Consigliere's 2004 Unbuild

After months of searching for a black on black NA2 I ended up purchasing BLAZEDNSX's 2004 Acura NSX-T. The car was in impeccable condition, however, one of the previous owners had performed some minor "racer boy" cosmetic modifications that I wasn't particularly fond of. This included reverse glow gauges, smoked marker lights, grey seat centers, aftermarket shift knob and other various modifications. The rest of the car was completely stock. I like mods just like anyone else, but I was specifically looking for an "unmolested" car that I could personalize to my own taste. I subsequently set out to return these items back to stock"ish" and will try to document this transformation as I go along.

Gauges

I probably would have left the white gauges alone, however, the whole instrument cluster turned bright blue at night which didn't match the rest of the red controls in the car. I was fortunate to find the white gauge faces weren't a complete replacement, but instead overlays on top of the original gauges. The second pic shows all the wiring related to the reverse glow gauges/backlighting that needed to be removed.

I must say, that second pic with all the wiring is pretty scary looking. Glad you reversed that mod.

Did you have to remove all the needles?

Seats

BTL3.0 said:

Did you have to remove all the needles?

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No, the overlays had just enough room to remove without taking off the needles. That being said, as careful as I was - and I was extremely careful - I still ended up breaking off the fuel gauge needle and had to purchase a new fuel/volt cluster. Learn from my mistake and be aware the needles in the instrument cluster are VERY fragile.


Since the seat centers were still in excellent condition I decided to dye them instead of having them reupholstered. I used Leatherique (rejuvenator oil/pristine clean/prepping agent/dye) which is what they use on a number of Ferrari and Rolls Royce restorations. The complete process took approximately one week, but the color and sheen turned out perfect.

Looks great so far, are you planning on doing something with the brake calipers and finding OEM wheels?

Calipers

htown said:

Looks great so far, are you planning on doing something with the brake calipers and finding OEM wheels?

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Thanks. I did refinish the brake calipers and am still on the hunt for a set of stock rims. One of the prior owners had hand painted the calipers red while they were still on the car. There were portions of all four calipers that weren't painted, while other components (rotors, hoses, etc.) had various red brush marks and/or drip marks. I cleaned off the excess paint, sandblasted all four calipers and then painted them a burnt orange metallic. I realize this is slightly off from the OEM gold, but it provides a really good contrast against the black car IMHO. You'll notice in the third and fifth pics that I also removed the tint from the marker lights and buffed them back to a like-new condition.

Nav Pod

One of the prior owners had added a JDM Navigation Pod that just seemed out of place. Don't get me wrong, the pod itself looked fine. However, it's matte black finish clashed with the 2004's existing silver trim and looked markedly aftermarket IMHO. Because of this, I took the pod down to a local body shop and had them paint the bezel surrounding the screen to match the rest of the trim in the car. Now the pod appears to "flow" into the rest of the center console as if it were a standard factory option.

Great job reversing all those eBay mods....
Mine had white guages as well. After peeling them off, I found they were held on by adhesive which damaged the Oem faces. Finally, after a couple years, I just ponied up and bought a new cluster then finished them with billet trim rings.
Luckily for you ,it was just a fuel/volt meter that broke. That was the same one I broke removing the white gauges. Like a 60$ part from Acura. The speedometer or rpm gauge, 650$ each and on back order. Possibly discontinued.
After breaking my old meters, I found out that the needles are not glued onto the meter shaft. If you use a small screwdriver, you can pop them right off. Useless now, but maybe good for future viewers.
I love the black on black btw:wink:

Body Mods

Thanks JINKS, I'm glad it wasn't the $650 tach that broke.

My next step was to add some Downforce ground effects and an NSX-R style hood to give the car a more personalized feel. Both mods are easily reversible and I will hold onto all the original parts in the event I ever sell the car. Here are a few before and after pics.

On an aside, I found the prior owner had evidently lost a few of the side skirt sill clips that hold them into place (Acura# 71807-SL0-000). My local dealer wanted $11.08 each for these and even online they're still going for ~$8.00 each, so the cost for a few of these relatively insignificant fasteners adds up real quick. Before spending nearly $100 on a handful of plastic clips I decided to stop by our local Honda dealer to look at some similar body molding fasteners I found online (Honda# 91513-SM4-000). The Honda clips turned out to be identical to the Acura ones I needed, which I later verified with both calipers and by test fitting into my NSX. The white one on the left is the Honda part (~$2) and the black one on the right is the Acura part (~$11). I hope this helps others.

