I went to the LA Auto Show last weekend, and front and center in the Honda area was the good ‘ole s2000. For the 9th year in a row with pretty much the same body style it’s had since it started it was getting lots of attention and looks.
After realizing it was too difficult to have anything in the trunk without worrying about damaging my subwoofer, I decided to get a cover for it. Most of the covers are grills with very thin holes and everything I read suggested that not enough air would be able to move fast enough and that it would change the sound of the woofer. So I opted for the matching Pioneer cover that fit perfectly and came with the extra long mounting screws.
It’s a little taller than i’d like it to be, and does make my trunk just that much smaller, but at least I don’t have to be as careful when I put things in there now.
After looking at a lot of different options for a sub enclosure for the s, I decided on an enclosure that goes in the center of the trunk. It requires you to remove the tool tray, however the tools still fit under the enclosure, which i wrapped in a towel so they wouldn’t rattle. The fit is pretty clean and I opted to have it cut for a 10″ subwoofer since the area is only .88 cubic feet. The Pioneer subwoofer I bought says that it’s designed for .7′ to 1.3′ box so I thought it would be fine, but it sounded pretty sloppy and too small for the sub. It might be because the box is built with two chambers, so I put in about 2/3lbs of polyfil and that cleaned the sound up nicely.
I also dynamatted the cutouts in the top of the trunk to kill the rattle that the sub was making since it faces directly up.
Here in California, this Saturday at 2AM, clocks get turned back, so it’ll seem like we get an extra hour of sleep on Monday morning (and will also seem like we’re staying an hour late at work). I really don’t like these short days when it’s just barely light when I go into work and dark when I get out, but that’s the way it goes. At least the s2000′s clock is pretty much the easiest and most straight forward car clock to adjust of any car I’ve ever seen.
Leftlane news has released some more artist renditions of possible s2000 successors. I really like the looks of these renditions more than others I’ve seen as they take some clear design cues from the current Honda s2000. The profile looks very similar to the current generation S, and the aggressive front end is very attractive. The rear end looks like a strange cross between a 6 series/solstice/new Accord coupe but overall I’m really liking the car. The wheels in the rendering are hideous, but there’s no way they’d ever make it to a production model anyway.
The article calls this the 2012 Honda s3000, but is Honda really going to keep the current generation s2000 for 12 years? It’s entirely possible. The NSX remained pretty much the same for 15 years.
The s2000′s license plate light is a boring yellowish light that takes away from the astuteness of the car’s led taillights and HID headlights. Ever since I got the car I wanted to change the license plate light, although the few times I looked at it, it seemed inaccessible.
So this weekend I decided to figure it out and it turns out that it’s pretty simple. There aren’t any screws or bolts (which I had been looking for and that’s why I had been confused), the clear housing simply pops out and is held in by pressure tabs on the side. Using a knife, or some other flat object, you can just pry it out.
Once the cover is removed, you’ll see that there’s a single 194 light bulb.
This light bulb just pulls straight out and can be replaced with the light of your choice. I went with an LED hyperwhite light that I found on ebay for about $8 shipped (pair of two). Pop the new bulb in, just press the clear housing until it snaps, and voilà, no more dingy yellow light.
Every now and then I get this click in my clutch pedal that I hear (maybe it’s more of a feel) as I’m depressing the pedal. If I keep a bit of pressure on the pedal with my foot lightly resting on it, it usually won’t happen again, but if i pull my foot completely off the pedal it will come back. The weird thing is that this ‘click’ will happen for a while, and then go away completely, for months at a time.
The first time that this started happening in my ’04 AP2, it would really drive me nuts. Noticing that the pedal wouldn’t click twice in a row if I left my foot lightly (not at all engaged) on the pedal, I tightened the nut under the clutch to take out most of the extra play. This actually solved the problem, although it felt uncomfortable not having any play in the clutch pedal (although since there was still the slightest bit of play, I assume it was fine). Eventually I backed out the nut and the click sound was still gone.
I did a bit of researching and it seems that the likely problem is that the push rod is not being lubricated well enough and something is binding. To lubricate this though, you need to remove the clutch cylinder which seems like more work than it’s worth. I’ve only had the click come back a few times and it only stays around for a little bit. I’ve noticed two other things about this click: If I cycle the clutch pedal (push it all the way to the floor, hold it for a second and let it all the way back out) a couple of times, the click usually goes away. I also noticed that I usually get this click when I have to drive in stop-and-go traffic on the freeway for an hour or so, where there’s a lot of clutch-in/clutch-out action.
If anyone else has had this problem or knows exactly what’s causing it, please comment and share.
Autoweek took the s2000 CR for a spin and enjoyed the ride. Praising the same things that most critics like about the car, great balance, gearbox and response among other things, they only had good things to say. In comparing the Club Racer to the base s2000:
This CR ratchets the thrills up a notch over the base car with its stiffened chassis, more aggressive suspension tuning, quicker steering rack ratio and weight reduction. The result is a dialed-in track star that oozes refinement, from the slick unity of shifter and clutch pedal to the high-revving inline-four to its inherently balanced handling characteristics.
Read the full Autoweek “Short Stint” review here:
http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/200809260430/
This news is actually a few months old, but I just came across it and thought I’d post. Apparently at some point Vin Diesel drives this RHD AP1 in the newest installment of the Fast and the Furious franchise and during filming accidentally wrecked the front end. Owner Ben Schaffer talks about the accident on The Real JDM.
It was a cool scene in the film, but I guess Vin got a little more into character than we all expected. A damaged fender, hood, bumper and headlight wasn’t supposed to be part of the deal!
Here’s a picture of the damage:
And here’s what the s2k looked like before the accident:
As mentioned in an earlier post, the BBC America channel that I get here in the US, is a couple of years behind in broadcasting episodes of Top Gear, but they’re all new to me (and the BBC info actually credits them as 2008). This week James May tried to record the Allman Brothers song Jessica (the Top Gear theme song) using notes found in the engines of various cars, from Enzo’s to steam rollers. May found the “D” note at 4500 RPM in the s2000.
The final result was a bit of a mess and just sounded like a bunch of farting, but it was fun to see him attempt it, and great that the s2000 was a part of it.