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Mike's Type S

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Mike's Type S

Post by norks27 » Wed Feb 27, 2019 12:23 pm

Looking very sweet indeed :thumbup:
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Post by ATR84 » Tue May 07, 2019 12:56 pm

Not much to update, other than I took the Type S to it's first show, Japfest at Silverstone, on Sunday. I was tempted to take it on track but didn't in the end. Looking forward to taking it to more shows.

I was talking to Darren on the Torque GT stand and he said he has a customer who is wanting a Type S imported at the moment and the search is on, so there could be another fresh type s coming onto the forum soon!

Anyway, here is mine on the stand at Japfest and a couple of shots of the stand.

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Last edited by ATR84 on Thu Nov 28, 2019 11:22 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by ATR84 » Tue Jun 04, 2019 10:08 pm

Went for a drive round the ashdown forrest at the weekend, and took a couple of pics:

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Last edited by ATR84 on Thu Nov 28, 2019 11:24 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by ATR84 » Sat Jun 15, 2019 8:27 pm

I went to Tunerfest at Brands Hatch last Sunday in the Prelude. I was on the South Jap Society stand as ludegeneration members were not doing anything for this show. I convoyed there with a friend of mine who owns a GT86.

I highly recommend this show to others, such a variety of cars, the view of the track is so much better than at Silverstone as well.

Quite a lot of people show interest in the Prelude at shows which is nice, I think I was getting more questions and compliments than most on the stand.

Few pics from the South Jap Society stand:

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Last edited by ATR84 on Thu Nov 28, 2019 11:27 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by ATR84 » Sat Jul 13, 2019 8:40 pm

This might be a bit longer than usual update.

Not sure where to start with this, but here it goes. My Type S has been leaking oil since before Torque GT sold me the car last year. The first time I became aware of the leak was before I collected it as I checked the MOT online and noticed that an oil leak was an advisory item. I called Darren at Torque GT and he confirmed that there was a leak and that it was coming from the rocker cover and they would sort it before I collected the car. To be honest, I thought little about it after that.

Fast forward to collection day, it must have been a few weeks after the conversation with Darren, the journey was long and delayed, and the weather was atrocious, wind and rain. The car looked stunning upon arrival, unfortunately I made the mistake of not looking under the car, if I had, I am pretty sure I would have seen some oil there.

After the 5 hour journey home, I put the car in the garage, and other than a trip to TGM the following day for some additional rust protection/undersealing (as detailed in an earlier post on this thread), the car was not used much mainly because we were heading into winter. The car is rust free and I want it to stay that way. After a few weeks I decided to take the car out of the garage to give it a proper clean and run out while it was dry. That is when I first realised there was a problem, as there were a few spots of oil on my garage floor.

I almost immediately called Darren at Torque GT to discuss this, obviously the leak or leaks they thought were coming from the rocker cover either had not been addressed, or the oil was coming from somewhere else. Torque GT have a relationship with TGM Motorsport in Fleet, they are about 50 miles from me, plus I had used them before anyway, so Darren said let them fix it and Torque GT would cover the bill. Great, or so I thought.

Over the coming weeks/months I made three separate trips to TGM, unfortunately they were unable to trace the oil leaks, they changed most of the obvious seals such as the vtec solenoid gasket, rocker cover gasket and other easy(ish) to get to seals that I cannot remember the names of right now. I started to become a little frustrated with the situation, especially when TGM and Torque GT started to suggest using a stop leak type product. I did some reading online and decided that was not for me, while some people reported these products had worked for them, there were also plenty that said they hadn’t. After much toing and froing over a period of months Torque GT finally gave me 3 options in order to resolve the issue once and for all:

1. Return the car to them so they could fix it
2. Give the car to TGM until fixed
3. Take £500 as a goodwill gesture

I went for number 3. Number 1 was not viable because they were simply too far away and by this point I was concerned that they would just pour a can of stop leak into it and hope for the best. I also ruled out number 2 because TGM had already had the car several times and again had recommended stop leak. I decided to take the £500 and book the car in with Performance Autoworks. After speaking to Rich at PAW and describing the issue, we decided it could be the rear main seal but with this sort of thing there are no guarantees. The only thing to do really was to start taking the car apart to see what was going on, and while they were at it I decided I might as well get an ATR clutch and Competition Clutches Ultra Lightweight Flywheel fitted. The girlfriend and I decided to make a mini break of it and spend some time in the Cotswolds, so on Wednesday just gone, we got up bright and early and made the 110 mile trip to PAW, the girlfriend followed me in her car, well actually I followed her. While we were exploring the area Rich at PAW got to work…….

Rich found more than he bargained for when he started to remove stuff, the oil leak or leaks were worse than what was obvious at first glance. He went ahead and did the rear main seal, there was some evidence to suggest it was leaking from there but it was not THAT bad. He also noticed that there seemed to be oil coming from around the cambelt area, so I gave him permission to go ahead and look into that in more detail which meant we ended up staying 2 nights in Burford (lovely town), rather than 1 but to be honest we didn’t take much persuading as it was great there. Rich found that it was certainly leaking from there so new cambelt, tensioner (Rich switched it to the manual tensioner at this point), and replaced other seals down in that area. What annoyed me about this is that Torque GT did the cambelt as part of the sale, however, they did not replace the auto tensioner so the cambelt had some slack in it, and the auto tensioner was leaking oil.