Nice work and your nav pod refresh really is excellent and one I'm sure you will see replicated by others ... Glw the lip build

Dumb question for you or whoever: What does the vent in the 'Stacy' skirts do? Does it go to the intake, brakes or??

prym8 said:

Dumb question for you or whoever: What does the vent in the 'Stacy' skirts do? Does it go to the intake, brakes or??

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It's just a dummy vent which is used to accentuate the Oem vent. Although, there is plenty of room in there to incorporate rear brake ducts.

Navigation

Up next in the "unbuild" was to update the navigation system and backup camera, as well as to remove a number of electronic goodies the previous owners had installed. I went back and forth between using a tablet to do this or simply using a standalone Garmin unit. Wiring in a tablet would have been relatively straightforward, however, I really didn't need all the bells and whistles that it offered and there were too many downsides (overheating, battery life, etc.), so I ended up going with a "glass front" Garmin 2789LMT with an integrated Garmin BC30 backup camera. LAMCHOP168 already did a really good write-up on a similar install (http://www.nsxprime.com/forum/showt...armin-GPS-with-Wireless-Backup-Camera-Project) using a 2798LMT so I won't bore you with the details. It should be noted, however, that the 2789LMT and 2798LMT both leave a gap of approximately 1/32" on either side of a standard navigation pod (see first pic). This is hardly noticeable to most, but I'm anal about these types of things and ended up fusing two pieces of plastic inside the bezel of the nav pod and then blending it in with epoxy and Bondo. The end result came out looking factory IMHO which has been the theme of this entire unbuild. On an aside, the last pic shows all the electronics and wiring I pulled out of the car. This included a monitor, hide-away unit, two DVDs (...you never know when you may get the sudden urge to watch X-Men while you're driving down the freeway), Bluetooth hands-free system, modulator, backup camera and various other miscellaneous components. I'm sure these were all state of the art in their day, but I wanted to return the car to stock and the Garmin does most of this already (Nav, Bluetooth, camera, etc.). You'll notice in the fourth pic that the aftermarket gearshift knob was also replaced at this time.

Front Spoiler

I want to add a front lip to the car and really like the style with the two ducts in the bottom like TURBO2GO used to have on his silverstone (see top pic). However, the manufacturer of this spoiler apparently went out of business some time ago and I haven't been able to find anything similar for the 2002+ cars. As such, I purchased the materials to fabricate my own. Here are a few pics of the project to date. I realize it looks pretty rough so far, but it's slowly but surely coming together and I'm hoping to have it completed within the next couple of weeks. Once I have it as perfect as I can get it, I'll take it down to the body shop and let them do the final finish work and then make a fiberglass mold so I can make a couple of spares in the event I ever lose a fight with a speed bump.

I like what you're doing; thank you for posting. So fabricating a plug out of MDF and then having a mold made?

Thanks JWMELVIN. You're right, I am fabricating it primarily out of MDF with a couple of layers of 1/8" plywood sandwiched in between for rigidity. Once the finish work is completed I will make the mold myself and then knock out a couple of fiberglass copies.

very very impressive!

Thanks MYW, it's a work in progress. Here are a few more pics.

Wow. Really digging the custom lip spoiler. I think you'll most certainly have prime folks asking to purchase them so save the mold buddy.

- - - Updated - - -

I still cannot believe someone did the gauge cluster modification to a 2004. They should be beaten and whipped.

Yeah. I am glad we got over the while white reverse glow gauge thing. It seems like every one was doing this mod 15 years ago.

Consigliere,
Great job! Love the navi pod finishing touches. Really makes a difference. It's the little details that make all the difference. Nice!
Acuman

Here are a few more pics of my spoiler project to date. I finally started fabricating the mold for it this week. Prior to gelcoating and glassing the mold I sanded it down with 1200 grit sandpaper, waxed it approximately a dozen times with mold release and then sprayed it with PVA to help promote separation once completed....I'm not sure how we ever accomplished anything before YouTube instructional videos were born.

I wasn't able to make a one-piece mold like I intended because of the draft angle, so it will end up being a three-piece mold connected by flanges at the corners. Despite this, the assembled mold should still be able to produce nearly seamless copies due to the tight tolerances I've been able to maintain so far (the third pic is a good closeup of one of the gelcoated flanges). I'm really pleased with how this project is coming together, although it seams like it is taking forever. I suppose if I knew what I was doing this would have been done a long time ago, but where's the fun in that? Anyway, this gives me a good opportunity to work on new swear words.

Very nice work!!