Hello 9th Gen Owners,
After years of planning and dreaming, I finally got myself a 9th Gen manual Honda Civic. I was coming over from a honda city and really loved how it responded with manual transmission and lighter body. I have been a Toyota lover for most of my life and I have personally owned 85,88,96,98,2003,2012 and 2016 Corollas. So having driven almost all generations of Corollas extensively, it was a pleasure to drive the Honda City as I felt it was more of a driver's car, rather than a passenger's car.
Getting the feel of a 1.3 manual honda made me want to go to a 1.8 manual Honda, as I felt that was the best combination a driving enthusiast could get in PKDM civic. After looking through the current inflated prices of cars, i sold my Honda City at a good price and got myself a 2013 manual civic for almost the same money. Keep in mind my city was a 2015 model and was decently customised to look the part. The civic I got was white and bone stock, with very few additions or maintenance done to it. I will share pictures later on my profile.
Finding a good sorted out civic in your budget is close to impossible, and that was the case here as well. The car was running fine but had all sorts of mechanical issues, from tyres, brakes to shocks and bushes. Since I got it at a good price, i was willing to build it up to my liking. First came the general fluids maintenance. I used 5W40 Shell Helix Ultra with genuine Honda Filter. Also added flamingo 2L green engine coolant. Installed new air filter and AC filter, serviced the brakes. Next, I wanted the engine to be running in optimum condition, so had the throttle body serviced, got the catalytic cleaned, did a tuneup. Previously the car was giving 11-12km/L in city, after service it started giving 14km/L in city drive.
After sorting out the running of the car, I focussed my attention towards rims and tyres. Installed civic X 16" rims in the car and added used Yokohama advan A-460 tyres 205/55/R16. Used because budget was not there for new tyres and did not want to install Chinese tyres. The increased rim size did not hurt my driving pleasure and the car felt better with new setup. Next came the suspension system. Went to peshawar and had the whole suspension system opened, front and rear. Unsuprisingly, the bushes and ends had gone out and needed replacement. I changed all of the bushing in the front and the rear, got the steering rack repaired, replaced the front shocks with good kabli ones, replaced the rear bushes, got new shocks for the rear. Bearings were fine and did not require changing. Keeping in mind that my car was driven only 80k, but the conditions it had suffered caused the parts to fail earlier than expected.
Next came the mods. I installed the modulo style body kit and had it installed with gaskit in place between original bumper and extension, which most shops don't include. Since ABS plastic is imported and is very hard to find, I had the body kit made in double coat fiber. Then got a roof spoiler installed of the same material. Procured an ABS plastic trunk lip spoiler and had it painted black to match the contrast theme I was going for. The side mirror indicators were broken and not working, so had them replaced as well. The car had few dents and dings here and there. Took the car to an expert dry denter and had all imperfections removed. It was costly but totally worth it.
Now, the interior is one of the best places to be in a 9th Gen civic. Unfortunately, it is plagued with a very bad choice of material for the arm rests. My car had all exposed armrests with top layer removed entirely. The interior was in 4-5 different colors with 3 shades of grey. Took out the armrest panels, center console, steering wheel plastics, interior door opening handles and android panel cover had them painted Piano black. Next, I did an Auxled conversion and replaced ALL bulbs in my car to LEDs, including cabin lights, indicators.reverse lights etc. Since it requires little current, had to install a load resistor to keep the blinking rate same as OEM.
After all these changes and mods, I feel that I have gotten a good balance between performance and looks. The khuwari that I had to endure for 5 months was a lot and not for most people, but in the end it was well worth it.