of the wiring. I assume it's supposed to be that way to be easily replaceable versus the rest of the system in case of SRS faults.



And for the final bit of today's catching-up update, here's one of the first goodies I got to order for the car. Waited about 2 weeks for these to ship in from Singapore. You'll see them mounted in tomorrow's update.


As always, thanks to those that helped along the way and I hope you all enjoy this update!
 
#15 ·
Haha I feel like we all tend to feed off little things from everyones' builds and tweak it a bit to make it our own. Whether it's a mod that takes a day to do or a week, go for it. And if you need help, myself and plenty of others are always happy to lend a hand, whether it be with advice or even physical assistance.

Plus, I tend to be a bit weird so some people like to watch the weird things that I end up building. Lots of function with still some consideration of form. Probably a bit of OCD? Maybe? Not too sure but who knows lmao. I think Spray2020 can attest to how much I care about function with form while still being entirely unique.
 
#17 ·
So I think this update will be a bit long but should just about catch up everyone to where the car is currently at. As promised, here's how the headlight covers look mounted on the car. Fitment was pretty good for the most part, about as good as you can expect for a $175 pair of covers. The fitment of body lines vs the light covers is actually pretty good. The chassis mounting tabs are decent too albeit you need to make slotted holes in order to allow for adjustment similar to the OEM units, but overall, very little work for a cool result!


And surprise! I managed to score a Seibon OEM style carbon fiber hood. It'll more than likely have some venting added and get painted NHBP to match the car since the clear is failing.




In addition to working on all the wiring (which is still a pain in my side as I absolutely hate depinning these connectors), I went ahead and started piecing together an EP3 EPS system along with doing a full ABS system delete. The non-ABS setup utilizes all OEM Honda components and requires 0 modifications to any of your systems. It all bolts right in place. I do still need to get one hard-line mount to hold the passenger side line to mount to the chassis but outside of that, the ABS delete is complete.


The lovely EPS rack that's getting an SHG rack slider and Tegiwa rack riser. We're also adding Davinci tie rods to make sure we have all the adjustment we need. (Not seen in the pic since I don't seem to have an updated pic at the moment. We're still waiting on a few parts for this so it's not installed just yet either).



Also have these I've been holding onto for probably two years at this point as they were supposed to go into the old chassis. DC5R Brembos painted Stratto Blue, although I'm considering going a more tradition black now just for sake of being less flashy. We'll see, plenty of time to refinish these before they'll need to go on. Braking system will be Stoptech stainless lines, Type S rears, DC5R fronts w/ S2000 rotors on Type S hubs.

My gorgeous hands (SIKE) for size reference.


Caliper and such are going to stay off until we're ready to have the braking system operational so it was just a test fit for the time being.

And finally, a little teaser, and what should be the final piece of the update as we wait for more OEM parts and aftermarket goodies to arrive and continue this project.



I think plenty of you know what mismatched fenders mean when it comes to building a time attack car and needing extra room for grip. ?

As always, thank you all for taking the time to stop by and read more about the project. I really hope you'll enjoy all the updates as they come in throughout both the near and distant future. Feel free to check out our other accounts as I may have missed adding something to here that I haven't added in other places but I'll do my best to keep this as updated as all the other places to keep both the admins and you all happy.
 
#21 ·
Been busy with shop work the past few days but that didn't stop me from getting some work done on the DC5.

On the 7 year anniversary of me purchasing my first RSX (Nov 8th), a very big set of parts showed up for this new chassis. Seemed very fitting in a sense, such a critical part of this rebirth showing up on the day of initial creation for me. A very big thank you to Anointed_DC5 for dealing with me over all these years and especially these last couple of months while this kit was being built. It's a great honor to finally own a product of yours that I consider the shining star of your business after knowing you all these years.



We've yet to cut the quarters or fenders so this is just a really rough mock up I did in maybe 30-45 minutes worth of time I had to spare.





In addition, Honda finally came through after two weeks of waiting for 2 O-rings and 2 boot bands so I got to finally reassemble the EPS rack. Still need to give it one finally cleaning to get it back to being nice and silver again. Now I'm just waiting on the rack to chassis mounts to actually get it back in the car.





Andddddddd done! We're developing poly bushings for the rack as well (not many options outside of Mugen) plus we can always pull the rack before the engine goes in to install those. Just need this back in place so we can move and steer the car if need be.



And that's about it for this update. Hopefully we can get some more wiring work done and get some gold tape in the engine bay after we give it a good wash and degrease yet again.
 
