Scooped these today. More on these soon....
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Monday, March 23, 2009
Continuation.
Frequent postings…….what are those? So, it’s been well over a month since my last posting, but rest assured, Project Legend is still continuing. Definitely not as planned, definitely not as quickly as I would like, and MOST definitely not as I’d imagined it.
Setting goals and working on the progress of these same goals without getting side tracked by the distractions of day-to-day life in the process is vital to the accomplishment of Project Legend. Writing about them well or not…… is not as necessary to the end result as is the mere act of writing about them in the first place. The whole purpose of taking the time to put thought into visible words is only an effort to keep progress and motivation at an all time high. OR at least somewhat influx. Well, either that or to, at the very least; inspire me to carry on in the continuation of some sort of charteable progress.
A certain stubbornness combined with and obscure passion for Honda’s KA7 chassis is the only real reason for the continual draining of my bank account along with a large portion of my time and effort/thought process. Lately, however, that portion of time has been filling up with other interests and life activities. Project Legend has been on the back burner for much of Spring 2009. This is a fact. A fact that I have chosen to remedy.
Last Friday I dropped close to $400.00 on getting my windshield replaced. I can now look through a windshield sans multiple cracks and it is great. However, the clarity of my new windshield only serves to accentuate the tears in the leather of my seats as well as the multiple cracks in my dashboard.
Time to get going.
Time to get working.
Time to get planning.
Time to develop a plan of action and proceed with a clear vision of what is next as well as how to best proceed.
Coming up in a future posting will be “The Plan”.
Setting goals and working on the progress of these same goals without getting side tracked by the distractions of day-to-day life in the process is vital to the accomplishment of Project Legend. Writing about them well or not…… is not as necessary to the end result as is the mere act of writing about them in the first place. The whole purpose of taking the time to put thought into visible words is only an effort to keep progress and motivation at an all time high. OR at least somewhat influx. Well, either that or to, at the very least; inspire me to carry on in the continuation of some sort of charteable progress.
A certain stubbornness combined with and obscure passion for Honda’s KA7 chassis is the only real reason for the continual draining of my bank account along with a large portion of my time and effort/thought process. Lately, however, that portion of time has been filling up with other interests and life activities. Project Legend has been on the back burner for much of Spring 2009. This is a fact. A fact that I have chosen to remedy.
Last Friday I dropped close to $400.00 on getting my windshield replaced. I can now look through a windshield sans multiple cracks and it is great. However, the clarity of my new windshield only serves to accentuate the tears in the leather of my seats as well as the multiple cracks in my dashboard.
Time to get going.
Time to get working.
Time to get planning.
Time to develop a plan of action and proceed with a clear vision of what is next as well as how to best proceed.
Coming up in a future posting will be “The Plan”.
Saturday, February 7, 2009
Reclining Rear Seats: Proper Blog Entry #2
Ok. So where we? Ah yes. The reclining rear seats that came as an option for the JDM KA7’s. They sold a few weeks ago, and I could not afford them, but I have recently learned that a respected member of the www.acura-legend.com forums ended up winning the auction. He has already built a really impressive black on black 6-speed with the C35A swap (3.5 RL 96-04 engine). And for as much as I wish they were in my car, I’m really looking forward to seeing them in his. Not as much as I am in seeing another set just like them in Project Legend’s interior but I’m looking forward none the less.
With that said, let me begin to try to explain the purpose of these seats:
In order to have a better understanding of all the luxuries that were standard, optional, or accessible to the Japanese Domestic Market, we must first decipher the market that Honda was trying to tap when producing the Honda Legend.
The primary competition was BMW’s 5 Series and the Mercedes E-Class.
The KA7 Honda Legend was built/manufactured/engineered as a luxury sedan and as such; is classified as luxury sedan. In almost, if not all, major cities, there are wealthy individuals and powerful business executives who can afford luxury sedans. Within those individual’s, there is a market for even wealthier individuals who, not only can afford a luxury sedan, but they (or the business they work for) can also afford a driver or “chauffer,” to drive them around; in there luxury sedans. Technically, cars like the Legend were classified as “Limousines” even.
For this reason, as an optional trim level, the KA7 Honda Legend came equipped with rear heated and reclining seats.
At the push of button you could recline one or both of the rear portions that comprised the rear seating area.
The center armrest doubled as separate control unit for the radio controls and heated seat buttons.
A rear and separate air conditioning system also was available for KA7’s with the controls for the system located in the rear center armrest but turned on by a master switch in the front.
(Mobile phone optional as well)
This separate air conditioning system was housed behind the rear reclining seats in the trunk of the car.
While I have no interested in converting Project Legend’s rear portion of the car to accommodate the separate A/C unit, it is an absolute MUST, that the Project incorporates the rear reclining and heated seats.
