HT: It looks like you were able to keep the Volk label on the wheel spokes, too.
MT: Yeah, the stickers were on the wheels when I bought them from Password: JDM, so I did a rubbing of the logo with a piece of paper and took it to my cousin, who has a vinyl plotter, and asked if he could duplicate the stickers. He worked on it and printed me out a whole sheet of stickers that were the right size. We used those and did a clear powder coat over the stickers so they can't be picked off.
HT: So what was the most challenging or difficult element of the build?
MT: The hardest part was probably having to do the motor a second time, because that was basically the first motor I'd ever built from scratch. I've done plenty of bolt ons and stuff like that to other motors, but I've never done all the internal work and put the whole thing together.
Originally, I planned on pulling the H23 and just sticking an H22 in the Prelude, but when I looked at buying an H22 it was $3,500 with the swap, and it's still a stock motor! It was just going to be like every VTEC Prelude ever made, so I have a friend that works for Honda, and he got in an H22 head with bent valves, and we already had the H23 block from a previous blown motor. They were just sitting at his house, and we took the head and put it on the block to see if the bolt and oil holes aligned, and they did. And he made me a deal; I think I paid $400 for it all, the crank, block, head, and 2 stock cams. I told him, 'I'll take it, just throw it in the truck;' I'll figure out what to do with it.
HT: What's next? You mentioned NSX calipers and Goodridge lines for potential brake upgrades, and I think I read somewhere that you want to remove the sunroof and ABS, too.
MT: I'm in the process of doing all that right now. I've got another H22 tranny with a polished case that I'm getting ready to put in. At the same time, I'm going to pull the intake manifold off so I can get to the brake lines on the firewall easier, and maybe put it back together with some individual throttle bodies instead of the manifold. I'd really like to have a better ECU, too; I've been looking at AEM's EMS.
I still need seats, and I've been talking to people about making a carbon [fiber] sunroof. Instead of just installing something that just covers up the sunroof hole, I would like to have a lightweight panel that fits more like factory. That way, I can bolt it to the track but leave the [sunroof] motor out and still use the bottom cover [integrated] in the headliner. I'd like to have 3 or 4 more sets of wheels like everybody else does, too, but I'm fairly happy with the way it is right now.