W00t!! Finally finished with my front end!

[Jareds 89 LX-i]

.... 99% finished, at least. People that have been around here know I've been working on getting this finished for a long ass time now, lol. But I'm quite happy.... the other day I found a real nice black hood and flippy bucket lids, both with good paint at the junkyard (as well as a new corner light.... man I was taking everything off that poor 3g!). Hood only has 2 very small inperfections in the metal and a few scratches, but overall in very very good shape for a junkyard part (the LX-i I got them off of had 217k on it), and looks waaaay better than my ghetto roller painted crooked front hood that was on there. So I put them on, and while I was at it I decided to go ahead and align the front end pieces, as they were still all outta whack from the wreck several years ago (passenger side looked somewhat pushed back, back part of the flippy went under the hood, huge ass gaps everywhere, uneven gaps, bumper sagging, etc). So anyways, 8 hours and 1 car wash later, here's the result!

BEFORE - This was when it was wrecked in 2000.... this is exactly how it was when I got it
http://www.geocities.com/jdpenttinen/wreck3.txt

http://www.geocities.com/jdpenttinen/wreck5.txt

NOW - as of about 1:15 this afternoon
http://www.hpphoto.com/servlet/LinkPhoto?GUID=29f27a83-5df5-11c1-2eab-748e5d314a88&size=

http://www.hpphoto.com/servlet/LinkPhoto?GUID=2a9e3453-1781-547a-565d-64173d846d66&size=

http://www.hpphoto.com/servlet/LinkPhoto?GUID=658b50b9-9b06-37c8-9e74-53fe39ce1e03&size=

http://www.hpphoto.com/servlet/LinkPhoto?GUID=5f4dee5b-433d-6e7f-314b-36de1bb45171&size=

http://www.hpphoto.com/servlet/LinkPhoto?GUID=430935fb-52e3-3fc2-61b1-5e242da3432b&size=

http://www.hpphoto.com/servlet/LinkPhoto?GUID=41d05583-4476-5a49-e48f-19ca34a33194&size=

http://www.hpphoto.com/servlet/LinkPhoto?GUID=6c974f86-4688-3300-77f9-402f7c5677bf&size=

http://www.hpphoto.com/servlet/LinkPhoto?GUID=4ddc29b3-91c3-4b6b-ab55-6f08358066f8&size=

Not too bad for junkyard stuff.... haven't even waxed it yet, just gave it a wash. All work done from before to now performed solely by myself, of course. The pass side flippy still needs just a little more tweaking to make it "perfect", but I can do that some other time. I don't think I'll ever be able to get them exactly perfect though, so I'm not gonna worry about that too much. Anyone who saw my car in person before knows how far out of whack it was (it always looked way better in the pictures). Now all I need is black fender (the one I got isn't in the greatest, shape, and ghetto painted), and unfortunatly, of the two black 3geez at the junkyard, one was smashed and the other was red, lol.

Now I just gotta fix those rust spots and it'll be looking real good! I'm so happy.... my car is finally looking sexy once again instead of looking crashed and ghetto.... sweetness!!

[NXRacer]

looks really good! What did you do to get the front all squared up again? Thats about the damage that was done to my integra (only a little worse) and i'm trying to figure out what i'm gonna do to fix it.

[buzzbomber88lx]

damn.....it's like miraculous how much better and straighter it looks. kinda like emeril on food tv.......BAM!!!

[Jareds 89 LX-i]

looks really good! What did you do to get the front all squared up again? Thats about the damage that was done to my integra (only a little worse) and i'm trying to figure out what i'm gonna do to fix it.
Thanks! Well I had replaced the entire front radiator support (you might be able to see in those pics it got bent back so far it actually tore the metal). I did this by slicing the whole radiator support about a foot behind the headlights, out of a parts car that I had. I seperated it from the frame with a spot weld cutter, then cut mine out minus the frame part.... just seperated it from the frame without cutting it (didn't want to cut my frame since it wasn't damaged). Put it in, but my cutting skillz suck so it didn't line up perfectly under the fenders and there was about a 2 inch gap. This however allowed for adjustment, as well as using some washers as spacers for the headlight buckets as well as forward-backward placement of the bottom part of the radiator support where it bolts on. I moved the top part of the radiator support back and forth by moving the piece under the fender (with a prybar, lol) where there was a gap, then took some hard strips of metal with holes in them (no idea what they're called... about 3 inches long or so), drilled a couple small holes once it was in position, then put screws in to hold it there. It wasn't quite as easy as that.... lots and lots of trial and error.... those stinking flippies are a friggin nightmare to line up right on all sides!! I got it as close as I could though, and bolted it all down, and viola!

:)

[adams86lxi]

good work!!! :cool:

[shane_lxi]

Wow! you're lucky that it was your front end, and not your rear and quarter panel like on my car. You are also a lucky bitch because you ofund a black 3g in the junk yard (they are kind of rare I have found :( ) Nice work though :) VERY NICE!

[Neuspeed87lx]

looks great man ... good work .... i know its alot of work to fix stuff like that ...especially when supports and the frame is bent .... excellent work

[Hash_man_Se_i]

Wow impressive.


so... wanna sell me your se-i center caps? plleeeease.

[johndej]

nice job man, its great to see someone resurrect a 3g. oh yeah, there are some caps on ebay i think hashman.

[BITESIZE]

Didn't even have to paint.............very lucky.

[SiR]

Starting to look real nice now, where did you get those front rims from, or did you just take them from the SE-i and put it on your car for the pics.

:From Cali

[i.c.]

dang man...it looks so much better than before....love the se-i rim things going on...

[Jareds 89 LX-i]

Thanks for all the comments!! :D I switched all 4 rims and tires with the SE-i cuz I had a bad tire that was making lots of noise (29lbs road force variation! :omg: Cord seperating or something...). Since my dad usually only drives 10 miles a day in town and I do alot of highway driving, he thought it'd be safer to switch them and give me the good tires for the time being. I'm getting tires for my 17inch rims as soon as a certain lazy ass gets his, well, lazy ass back down here :kekeke: (J/K lil buddy!!) So now the SE-i is pimping my LX-i stockies, with no center caps, lol. I really like the SE-i rims on a black car though....pretty sharp combo I must say!

[MrBen]

Way to go Jared, way to go. Good work! Nice ride.

I know what a bitch it is to adjust those headlight covers and the hood all aligned, and it takes forever!