1996 Acura Integra RS from North America - Comments

I bought the car with 188,000km on it and had no knowledge of what the past owners had really done to it. Throwout bearing went just shortly after the purchase. The rear right side strut was broken. At about 210,000km the timing belt broke while I was shifting into 4th gear. I was in traffic and leaving a stop light so there was no excessive acceleration or anything like that. 50/50 chance that I crushed some valves... not one was damaged. I had the head and all parts cleaned and inspected by a machine shop and installed an OEM Honda top-end gasket set. There were indications of a bad head gasket before the timing belt incident, but after re-assembly the car is showing no signs of being old or having 216,000km on it! Easily ran a 15.3 1/4 mile time with basic intake and exhaust upgrades... but the aftermarket LSD is what makes the difference.

All in all, I had always wanted an Integra. I jumped at the first opportunity to purchase mine instead of shopping around or searching in depth before I bought it. It had a few things that needed to be taken care of, but what can you expect from a car that is 10 years old? ... and has most likely been driven like most Hondas are driven. On repair costs - I've spent probably about $1500 in total. I've also done quite a bit of aftermarket mods to the suspension, brakes, and drivetrain. As for the engine; all internals are stock and most sensors are original. The car can still pull all the way to redline without any complaining.

Well an update for anybody viewing this. I no longer have the Integra... in fact I traded it to a gentleman for a 1986 Toyota Celica GT-S with a 3S-GTE swap from an 88 Alltrac/GT4. The car had 222004 when I handed it over. The only things I've done to it since last posting this review was replace the fuel filter, oil changes at 4k mile intervals, new clutch master cylinder, brake system blead and new front pads/rotors, adj. FPR (fuel pres. reg.), and new wiper blades front and rear.