With that said, let me begin to try to explain the purpose of these seats:
In order to have a better understanding of all the luxuries that were standard, optional, or accessible to the Japanese Domestic Market, we must first decipher the market that Honda was trying to tap when producing the Honda Legend.
The primary competition was BMW’s 5 Series and the Mercedes E-Class.
The KA7 Honda Legend was built/manufactured/engineered as a luxury sedan and as such; is classified as luxury sedan. In almost, if not all, major cities, there are wealthy individuals and powerful business executives who can afford luxury sedans. Within those individual’s, there is a market for even wealthier individuals who, not only can afford a luxury sedan, but they (or the business they work for) can also afford a driver or “chauffer,” to drive them around; in there luxury sedans. Technically, cars like the Legend were classified as “Limousines” even.
For this reason, as an optional trim level, the KA7 Honda Legend came equipped with rear heated and reclining seats.
At the push of button you could recline one or both of the rear portions that comprised the rear seating area.
The center armrest doubled as separate control unit for the radio controls and heated seat buttons.
A rear and separate air conditioning system also was available for KA7’s with the controls for the system located in the rear center armrest but turned on by a master switch in the front.
(Mobile phone optional as well)
This separate air conditioning system was housed behind the rear reclining seats in the trunk of the car.
While I have no interested in converting Project Legend’s rear portion of the car to accommodate the separate A/C unit, it is an absolute MUST, that the Project incorporates the rear reclining and heated seats.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Luxury in a Sedan=Luxury Sedan.
Noo….
$1,125.00 + $310.00 for shipping from the motherland. That is the amount that the JDM REAR RECLINING/HEATED SEATS ended for on last Saturdays eBay Auction.
Sadly, that amount was just not in Project Legend’s budget. And yet….and yet they were in perfect shape. They were the correct color combination. So lets start there and then I’ll explain about the seats.
Its kind of hard to tell from the some of the pics, but the seats are wrapped in black leather with yellow/gold stitching. This trim is indicative of the “alpha Touring” Honda Legend.
It is the rarest of all interiors and therefore, the most sought after. In its completion, Project Legend’s interior will mirror it; be it OEM or custom stitched/sewn.
Everything will match correctly on the inside just as everything will flow in unison on the outside. The difference being that the outside of the vehicle will be a mix between black, gold, and Italian Burlwood brown, while the exterior will be Graneda Black and silver/chrome. The gold stitching of the seats is a subtle touch to the gold lettering of the center arm rest trim piece,
the floormat badges,
the key embossing,
as well as the custom MOMO x Honda steering wheel horn button
that I’m retro-fitting into my woodgrain steering wheel.
The stitching will also have to match the boot of the stick shift that I’ll be retro-fitting into the automatic only Navigation center console. So instead of an automatic…
There will be a six-speed stick shift in its place
with an Integra Type R Yellow stitched boot.
Continued soon.....
$1,125.00 + $310.00 for shipping from the motherland. That is the amount that the JDM REAR RECLINING/HEATED SEATS ended for on last Saturdays eBay Auction.
Sadly, that amount was just not in Project Legend’s budget. And yet….and yet they were in perfect shape. They were the correct color combination. So lets start there and then I’ll explain about the seats.
Its kind of hard to tell from the some of the pics, but the seats are wrapped in black leather with yellow/gold stitching. This trim is indicative of the “alpha Touring” Honda Legend.
It is the rarest of all interiors and therefore, the most sought after. In its completion, Project Legend’s interior will mirror it; be it OEM or custom stitched/sewn.
Everything will match correctly on the inside just as everything will flow in unison on the outside. The difference being that the outside of the vehicle will be a mix between black, gold, and Italian Burlwood brown, while the exterior will be Graneda Black and silver/chrome. The gold stitching of the seats is a subtle touch to the gold lettering of the center arm rest trim piece,
the floormat badges,
the key embossing,
as well as the custom MOMO x Honda steering wheel horn button
that I’m retro-fitting into my woodgrain steering wheel.
The stitching will also have to match the boot of the stick shift that I’ll be retro-fitting into the automatic only Navigation center console. So instead of an automatic…
There will be a six-speed stick shift in its place
with an Integra Type R Yellow stitched boot.
Continued soon.....
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Cornered: A Write Up About Cornering Lights
First off, let me begin this post by saying that much of the information gathered and appropriated for this post is derived directly from auctions on eBay listed by an associate of mine. This person goes through a lot to extract various parts, wiring, and systems from Japanese salvage yards in order to sell them to JDM connoisseurs such as myself and his work in doing so is much appreciated.
This person’s name is Don but his eBay alias is JDMISME. I highly suggest checking him and his auctions out.
