Loud & Low 8th Gen Civic - Time to say good bye to her.

[Tecomah]

Looking awesome. Taking notes. Definitely got some skills and an eye for detail

[HatersGonnaHate]

So much sex in one thread!

As usual, exceptional work, Scott!

[funky]

I am just loving the color scheme! Great work!

[scooter99]

Thanks guys I appreciate the comments.

Jamie, I haven't figured it out yet. I thought about just filling the sides with great stuff.

Put a piece of 1/4"-1/2" mdf on the deck, with inserts to screw it tight from the bottom. Then put the deck piece on top of that, and filling the inside with great stuff and then do my finish work over it. I have great stuff so maybe ill just use that anyway.

Off to work. My issues are fixed with the voltage btw! All I can say right now is EFF HONDA AND THEIR DUMB ASS ELD!!! Fixed it. I have pics, and what I did that ill put up tonight.

[scooter99]

So I was having issues with my car after I put the alt and battery in, as I mentioned the other day. I was stopping at a light and the battery light was coming on. Put the meter on it, and the VM-1 as well, and found that i was dancing all over the place. Low was 12.3v while driving and then high was 14.5v. I hadn't done the ELD bypass yet, EFF YOU HONDA FOR GIVING US THIS CRAP, so I thought that would be my next step. Hoping that was the fix! Well it was!!! NOTE: AFTER DOING THIS, I'VE FOUND OUT YOU DO NOT HAVE TO DO THIS FOR THESE NEWER (06 AND UP) CIVICS. JUST PULL THE PLUG. NO LIGHTS NO NOTHING. ELD OFF, POWER UP, AND NO SWITCH TO HAVE TO FLIP.

That being said, let's run through what I did.

First thing I did was pull the cover off the fuse box. That's where the eld is. Unlike the pre 2006 civics, the eld isn't screw in on the 2006 and up. Not easily accessed like those.

Next thing you need to do is find these clips. These are what holds the fuse box in. There are 3, 1 in front and 2 in back. The clips pull toward the the fuse box. Pull the clips toward the fuse box and then pull the box up at the same time. You'll probably have to work around it. It's tight.

Here are the second two in back.

Next you're going to follow the harness down. You're going to do this because you won't be able to pull the box up farther than getting them off the clips. See this green clip? That's not it. I didn't get a good picture of it, but it's at the bottom around the bigger harness, and on the frame rail. I couldn't get it to pop off, so I cut the zip tie. It's one of those zip tie clips.

Next you're going to clip this zip tie under the box that holds the harness to the box.

Finally all around the box, are these spaces. Those are for a screwdriver to go in and press in while pulling down on the bottom half of the box with your hands. That whole bottom part will come off. Go one clip at a time until it slides off.

Last side. Screwdriver goes in like this.

Now you've exposed the wires, this is the eld clip I'm pointing at. NOW, you can just pull this plug off and button everything back up if you want to. Again, you won't get any cel's or anything. I wanted the switch in case I needed to take it in and turn it back on for testing or anything. But the switch didn't work in the end. But it may just be the kind of switch I have.

Closer view.

Ran the wires from my switch up front.

[scooter99]

I'm splicing the orange wire with the silver stripes. This is the sensing wire. The yellow is power and black is ground.

Soldered the switch wires on. I actually swapped this out, because the red is my common wire for the switch, in other words feeds power into the switch. The blue is the Normally Open wire, passes the common through when the button is pressed. So the eld, is in the fuse box, and thus the signal comes out of the plug and out to the alt.

After some heat shrink and some zip ties we're ready to put it all back together again.

Bottom cover goes back on opposite of how it came off. Except no screw driver was needed.

Next snap the box down on the pins.

Put the cover back on. Fuse box is done.

Put everything else back together.

What a mess! One day I'm going to get down here and either replace this alarm, or re wire this one!

All cleaned back up and under the dash.

So after a test, I'm sitting solid at 14.6v consistent, and it touched the 14.9v on occasion. So the eld bypass fixed this. What I found out however, is for some reason the switch doesn't do anything. Turning the ELD back on with the switch, doesn't switch it back on. There was never a drop. Not like there has been. It's stayed right at 14.3v. So, I'm probably going to remove the switch now and use that spot for something else. So there you go. ELD Bypass.

