Hello People!
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Joined: Sep 2023
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From: Ventura, Ca
Hello People!
Good morning, afternoon, and evening!
My name is Daniel and I have had the good fortune of purchasing a 2012 Honda Fit with 14,000 miles on it.
And I paid basically half of medium book value.
It was an old lady car and so has old lady damage, light scuffs and scratches, a messy interior etc.
But underneath all the " damage " is a new car.
I haven't actually taken possession of it yet, I put a deposit and the rest of payment is due when the duplicate pink is delivered to the executrix of the sellers' estate.
This should happen in another two weeks or so.
So, it sits outside right by my condo garage door and teases me with its' awesomeness. I bought this car without knowing anything about it because of the circumstances; a new car for nothing.
My daily is a '98 Honda Civic that I got 17 years ago ( another old lady car with 30,000 miles on it) and have worked that sucker, these Honda engines are the best!
The thing that made this Civic awesome, was dialing in the suspension, and most parts were found at the local salvage yard. Didn't want to do much engine wise because the vehicle still has to pass smog every two years and the new Fit will follow suit.
So I am gonna dial the suspension in on the Fit first.
Right off the bat I bought the rear sway bar because I know that is going to really help.
And the fact that the rear suspension is trailing arm ( meaning wheels only go up and down with no camber change) means that wider wheels are a must as they will be free of the wide wheels w/ coilover camber inner edge wear blues.
The front suspension is interesting as well.
It looks like on this car the struts do not do a great deal in locating the wheels on the vehicle, this is apparent because the front struts are only held to the vehicle by the strut nut and the assemblies do not have the mounting bracket that one would expect.
I like strut bars but it looks like a strut bar on this car would serve almost no purpose so I am holding out on that.
It almost looks like lowering springs might suffice instead of full on coilovers. I gotta see how the vehicle rides when I take possession of it first though.
The wheels that are on it are stock steelies and the tires are shot so I went haunting and found a set of VW 5 spoke alloys ( they look like Enkies and actually, one is a seven spoke) .
They are " racing rims " and are 14' and the tires are 185 x 65/ 14. The tires are like brand new Haida racing tires.
They might be a little too small but we will see how they perform.
If no go I have Voxx 16" black rims on my Civic that I will put on the Fit.
The tires are 205 45/16 which is the perfect size on my Civic to dial in the suspension mods. while retaining driveability.
They are close to stock size on both vehicles so they don't mess with the speedo/ odo too much.
Definitely getting all glass ( except the windshield) blacked out as the FIT has a lot of real estate exposed to the hot Ca. sun day in and day out that needs to be tinted.
Plus I want to look important too!
Last thing is available seating upgrades; did the more deluxe models ever come with leather or vinyl seats or is there a bolt in other marque solution to have leather or vinyl seats?
Don't laugh, my Datsun '80 720 diesel truck has leather seats thanks to the bolt in effectiveness of the Dodge Neon GT edition.
So right now it is just hurry up and wait but maybe I will have my car this week!
Thanks, Daniel P.
My name is Daniel and I have had the good fortune of purchasing a 2012 Honda Fit with 14,000 miles on it.
And I paid basically half of medium book value.
It was an old lady car and so has old lady damage, light scuffs and scratches, a messy interior etc.
But underneath all the " damage " is a new car.
I haven't actually taken possession of it yet, I put a deposit and the rest of payment is due when the duplicate pink is delivered to the executrix of the sellers' estate.
This should happen in another two weeks or so.
So, it sits outside right by my condo garage door and teases me with its' awesomeness. I bought this car without knowing anything about it because of the circumstances; a new car for nothing.
My daily is a '98 Honda Civic that I got 17 years ago ( another old lady car with 30,000 miles on it) and have worked that sucker, these Honda engines are the best!
The thing that made this Civic awesome, was dialing in the suspension, and most parts were found at the local salvage yard. Didn't want to do much engine wise because the vehicle still has to pass smog every two years and the new Fit will follow suit.
So I am gonna dial the suspension in on the Fit first.
Right off the bat I bought the rear sway bar because I know that is going to really help.
And the fact that the rear suspension is trailing arm ( meaning wheels only go up and down with no camber change) means that wider wheels are a must as they will be free of the wide wheels w/ coilover camber inner edge wear blues.
The front suspension is interesting as well.
It looks like on this car the struts do not do a great deal in locating the wheels on the vehicle, this is apparent because the front struts are only held to the vehicle by the strut nut and the assemblies do not have the mounting bracket that one would expect.
I like strut bars but it looks like a strut bar on this car would serve almost no purpose so I am holding out on that.
It almost looks like lowering springs might suffice instead of full on coilovers. I gotta see how the vehicle rides when I take possession of it first though.
The wheels that are on it are stock steelies and the tires are shot so I went haunting and found a set of VW 5 spoke alloys ( they look like Enkies and actually, one is a seven spoke) .
They are " racing rims " and are 14' and the tires are 185 x 65/ 14. The tires are like brand new Haida racing tires.
They might be a little too small but we will see how they perform.
If no go I have Voxx 16" black rims on my Civic that I will put on the Fit.
The tires are 205 45/16 which is the perfect size on my Civic to dial in the suspension mods. while retaining driveability.
They are close to stock size on both vehicles so they don't mess with the speedo/ odo too much.
Definitely getting all glass ( except the windshield) blacked out as the FIT has a lot of real estate exposed to the hot Ca. sun day in and day out that needs to be tinted.
Plus I want to look important too!
Last thing is available seating upgrades; did the more deluxe models ever come with leather or vinyl seats or is there a bolt in other marque solution to have leather or vinyl seats?
Don't laugh, my Datsun '80 720 diesel truck has leather seats thanks to the bolt in effectiveness of the Dodge Neon GT edition.
So right now it is just hurry up and wait but maybe I will have my car this week!
Thanks, Daniel P.
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