Goodbye Old School, Hello New Style! - Our Garage

This EF needs to get with the times.

It’s been an awfully long time since I’ve done an update for my EF Civic project but I thought I’d try something new for 2012 and change things up. Whether you’re familiar with the project or not, I’ll say that my original goal for the car was to build it with an old-school theme mixed with some JDM flair—restore the car as best as possible, using brand new OEM parts and converting as much of the car to JDM-spec without doing the actual RHD conversion. I’d say my efforts were close to the money—fairly simple, not at all flashy. After 3 years in this state—and after visiting Osaka JDM this past winter—I decided to go against all logic. This EF needs to get with the times. Performance and looks, this is what I’ve decided on.

Kinsler ITB Set

I’ve been saving this for a while, not because I’m not anxious to get these onto the B16A, but because I haven’t set aside enough time to visit a California state ref to have the motor legalized for my chassis before installing these individual throttle bodies. And guess who I’ve called upon to do the tuning—none other than the master himself, Bisi Ezerioha of Bisimoto. I actually have him to thank for connecting me with Kinsler after admiring the setup on some of his older single cam engines, and there really isn’t a reason why I chose this particular setup other than it will be a more basic setup (if you can even call it that) to keep it street driving-friendly (aka kid friendly). The plan calls for rewiring the engine harness with Rywire and to place an AEM Series2 EMS onboard to help fine tune the ITBs and RC Engineering fuel injectors. Plus, I can’t think of a better combination of parts for Bisi to work alongside, as these are parts that were specifically recommended by him and tuned frequently for other customer’s projects. I know my engine will be in the best of hands.

As far as power expectations are concerned, I admit that trying to crank out the max on a bone-stock B16A would’ve been an interesting goal but not one that I’m willing to do at this stage, er, age. You see, part of my influence for going to this next stage of my build comes from the Osaka kanjo racers—and most of their cars still run stock engines (even if they are just swapped B16Bs and what not). I figured, why change that and ruin driveability for the street? Without having to worry about rebuilding the long block and racking up a major parts bill, I feel the ITBs will be perfect enough of a modification along with the right tuning from the EMS to make it a really fun car to drive on the streets, not just track-only.

Goodbye Old School Hello New Style Wheel Cap

Osaka JDM Loop5 Wheels

Feast your eyes on this: the Loop5 wheel from Osaka JDM, which is actually a Work CR01 but not quite. Work Wheels Japan actually builds these specifically for Osaka JDM and can’t be ordered anywhere else, nor can you build your CR01s to the exact specifications as the Loop5. Work Wheels USA offers some but not all the color options for both the wheel face and barrel; Osaka JDM can give you the Loop5 in any style that Work Japan offers, which are at least a couple more than the US. I learned this after talking to Kazuhiro Furukawa, Osaka JDM’s president, and thought I could be slick by ordering the wheel center caps. I knew right then and there that I had to get the Loop5 if I were to begin the transformation of my EF to the Osaka-style. After sorting out wheel sizing with Furukawa-san, I finally decided to do as they do and ordered a staggered set of 15x8" +10 and 15x9" +20 with white faces, polished barrels and black bolts—most likely one of a few sets, if not the only set in the world. Gotta go big, right? Now let’s see if they’ll fit…(more on that coming soon!) Toyo has also graciously stepped in to match up a set of odd fitting tires for these aggressive wheels and should provide the right amount of stretch—after all, I went with the exact same wheel setup as Osaka JDM’s EF9!

Osaka JDM Carbon Rear Wing

Last, I decided to pick up this carbon upper wing from Osaka JDM. Normally, I opt for less show and while the Loop5s might’ve been enough, I really needed something to seal the deal—what better than carbon-fiber? These are made to order and bolt onto the existing factory wing, so that prompted me to track down another wing so I wouldn’t have to drill into the JDM piece already on the car. It’s both a subtle and wild body part to put on an EF, and would only really complete that Osaka look I’m going for (lots of companies offer a wing similar to this, like TRA Kyoto, J’s Racing). Maybe I’ll have to strip the interior down and bolt a rollcage in also, but nah…Jason mask for sure, though.