I thought it would be satisfying to chronicle my efforts as a way of tracking progress. I hope readers find it to be entertaining, perhaps informative and hopefully inspiring.


The subject of this thread was purchased from an online auction. It lived a long and happy life out west before being sold to someone in NY state who wrecked it shortly after purchase. Its quite obvious that the last owner didn't do much to maintain the interior of the vehicle as I found melted candies, animal hair, stains of unknown origin, cigarette burn holes, lots of trash, over $1 in loose change etc. This car was rusting away on an auction lot in NY destined for a gloomy future. I thought it would be perfect for a little project I had in mind.


Its arrival


An abused 2005 GG MR



What is that under the hood?



Well it appears to be a Honda SOHC POS, what a surprise!

 

Step one was obvious, remove the turd from the engine bay and wash the New York off of her.



Rad support is toast. Nothing says 'abused' more than the 3 different types of wheels.



Lame-ectomy and bath complete, tucked into bed.

 

Damn...What a shame! Stupid people should not have nice cars! Thanks for saving her. I wish you luck, and hope she'll be on the road soon! Any long range plans yet?

 

Sad to see it like this.
Hope that you can restore this to it's fully glory again.
Good luck with it.
Keep us updated.

 

Appraising the interior

In a word: $hit.


Even with the carpet out it still smells like hair gel and fist bumpin


Destined for a thorough cleaning


A testament to the 'fragrance' in the car, my cat couldn't get enough of that stank


Seat on the operating table


Looking a bit cleaner

 

Hell yea, thanks for savin her! Looks like you have your work cut out for you.

 

Its twisted


Passenger frame rail bent about 1" up, in front of the strut tower thankfully.



Physics can be fun!



10,000psi of ramming, days of hammering and a bottle's worth of propane torching later...


Next step is to remove that nasty radiator support.

 

OEM goodness


New rad support arrived from Mitsu! Here it is mocked up. I'm awaiting fender, headlights and front bumper so I can make sure all body panels line up before I tack it on there.

 

you do good work. i marvel in people who do body work!

 

Good work so far and making lots of progress, but I am sure fellow enthusiasts want to know..... How much did this pile of scraps cost you?

 

That's one really weird picture... Something dose not ad up...

 

^^ Right!? I'm thinking insurance fraud...


My winning bid for the auction of this vehicle was $2600.

 

Parts influx


Ever wonder what those super cheap (~$190) FRP OEM replacement bumper covers from Extreme Dimensions actually look like? I hesitate to call it an OEM replacement. It is more like an 'OEM inspired' replacement.


There are no mounting holes, none. The two slits above the main FMIC inlet are not inlets they are depressions and the 'high quality' mesh that came with the piece was very optimistically attempting to redefine the term 'high quality,' so I ditched it.


On the positive side, it does look just like an evo 9 front bumper cover from about 10 feet away. It is MUCH more flexible and resilient than fiberglass and about 30% the cost of a urethane polymer variant.

 

New eyeballs


Big thanks to SSMCL9!

 

Clay bar and wax


Its much more fun if you can do it on the couch with a beer
(as is most anything else I suppose).