ID-Workz Supercharged Civic Type R EP3

With our White Glanza being off the road for the best part of 2 years after a head gasket failure at Silverstone, I needed something to take her place. She was only meant to be off the road but for a few months but as with all project cars, the to-do list is getting bigger rather than smaller, so completion is not in sight and I'm getting impatient!

I was originally looking for an EP82 Starlet GT Turbo but a good example is no longer easy to source so I decided to go for a Civic Type R EP3. I planned on a rev-happy high power build as I know how much fun they are (I had one for a short while a few years ago) but then I came across this gem on eBay..

Although this particular Civic Type R looks almost stock, it's far from it..

Yep, that's a Jackson Racing Supercharger kit comfortably sitting in the engine bay! With the help of a Quaife ATB LSD to put the power down, she's running a safe 290bhp at 6psi.

I love how the car looks so original. Sure, that will change during my ownership, but it's the perfect base to start with. 

It's the first Supercharged car I've owned and one thing I'm very impressed with so far is the response. The Supercharger combined with the Quaife LSD is awesome fun around the bends. It doesn't pack the mighty punch that I'm used to feeling in the Glanza or any other turbo car, but the power is useable and it's a completely different car coming out of bends. It will definitely take some getting used to though, as the Supercharger does feel more bland compared to a turbo.

Full spec of the car:

Engine

• Jackson Racing Supercharger Kit
• Tegiwa Carbon Air Intake
• Tegiwa Exhaust Manifold
• Mugen Twin-loop Cat-back Exhaust
• RC650 Fuel Injectors
• CPL Fuel Rail
• Hondata K100 ECU Mapped by Eurospec producing 290bhp at 6psi

Drivetrain

• Quaife LSD
• M-Factory Carbon Gear Synchros
• Exedy Organic Clutch Kit

Chassis

• Eibach Sportline Lowering Springs
• Eibach Front Camber Bolts
• Eibach Rear Camber Arms
• Toyo T1R's

 Interior

• Bride Super Low Seat Rails
• OEM Recaros
• Boost Gauge

 Exterior

• Mugen Style rear spoiler

Back in Huddersfield after a 200 mile drive home from London. Updates to follow!

April 2018 Update

With show season fast approaching we needed to get the EP3 covered in ID-Workz branding. I visited our good friends at Go Tints Huddersfield to run through my plans and then left it with them to work their magic.

A few pictures as they got her stripped down

Anyone who had followed my old build threads on forums will know I love Yellow cars. This started back in 2007 when I was 15 years old and was building my first ever project car; an EP91 Starlet which ended up a Glanza replica. I had the choice to paint it in any colour I wanted and somehow ended up going for Pearl Yellow. It worked really well and the car got a lot of attention both on the road and across the forums I posted the build on.

 

Skip to 2011 when I was building the ID-Workz Demo Glanza - that also ended up the same colour

The Demo Glanza really helped build the ID-Workz name. It turned heads at all the car shows and got a full feature in Japanese Banzai Magazine and Japanese Performance Magazine.

Now that I had the choice to wrap the EP3 any colour I wanted it just felt right to choose Yellow, especially as there aren't many Yellow EP3s about. Yellow works so well with Black so I went for a half wrap. I'll let the pictures do the talking..

I'd like to say a huge thank you to the team at Go Tints Huddersfield - they've wrapped it exactly how I wanted it. The ID-Workz branding is yet to be applied and she's dying for a new set of wheels - the silver OEM wheels look out of place with the Yellow!

May 2018 Update

Things got quite hectic with the run up to Japfest, so I've been unable to take time out for blogging the build. Japfest Silverstone 2018 was the first ever show that ID-Workz had a trade stand at. It was thoroughly exciting but a lot of effort nonetheless.

In order to attract people to our stand we took a big load of awesome performance parts, but we needed a head turning car on the stand too. I'm thrilled to say the EP3 did it! 

If you've seen Part 2 of the blog you'll see that the OEM wheels no longer suited the car, so there was no way we could take her down to Japfest looking like that!

To replace the OE wheels I opted for a set of 17" Rota Torques in Bronze.

I had these wrapped in a fresh set of Yokohama AD08R's

Once I fitted the wheels I went back to Go Tints to have the ID-Workz vinyls applied. Results..

 

Safe to say that I absolutely love the new look. The combination of Black and Yellow with the Bronze wheels looks outstanding and got a lot of attention at Japfest. I'm really looking forward to attending more shows this year in our new demo car!

June 2018 Update

With the aesthetics sorted it was time to move on to the most essential part of tuning a car; the suspension. Usually I'd start with brakes and suspension upgrades before power mods however the power upgrades were already done before I bought it, so it definitely needed the chassis upgrades.

The first upgrade has to be a set of BC Racing BR Series coilovers. These offer features such as 30-way damping adjustment and camber adjustable top mounts making them our best selling coilovers for many cars.

Instead of jumping right in to it and fitting the coilovers it made more sense to do a full suspension overhaul in one go. Next up is the SuperPro full poly bush kit consisting of:

• Front control arm bushes with castor increase (SPF2308K)
• Front ARB mounting bushes (SPF2183-24K)
• Rear Lower control arm inner rear bush (SPF2318K)
• Rear Lower control arm bushes (SPF3195K)
• Rear Upper control arm outer bushes (SPF2311K)
• Rear ARB mounting bushes (SPF2184-19K)

One of the Eibach rear camber arm bushes had a bit of play in it so instead of changing the bush (only available from Eibach and not cheap) I went for new Hardrace rear camber arms complete with hardened rubber bushes

I also got a set of Hardrace rear LCA's to match which look awesome in the anodised blue finish.

Last but not least are these SuperPro uprated anti-roll bars - shout out to SuperPro for hooking us up with these!

Just before everything was due to be fitted the clutch started slipping slightly. This called for an upgrade so I went for our extremely popular Competition Clutch package which consists of a Stage 4 Clutch kit and Ultra Lightweight flywheel. Also fitted a new genuine Honda crank seal at the same time.

A few installation pictures

With everything fitted the car went to Atec-Align for Hawkeye alignment with 'fast road setup'

I went for just 1° negative camber front and rear as she'll mostly be used on the road rather than track.

Just to summarise here's a list of upgrades carried out:

• BC Racing BR Series coilovers
• SuperPro Full poly bush kit
• SuperPro Front & Rear anti-roll bars
• Hardrace Rear camber arms
• Hardrace Rear LCA's
• Competition Clutch Stage 4 clutch kit
• Competition Clutch Ultra Lightweight flywheel
• New track rod ends
• New ball joints
• Genuine Honda main crank seal

July 2018 Update

I haven't done much to the car in the last month but I have been enjoying it using it for a couple of car shows and meets.

We had a trade stand at Japfest 2 / Trax weekend in partnership with K-Sport brakes. There was an awesome selection of cars on show at Japfest 2 and a huge variety of modified cars at Trax.

Although I haven't done a full track day in it I did manage to get a couple of 20 minute sessions in at Trax (Donnington) which were a lot of fun! The seats sit real nice and low with the Bride rails however a proper harness would be needed for a track day as I was flying about way too much!