Tearing down donor car..What to keep?

[ex1z7]

Alright so, if anyone remembers my previous posts.. I have a gold '87 carb/auto LX.. Blown engine and torn apart tranny.. Today I found another 87 LX with the same engine and tranny as mine, in good condition - however the body is terrible. To safety this other car would take some serious, serious work, and I'm just not interested in that - so what I plan to do is tear out the engine and trans, and throw it into mine.. I have access to an engine hoist now, and everything I need to swap, and a budget big enough to support what might go wrong etc. and enough to do a full service on the engine to boot.

So what I'm asking is.. When I tear the bad bodied accord apart, what should I take as well that I might need later? All the panels are in pretty rough shape, the hood and trunk are good - no rust that I saw in a quick walk around, but all fenders and doors are in pretty bad shape. The interior is blue and mine is tan, so I don't want to have like spare blue seats..

I was thinking of taking out ANYTHING that is in perfect condition, however, I was thinking that once I tear it down, someone on here might need something..

Now, don't start yelling at me telling me you need this part and that part, as soon as I have both cars sitting in my driveway ready to do the swap, or during the swap, I'll take lots of pictures and then when I'm done the swap I'll rip off anything someone needs/wants.. I'm wondering, though, what should I transfer to my car .. or what should I keep "in case" type thing.

I'll keep this thread updated as soon as possible with whats happening with the cars, hopefully I'll be able to make back some of the money it'll cost me to do this swap thing..

<quick recap> During this swap, what should I look to keep in case. And what should I rip off to sell on here for people. </quick recap>

[MessyHonda]

sorry to say but if you have the money why not swap a fuel injected engine. its a mess to work with the carb...my uncle who has a mazda carb cant adjust mine right...honda carbs are hard to work with if you dont have the right knowlege. a guy might sell me all the fuel injected stuff for 260 bucks...includes everything

[ex1z7]

Well because I can't find a fuel injected donor car, or a fuel injected engine in my city for less then 750 dollars. And I don't really feel much like paying 750 dollars for a fuel injected A20 thats only worth 300, tops.

Alllllso I wanted to add, as I was thinking of it, as I'm taking the engine out and all .. I'm going to pressure wash it and paint the valve cover and carb cover and such .. I was planning on an oil change, full filter change, spark plugs, new coil, new plug wires, auto tranny fluid change, and if I can find one soon - an A20A3/4 exhaust manifold.. Anything else I should look at doing? I was considering gaskets, but I don't want to rent a hoist for longer then I have to .. and I really don't want to do gaskets as I'm afraid of screwing something up..

Any idea's, as the engine is out? I'm pressure washing it, too, and cleaning everything .. Taping and such too - make sure things go back where they should.

[MessyHonda]

you should compression test it...anything less than 120 is not good. maybe you can rebuild it...you could be making like 140hp with a rebuild but that will take money and time. yeah you might want to change the timing belt, water pump and gaskets. i got a head gasket kit for 43 bucks on ebay but you can get the whole engine kit for 60-80 and the gaskets look hard core. it would be nice if you can clean up your engine bay also. i used some engine paint and it looks nice...i missed some spots but its still good.

[RamThis]

If you plan on doing work to your cars, why not buy an engine hoist?? You can get them at Harbor Freight Tools for about $150, that's where I got mine. The fold-up style is closer to $200. I had to drop a new engine in my Ram so I just bought the hoist and now I use it for heavy lifting items all the time in my shop (garage) Also the engine stands are really cheap there, I have two of those, one to store my 68 Charger's 383 on, and the working stand for working on engines. It's a small investment for something that you will use more than you think, and to rent one a couple times pretty much pays for itself. Just something to think about.....

[ex1z7]

Well for one, I don't live in Texas so going to Harbor Front isn't really easy =).. And I'm also a struggling student so I don't have the money to invest in a full tool set, a hoist, an engine stand, etc. etc... That and I don't have a garage - or anything that resembles a garage at my house so I have no where to do the work like that in.. if i did I'd invest awfully quick as soon as I had the money, and yea, I'd rent the stuff out to friends or friends-of-friends to help pay for the loss of buying a hoist.

The only thing stopping me from running out to the car(s) to tear them down and swap them over is ... A.) my car is parked at a garage, and needs towing, I need to get my mechanic to shove a few cars out of the way so I can get to mine. B.) I don't have a place to do the work. C.) I don't have the tools to do the work. D.) I don't have the knowledge on how to do this swap and E.) I don't have the second accord, I need ot go pick that up down the street.