So the next thing I'm thinking of is the switches. Since now that last switch is pretty much not needed, I'm thinking I may replace it with a momentary switch.

I have an idea and I'd love to get some input on it.

What I'd like to do, is take the current up button for the trunk actuator, and combine the trunk pop with it. I'm thinking that when I press the button the trunk pops, and a split second delay happens, and then the trunk goes up. I'd need some sort of pulse to constant relay thing. Or I have a DEI 527t (I think is what it is, it's the pulse timer module). But I'd need the trunk pop to be a pulse and then be done. I'm not sure how to do that.

Then I can keep the down button the same, and then the button I currently have specific for the trunk pop, I can use for the back seat down, and then the swapped out on/off to momentary button can be used for the back seat up.

So if someone can maybe help me with the trunk pop button thing, I'd be grateful. I'm gonna go research now. Thanks guys for checking things out!

[Herokight]

Yeah, I was wondering why you had those and two different switches. I never thought of there needing to be a delay before. Oh yeah, I forgot about bypassing the ELD until I saw your post. I got some research to do now; I might have '96 Civic if it hasn't been sold before I can get it.

Hopefully somebody will chime in with an answer about your auto-trunk, but things look like business as usual from here.

[mgameforever01]

awesome work, I wish I had the motivation and time to do the same great work

[scooter99]

Yeah, I was wondering why you had those and two different switches. I never thought of there needing to be a delay before. Oh yeah, I forgot about bypassing the ELD until I saw your post. I got some research to do now; I might have '96 Civic if it hasn't been sold before I can get it.

Hopefully somebody will chime in with an answer about your auto-trunk, but things look like business as usual from here.

Hit me up if you need help with the civic. I'll do what I can. I used to have a 95 sedan, but I was nowhere near what I am now as far as modding it. But I'm happy to help you figure it out.

I have figured out the trunk thing though. I was looking at relays and momentary to constant and all kinds of stuff last night and I came up with a way but it ended up taking like 8 relays or something stupid for the whole thing, up and down. Was a relay to reverse polarity (trunk solenoid is a negative pulse) relay, followed by a pair of relays which took the momentary signal and made it a constant signal, and that took a negative input also. So I was going to split the wires after the reverse polarity relay and run one to the trunk pop, and the other to the momentary to constant relays. So naturally I needed the same thing for the other side too. So that's 6 relays and then add in the existing relays that make the actuators work. 8 relays. ORRRRRRRRRRRRR.......................................

I still need a reverse polarity relay for the trunk pop, but if I have the positive switched wire out of the switch, run it to the reverse polarity relay, and also a DEI 528T, it will pop the trunk and the 528T will make the momentary signal a constant because it's a pulse timer. I can make it operate from 1 second up to 90 seconds. It'll take some adjustment, but I'll set it to go up to a certain time and stop, then use a second one (which I won't need a reverse polarity relay for on the down side) to go down to a certain time. So that's only 1 more relay than I already have, totaling 3, and I get what I want without all those other relays and trying to figure out limit switches etc.

Clear as mud? Good. I ordered 3 more DEI 528t's last night. I have one already. I'm going to put it together this weekend, with the one, and see where it gets me. I'll make a video of it of course. So everyone can see it.

Going to use this same method for my rear seat too. So now, since that ELD switch isn't needed, I'm going to swap that out with a momentary switch, then I'll have the trunk actuator and rear seat actuator switches in there all at once.

I do think I also need to put a resistor on my leds too. I had an led halo blow yesterday. And the buttons feel hot. I left them on the whole drive home, 45 minutes, and by the time I got home, my kids wanted to put the trunk up and down, and my youngest daughter said it was hot. No big.

awesome work, I wish I had the motivation and time to do the same great work

Thanks for the compliments. I don't have the time unfortunately, which is why this is taking so long. Alot of these guys might have had this done a long time ago.

THanks for checking in guys!

Always open to questions, suggestions,etc. Feel free!!

[funky]

You are very detail oriented, makes for a great log and a great build. Love that you explain and use pics for everything!