#23 ·
Haha thank ya, thank ya. I actually think they might still be produced. I'll have to check back around on instagram and see. The quality on them is good as far as what's visible but the mounting structure took a lot of modifying to make work as it slides into some OEM alignment slots. Spent an hour or two on each piece to get them to fit snuggly in their respective locations.
 
#24 ·
Got bored and test fit 18x11 +25 wrapped in 295s on the RSX to see how the kit would look filled in with a wide setup. Rears would need a 5mm spacer since they hit the chassis around the shock. Fronts clear just fine but cant turn full lock with it just barely hitting the frame rail. Both fit easily under the kit though!









Overall a positive experiment to know that the specs in 17" I plan to run will clear no problem. I don't plan to run anywhere near an 18x11 and 295 though, more in the 17x9.5 or 17x10 realm and 255 or 265 tire but slicks do tend to run a tad wider. Really weird to see muscle car or big turbo car wheel/tire specs on a Honda though.
 
#26 ·
The shell happened to have Davinci rods from the prior owner so we'll at least be starting with those paired with a Tegiwa rack riser. As far as camber specs, I speculate we'll need somewhere in the 3-3.5° range for what tracks we run vs our projected tire spec but all that'll have to get figured out once we have all the new control arms and such in and really start doing the fine tuning geometry work.

On the old car before the accident, we pulled only -2° up front with maybe like 3° of caster and that maxed out the OEM rods to go back to 0° of toe at 1 finger gap with 235/45r17 (for whatever ride height reference you can make from those figures to compare to your own).

I'd consider either a rack riser and OEM rods for your setup and see if that helps or consider an inverted tie rod setup albeit at the potential risk of it dropping out or hitting part of the chassis (vs the original manner of over-arm mounted vs the inverted setup being under-arm). Davinci rods used to be a good solution as well but I don't think he makes them or if he still does, they're in very spaced out batches.
 
#29 ·
I'm using the regular BC Racing BR Type. Swift springs and custom rates. So looks like I'll be getting new tie rods. The J's Racing ones include I think regular ends, while the ktuned ones are endless, but they also make a set which includes spherical ends.

Thoughts on spherical vs regular? I feel like it's overkill for me. lol I don't have anything else spherical on the car atm.
 
#30 ·
Tighter tolerances in the spherical will give a more direct feel but require maintenance (mainly just inspections and cleaning/lubing). If you're doing mainly street/daily driving, just go regular sealed joint end but if it's sort of a weekend warrior or dedicated track build or you're willing to keep an eye on the sphericals, then they're the more performance oriented option. Just really look at what the car mainly does the most and go from there. Obviously also consider if you'd be willing to give those rods a quick look-at every oil change if you go spherical and you'll be happy with those but there's also no loss for street driving if you stay regular/OEM.
 
#33 ·
I'm also debating what tie rods/ends to get. I just got bc racing extreme low coils with swift springs and they have the flat arms. I can't decide if i want to wait for devinci rods or just get the ktuned arms with spherical bushings or get hardrace setup
 
#34 ·
You won't need anything in terms of correction since the flat arms negate the need for shorter arms, inverted rods, etc. If you want them for extra adjustment range or better bushings, then by all means go for it, but you won't need them for anything else really.
For those arms, stay OEM length regardless of if you go Davinci, K-Tuned, Hardrace, etc.

And whatever you do, do not get inverted rods with flat arms, you need to stay OEM / OEM style or equivalent mounting style of spherical (anything that mounts to the top side vs inverted going under the arm.)
 
#37 ·
So a bit of an update to check back in with everyone and show some progress. I've been busy prepping my Miata for the 2019 time attack season (aero, minor maintenance/upgrade, etc.) so the RSX has just been sitting for a bit.

EPS was supposed to go in over the past few weeks but after doing the rebuild, I figured I was only going to have the rack out once so better do everything now and so because of that, we're designing some higher durometer rack bushings to replace the OEM rubber ones that slowly deteriorate over time. That being said, once those are in, the rack will be in and that's the last I have to deal with it until wiring in the EPS.

Now onto the more fun part of the update. I'm sure plenty of you know of Jose / Circuit Dreams and his RSX. He's been a buddy of mine for some time, so I like to pester him from time to time when I want some cool, unique stuff. Soooooooooooo....

I couldn't have just two carbon fiber panels in the dash, I needed everything to be CF.

Pardon the blue film on some of the pieces as this is just to protect them until they're permanently fixed in place.







Thank you again, Jose. I love these little bits that help make the dash just that much more complete.

Hopefully I'll be able to give you guys some more updates in the coming weeks as I tend to get more free time around the holidays, so hopefully it also means more RSX work. As always, thanks for stopping by. Check our Youtube updates if you'd like to see some of this but in video form, and yeah, enjoy!
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top