However, last night I couldn't sleep after solving near all my problems.. My buddy has a driveway I can use for a few days, my other friend who did a few CRX B16/B18 swaps in his garage said he'll help, my OTHER friend has all the tools I need, and really wants to help.. I also read the how-to on tearing my engine out so I think I can pull it off easily, plus, I've done a few RWD swaps before so I'm confident I can do a FWD one.. And all I need to do now is walk down and grab the keys to the blue accord and I'm set. Only problem left is getting my gold 3g out of a yard..

I was thinking last night, as well, as I did a tranny fluid swap on my Commodore in Australia and the fluid pan was HUGE, and i was looking at some Honda auto tranny's and they're tiny and I don't see a pan anywhere.. How do I swap the fluid? Just pull the drain plug and pour new fluid into the fill cap? Or can I take the pan off, wherever it is, and drain all the fluid that way?

I'm getting more and more excited to do this swap every hour now.. I almost want to dance.

< close enough.

[speedpenguin]

Harbor Freight tools isn't a place, it's a mail order catalog, and I'm pretty sure they ship to Canada, so you should be OK.

And yes, just drain and replace the fluid for your tranny.

[LiTtLe xOx BitT]

Harbor Freight tools isn't a place, it's a mail order catalog, and I'm pretty sure they ship to Canada, so you should be OK.

And yes, just drain and replace the fluid for your tranny.

Good luck with the work, take some pics. Harbor freight is a place, there is a harbor freight store a few block from me.

[w261w261]

If you have power windows, get the switches from the doors. Also get the driver's door window drop relay unit from the drivers door. Get the ECU, the power window controller, grab all the fuses and the relays from the fuse box and the box under the hood. Get all the lights, plus the light combo switch on the steering column and the ignition switch. If you have a sunroof, grab the sunroof motor from the roof. Get the cooling fans. Take out the temp sensors from the manifold near the thermostat.

When you're doing the engine transplant, don't forget to take out the coolant overflow bottle and clean it with something that has phosphoric acid in it ("The Must for Rust" or pool tile cleaner or Milkstone remover). You'll be able to actually see the level of coolant when you're done.

Get the headlight motors too.

[speedpenguin]

Good luck with the work, take some pics. Harbor freight is a place, there is a harbor freight store a few block from me.

OK, I was wrong. Oh well, it's also a mail order catalog.

[sjsjbb]

just a thought try a public car auction i just went to one and ther was about 4 that sold for under 200 to 300 dollars fixes ranged from water pump on one nice car i was late on that one no bidding number. other was just hiiigh millage and interiors on all but one were almost perfect. next one is june 24 and i will be there earley .cars went cheep. ilive in pa. but im sure other states have them.. people are there from texas mexico new york oh. fl. just some i met.

[ex1z7]

Soooo I went to the wreckers today and don't trust ANY of those engines, so I'm still doing the donor car swap, however there are a fair few fuel injected A20's so I'm very excited about a future -i swap. Not engine, just convert it ..

Also I found a really nice black coupe thats body is crashed to shit, it kinda looks like it got run over too but by like a motorcycle ha.. I was wondering, however, cus it has a black dash and really soft seats - like .. uh almost suede or velvet? Iono they were silky and cream coloured.. I was wondering if I could rip out that dash and it'd fit in my sedan.. Also the front and rear seats, minus the trim, would it fit? i figure the door trim and dash trim would fit, and front seats shouldn't be any problem at all, but the rear seats I doubt would fit but I'm not sure so .. Anyone know?

Also, anyone have any tips on checking things to make sure the fuel injection works on an engine that's been sitting in a wreckers for however long? I'm interested in doing the swap now, at least, in a few months when I have enough money to rip the car apart again hehe..

i feel so happy now that I found a few cool things.. Like leather trim around the gear knob in perfect condition.. i wanted to take it but I thought I might catch herpes touching the gear knob, it was kinda sticky..