So corner lights. What are they? What applications were the made for? Well, as an option from Honda, corner lights were offered for Honda vehicles such as the CD/CE Series Accord, KA7 Legend, DB/DC Series Integra, 95-98 Odyssey and various others. The main difference between the individual vehicle sets are the plastic inserts/bezels that the lamps are attached to and then inserted into the bumper. Those are vehicle specific to match the exact contour of the different bumpers
They look like this:
They work like this:
When your turn signals are turned on, the corresponding cornering light (right or left) will be illuminated to light up that side of the road in the direction that you are turning into. These are handy option items that help you when you're unsure of the road that you are traveling on. They can help to keep you from hitting unseen/unexpected road hazzards that normally would not be visible at night. The cornering lights stay on for as long as the turn signal is on and then they turn off about a second after the turn signals are turned off.
I’ve seen two different kinds used on Legends:
Kind of a squarer type if you look closely….
The other type looks like this…..
Currently the above type is listed on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $175.00 plus $12.00 shipping. A bit too pricy for me right now, but I imagine I’ll be getting a set or two before Project Legend is completed. I’m partial to the squarer version myself, but if a set like the ones above presented themselves at a decent price, I would definitely not turn them down.
So that’s Novembers second blog posting. It seems that since this blogs inception, I’m really only posting once or twice a month. I intend to change that infrequency for the better however.
I have recently began employment with an amazing car shop and as a result, I now can afford to begin some serious Project Legend undertakings. Because of that, I ideally won’t have to just post about stuff I see on eBay that I can’t afford. I should be able to begin to write and update posts with process updates as well as “How-To’s” that visually document varying modifications and upgrades.
So until then, stay tuned. More coming soon. Hopefully REAL soon.
Project Legend continues……
This person’s name is Don but his eBay alias is JDMISME. I highly suggest checking him and his auctions out.
So corner lights. What are they? What applications were the made for? Well, as an option from Honda, corner lights were offered for Honda vehicles such as the CD/CE Series Accord, KA7 Legend, DB/DC Series Integra, 95-98 Odyssey and various others. The main difference between the individual vehicle sets are the plastic inserts/bezels that the lamps are attached to and then inserted into the bumper. Those are vehicle specific to match the exact contour of the different bumpers
They look like this:
They work like this:
When your turn signals are turned on, the corresponding cornering light (right or left) will be illuminated to light up that side of the road in the direction that you are turning into. These are handy option items that help you when you're unsure of the road that you are traveling on. They can help to keep you from hitting unseen/unexpected road hazzards that normally would not be visible at night. The cornering lights stay on for as long as the turn signal is on and then they turn off about a second after the turn signals are turned off.
I’ve seen two different kinds used on Legends:
Kind of a squarer type if you look closely….
The other type looks like this…..
Currently the above type is listed on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $175.00 plus $12.00 shipping. A bit too pricy for me right now, but I imagine I’ll be getting a set or two before Project Legend is completed. I’m partial to the squarer version myself, but if a set like the ones above presented themselves at a decent price, I would definitely not turn them down.
So that’s Novembers second blog posting. It seems that since this blogs inception, I’m really only posting once or twice a month. I intend to change that infrequency for the better however.
I have recently began employment with an amazing car shop and as a result, I now can afford to begin some serious Project Legend undertakings. Because of that, I ideally won’t have to just post about stuff I see on eBay that I can’t afford. I should be able to begin to write and update posts with process updates as well as “How-To’s” that visually document varying modifications and upgrades.
So until then, stay tuned. More coming soon. Hopefully REAL soon.
Project Legend continues……
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Importation Information as a Forum Response
In response to a forum topic at Acura-Legend.com, found here:
http://www.acura-legend.com/vbulletin/f4/jdm-drooling-why-doesnt-someone-130010/
I wrote this. Its the most I've written in awhile so I thought I'd start it off as Novembers first blog posting...
*ahem*
Why DOESN'T someone import a RHD Legend. Be it from the UK or the Legend's motherland; Japan. I know what’s holding me back; and that is money. But I fully intend to. When? I'm not sure yet. But I'll do it. I'd like to be the first KA7 owner to successfully swap a 6-speed into a RHD Legend. But I'd also like to see other people do it. So much so that if someone did before me, I'd just be that much more motivated to do the same thing too. It’s not impossible. As anyone here who has been following the Korean Turbo and Supercharged thread can attest, nothing is impossible and there is way more potential in our cars that has yet to be tapped. However it takes initiative.