The car was with Rich for 2 and a half days in the end, but I am glad I took the decision as I finally felt I had someone who knew what they were looking at dealing with the car. Plenty of other work was done while it was there which I will detail below, but the main takeaways for me are:

- Torque GT are great at importing high quality imports, I have seen their operation in the flesh and the examples they bring across are cosmetically very good. I do have concerns with whatever mechanic worked on my car, however, mistakes can happen. It is worth mentioning though, that during one of my visits to TGM I got chatting to someone with a DC5 who had also purchased from Torque GT and he was less than complementary about the aptitude of their mechanic(s), so perhaps mine is not an isolated incident......

- I have used TGM Motorsport for many years, and to be fair to Tom at TGM, he did offer to do the same work that PAW quoted me for, but I had lost a bit of confidence in them and Tom admitted he hadn’t worked with ATTS before and seeing as that needed to come out, this made me nervous. The Prelude will only be going to PAW from now on, it’s just better for the car’s health and my sanity. I will still use TGM for bodywork or minor mechanical stuff if required.

- PAW and Rich in particular filled me with confidence, provided detailed updates throughout the process, and with plenty of pictures as well. All in all, a first-class service.

Full list of works carried out:

Remove exhaust down pipes, ATTS unit, gearbox assembly, clutch and flywheel
Renew crankshaft rear main oil seal. Fit new OEM clutch and CC flywheel
Refit gearbox. Renew oil cooler and base oil seals
Refit and fill ATTS
Drain, remove and clean up sump and mating surfaces
Refit with fresh Hondabond sealant
Refit exhaust downpipes
Fresh oil (Millers Nanodrive 10w 40) and Hamp filter
Remove cam cover, timing covers and belts etc.
Remove camshafts, clean up journal caps etc.
Renew cam seals, balance shaft seal (plus add retainer), crank seal, cambelt, balance belt and swap to manual tensioner
Build up and set valve clearances
Renew customer supplied dizzy cap, rotor arm, coil, coil cover, spark plugs and HT leads
Set base ignition timing
MOT (no advisories)

The car has done around 150 miles since all this and so far, I can’t see any fresh oil underneath the car, I will keep a close eye on it for the next few weeks, but fingers crossed!

A pic of the re-used auto tensioner:

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A pic of 2 white type s Preludes next to each other:

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Last edited by ATR84 on Thu Nov 28, 2019 3:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by Scott560 » Sat Jul 13, 2019 9:08 pm

Glad to know you got to the bottom of it and glad that your happy with the service / peace of mind. Its one of the reasons i like to do as much as i can myself (despite sometimes hating having to do it). Even small things like tyre changes, and they put the handed wheels on backwards (This has happened more than once) , just small things put you off going back to some places...

My friend (who I go on track days with) imported a DC5 through Torque GT and he was happy with the service and the car. Can't recall if he had any other trouble with it or not.

Burford is a nice place for a day trip - not much else to do there (i used to live nearby). The roads the satnav took me on today from Fairford to Burford were awful mind. Pretty sure my LCA grounded out :(

I have just got back from dropping my ATR gearbox off today at PAW, it was refreshing to email a company about some work, and actually get a response quickly and positively. The same cannot be said for all companies (honda related or otherwise). Always remember to lift with your legs , i'm only 35 but think I've pulled something. seems heavier than when I collected it.

I have only heard good things about PAW so far - so will probably be getting some work from me in the future (getting too old to keep doing it myself!).
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Post by RattyMcClelland » Sat Jul 13, 2019 10:17 pm

You do know that was my Type S you were parked next to? ;)

Torque GT know their stuff about everything but when i comes to mechanical you cannot beat a specialist. I must have spent over £14k with PAW since 2011 on my Type S. One engine swap that i provided and 3 rebuilds all of which were my fault or.........because supercharged.

Rich knows his stuff. He knows ATTS, time it takes and what works and what doesnt.
Ill continue to use him until the end.

At least you have a reliable car that Torque GT have almost sorted. From my Experience a Type S with ATTS is worse than a clutch change on an R32 GTR, this was my bro in laws garage on a simple everyday job. 4 hours in and ATTS was still not removed which is necessary to change a clutch.
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Post by ATR84 » Sun Jul 14, 2019 9:02 am

@Scott560 We were not in Burford the whole time, but that is where we stayed both nights. We spent some time in Oxford, and some time at the nearby Wildlife Park. Sitting outside the pubs in Burford in the evening was nice and relaxing, it was a nice mini break :)

@RattyMcClelland Yes I knew that was your car :D . Thought I better get a pic of them together seeing as we never seem to be at the same meets :thumbup:

In regards to Torque GT, I am a bit annoyed about the mechanical side of things with the car, things that in my opinion should not have happened. In essence, they sent the car out with an oil leak that I have ended up footing the majority of the bill for. In their defence, they offered to have the car back there but this was simply not practical and I was not confident it would be fixed properly if I did that anyway. Overall, I would still recommend them, I think the imports they get in are of high quality, in some cases they are importing old and complex cars so things can go wrong.

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Post by ATR84 » Fri Aug 02, 2019 5:24 pm

Well no sign of the old oil leaks so looks like Rich and Performance Autoworks sorted it :D

I ordered some climair wind deflectors in the darkest shade, I had to call them up directly to get these as the ones I found online were the 'smoke' shade which are not dark enough for me.

Anyway, finally got round to fitting them today:

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Mike's Type S

Post by toadster » Fri Aug 02, 2019 5:35 pm

Lo :D
Lude looks 8)
I want the dark colour wind deflectors as My current one's are light smoke and are a bit damaged where they clip in.
Cheers ;)
Toadster
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