[ex1z7]

Wellll A small update. So I bought my first honda today. Yes, my first honda. The donor car is sitting in my driveway now - I was going through the pro's and con's and the pricing of everything I have to do to the 2 cars to get them to become 1, and just waiting till I had it all sorted out .. Then I made the call to the woman who owned the 3rd gen, took it for a spin, put air in the tires cus they were flat a little, then drove it more .. Not as fast as I would like but a carb'ed a20 isn't exactly blistering =P

So anyways.. Thinking of stripping as MUCH of the car as possible. My car is in very, very good shape from what I saw the other day when I went and looked at it.. So hopefully it'll be time to paint the scheme I have planned after the engine gets goin'.. but the plan is black dash, light cream interior, black speaker covers, black roof liner (maybe) and maybe black carpet if I figure out how.. I want better headlights, too, so I was thinking of finding a way to get better brighter bulbs, I'll scour around and show links to what i'm thinkin' of buying later, when I get closer to that stage.

So yes.. Hopefully tomorrow I can take pics and upload some of the sexy, rusty, dented new car I bought =)

Ahhhhh this friday should be interesting =) time for some swapppppppaggeeee baby.


Oh and I also found a Haynes manual in the car, i just twitched a little and went ".. woot"

=D

[AccordEpicenter]

cool. Do some searches there are lots of threads to help you with your project like the headlights etc. Post some pics up if you can

[ex1z7]

I'm still psyched cus the only other car I bought with my own money was a Datsun 200b-SX, which blew up 3 blocks from the original owners house 5 mins after I bought it..

But yea, first car in canada, first honda, first car that made it home.. I feel so uhm.. Giddy.

I also have a few idea's I'm going to do headlight/taillight wise, I'll keep everyone posted as soon as I do the swap .. thats my main concern right now - everything after that is just fluff.

[ex1z7]

Well right now my car is on it's way to my friends on a flatbed.. I'll drain it and get it ready to pull tomorrow.. I've got to run to the store to get all the things I need fluid and filter wise to replace afterwards, and maybe buy a pickle fork so I can get that ball joint out or whatever.. Shal keep everyone posted.. One more step closer to this swap

it's officially the point of no return, though. Woo..


I'm kinda scared though :x the only thing I'm not sure on how to do is get the ball joint free, but I think you just use a pickle fork and a hammer, or just pull super hard.. Iono, i'll figure it out..

Pics to come saturday night =)

['89AccordLX(Rus)]

Well right now my car is on it's way to my friends on a flatbed.. I'll drain it and get it ready to pull tomorrow.. I've got to run to the store to get all the things I need fluid and filter wise to replace afterwards, and maybe buy a pickle fork so I can get that ball joint out or whatever.. Shal keep everyone posted.. One more step closer to this swap
it's officially the point of no return, though. Woo..
I'm kinda scared though :x the only thing I'm not sure on how to do is get the ball joint free, but I think you just use a pickle fork and a hammer, or just pull super hard.. Iono, i'll figure it out..
Pics to come saturday night =)

For the ball joints you can use a puller. Most autostores carry a device called a "Pitman Arm Puller". It fits every balljoint on these cars and makes disassembly a breeze without destroying boots. Hope this helps.

[ex1z7]

Think that tank is legal? haha..

[MessyHonda]

^^^ CANCER^^^ wow....cali cars dont have any of that crap...lol

[w261w261]

fwiw, there's a recall on the gas filler pipe. you can take it over to your friendly honda dealer and they'll fix it right up, no charge.

[speedpenguin]

I think it's beyond just a filler pipe at this point.

[w261w261]

You think?

[ex1z7]

I have a feeling it might be a little too far past a filler pipe

[ex1z7]

Well ... A few more updates cus I've been really ignoring this thread lately, and my entire project.

I havn't been doing the swap as there was a death in my family and that took priority for a few weeks.. however, it's time to finish what i started.

The other day I started tearing the car down, my /good/ accord. the engine is now fairly close to coming out - I need to crack the mounts and remove the axles etc. and then it's ready.

However, my donor car I decided to go offroading with, with some friends, as I didn't care if it got scratched/damaged etc.... Well now it's stuck in the middle of the bush in grass taller then the roof. I'm going to go tow it out with a friends truck today/tomorrow.. I'd love to get pics but I'm not sure if I can get a digital camera. I'll see what I can do... It's really quite a humerous site.

Hopefully tomorrow I should have the donor accord torn apart as well, then I can lift both engines and drop the good one back in. A month after I originally planned to.. Heh.

Thanks everyone so far for all their help, and all the advice people have given me on how to do this and such. I've gotten lost and confused a few times but I've been able to figure out what needs to be removed etc. I've been labelling lines and stuff too which was a great idea.

Getting that much closer to having a /legal/ accord on the road. Woot.