Like many things in life, all it takes is for one person to do it, say "hey everybody, this is how its done" and others will follow. Just look to people like Christian aka DV8. How long ago did he successfully swap a 3.5 in to a KA7, and now look at how many members have done it or in the process of doing it. Sure, swapping out a higher displacement engine and importing a RHD version of our car isn't exactly the same thing, but you get what I'm saying.
Importing a RHD isn't an easy process. It never has been. But it’s a hell of a lot easier now than it was ten years ago. If you take the time to research it, price it out, adjust your expenses to afford it, find a trust worthy enough DOT certified RI (Registered Importer) to do business with, and are patient enough to have a car shipped to you and then quite possibly and most likely have it sit there undriveable until you sort through all the red tape to get it legal......it is very possible.
Is it costly? Yep. Is it worth it to drive around on the opposite side of a car? Yeah. I think so.
But that's just my opinion. I'm sure there are plenty of people or even members of this forum who just don't see the value in it or don't think it’s worth the hassle. However I'm sure that some of those same people might just change there minds if someone did it successfully and documented it here on the forums though.
I guess I'm just tired of opening up Honda Tuning every month and seeing the same old Civic, Integra, Civic, (and maybe an) S2000 featured articles. And not just Honda Tuning, but all the other magazines or articles that I read. I want to see innovation. I want to see a car that I can relate to that I drive in......up in a magazine article......or on the cover. To do this, however, is probably going to take just that much extra effort that importing a RHD or at least a front clip and converting it, WOULD take.
Ok...I'll finish up my little soap box rant here...but the title of this thread just popped out at me tonight and I've been wanting to see a RHD Legend over here on US soil for so long, that I just had to say something.
I'll end this by saying that "where’s there is a will, there is a way" and if importing a RHD car was easy, it (like so many other things in life) probably wouldn't be worth it. Just because it hasn't been done, doesn't mean that it can't be done. There ARE ways to do it. There ARE problems you WILL run into. It WILL be challenging. But then again...that's what I love most about owning and modifying a Legend; the challenge.
http://www.acura-legend.com/vbulletin/f4/jdm-drooling-why-doesnt-someone-130010/
I wrote this. Its the most I've written in awhile so I thought I'd start it off as Novembers first blog posting...
*ahem*
Why DOESN'T someone import a RHD Legend. Be it from the UK or the Legend's motherland; Japan. I know what’s holding me back; and that is money. But I fully intend to. When? I'm not sure yet. But I'll do it. I'd like to be the first KA7 owner to successfully swap a 6-speed into a RHD Legend. But I'd also like to see other people do it. So much so that if someone did before me, I'd just be that much more motivated to do the same thing too. It’s not impossible. As anyone here who has been following the Korean Turbo and Supercharged thread can attest, nothing is impossible and there is way more potential in our cars that has yet to be tapped. However it takes initiative.
Like many things in life, all it takes is for one person to do it, say "hey everybody, this is how its done" and others will follow. Just look to people like Christian aka DV8. How long ago did he successfully swap a 3.5 in to a KA7, and now look at how many members have done it or in the process of doing it. Sure, swapping out a higher displacement engine and importing a RHD version of our car isn't exactly the same thing, but you get what I'm saying.
Importing a RHD isn't an easy process. It never has been. But it’s a hell of a lot easier now than it was ten years ago. If you take the time to research it, price it out, adjust your expenses to afford it, find a trust worthy enough DOT certified RI (Registered Importer) to do business with, and are patient enough to have a car shipped to you and then quite possibly and most likely have it sit there undriveable until you sort through all the red tape to get it legal......it is very possible.
Is it costly? Yep. Is it worth it to drive around on the opposite side of a car? Yeah. I think so.
But that's just my opinion. I'm sure there are plenty of people or even members of this forum who just don't see the value in it or don't think it’s worth the hassle. However I'm sure that some of those same people might just change there minds if someone did it successfully and documented it here on the forums though.
I guess I'm just tired of opening up Honda Tuning every month and seeing the same old Civic, Integra, Civic, (and maybe an) S2000 featured articles. And not just Honda Tuning, but all the other magazines or articles that I read. I want to see innovation. I want to see a car that I can relate to that I drive in......up in a magazine article......or on the cover. To do this, however, is probably going to take just that much extra effort that importing a RHD or at least a front clip and converting it, WOULD take.
Ok...I'll finish up my little soap box rant here...but the title of this thread just popped out at me tonight and I've been wanting to see a RHD Legend over here on US soil for so long, that I just had to say something.
I'll end this by saying that "where’s there is a will, there is a way" and if importing a RHD car was easy, it (like so many other things in life) probably wouldn't be worth it. Just because it hasn't been done, doesn't mean that it can't be done. There ARE ways to do it. There ARE problems you WILL run into. It WILL be challenging. But then again...that's what I love most about owning and modifying a Legend; the challenge.
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