Paint You Wings

The pride and joy of all that I love about my CRZ. The HPD inspired wing. It is by far, the most beautiful thing I've ever done to it.

I love GT wings on cars. I dont know why. I think its preposterous, absurd, ridiculous, outrageous! But if designed and fitted properly, its the most beautiful thing ever to grace the car.

It totally transform how the car looks. Good or bad it is all subjective. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder right? I was determined to make this wing. I told myself, that no matter what, this wing is a must. I dont care if the person has to custom it or source it from somewhere.

As long as it fits my budget. By heaven or hell, I will have it done! As far as i can remember, i started asking around bodykit vendors, car accessory shop and even FRP custom builders if they have a mold of the wing. No luck. Custom was too expensive, and pre-made ones are too small.

I even found out the wing that was used by Honda HPD in US, its from APR and a carbon fiber wing which costs more than $USD2000. So yeah. No.

My members tried to persuade me to go for the J's Racing GT wing for the CRZ. Meh. That's too small bro! I WANTED THIS!

Look at that beauty. The CRZ's width is 1740mm not including the side mirrors. To get this exact size means i can only custom make it. No way, those pre-made or aftermarket ones has this exact size or i was fed up looking.

Finally i found it. Someone who's willing to do it for me. Coming from a shop who specializes in making custom FRP kits for cars, the man told me he's willing to do it for me for just RM800 including paint. The holders will be using aluminium stands to support the wing. RM800? WTF AM I WAITING FOR? I immediately said ok.

This guy was very detailed and thorough with the work. Everything was measured to the millimeter.

Both the stand and support leg was using standard aluminium stands. Strong and solid. I'm gonna regret saying this.

Then the wing itself was using a generic GT wing and being extended at 3 different place to the exact width i wanted. It was fucking fabulous!

Even had to see if it has the proper height. Not over the roofline as exactly in the picure above.

He even got the size of the side blades down to perfection. Finishing touch to honor the wing? HPD's very own logo. Took him 5 days in total from measuring to installing. He was the master. He wasn't the man I wanted. He was the hero I needed.

B-O-O-M!

Bubble Butt

While doing my build, I didn't have a specific order or process of completing my build. I was just going around looking at things which I can get my hands on. Well in other words. Afford.

I was almost there, there's no way of getting the HPD diffuser except from HPD themselves from the US. With the shipment cost and fragility, its a risk I didn't wanna take.

So i went with AMS Terra, the Noblesse was so underwhelming, its borderline sad. No way I was going to pair the HPD wing, with the Noblesse diffuser, have you seen that wing? Its a statement, and the AMS Terra diffuser goes well with it just so perfectly.

I saw the AMS Terra diffuser awhile back, during the ZF1 days when a few members were using it back then. I. Fell. In. Love. Immediately. I knew, this was the diffuser I need for mine. It was something special. It was different. I never knew I love center exit exhausts.
Its an acquired taste, some likes it, some thinks its too much, well, as i said. I love it.

At the time, they were selling the AMS Terra kit as a set, comes with a front grill, front lip, side skirts, a small spoiler and the diffuser. No one was selling it separately. Until one day, a body kit supplier decided to start making replicas, well, i jumped on it. Cost me RM500, got a bloody overweight fiber piece of plastic. With installation and spray costing another RM300.

It was done. It was on. It was, perfect.
Before:

After:

My joy was beyond the sky, over the rainbow, unmeasurable. It was fucking amazing. Even got a pair of LED reflectors to go with it. Only thing missing was the three gaping holes in the middle. It was literally, empty. I was young, I was dumb. So naturally, I decided to create a dummy exhaust to fill that hole. After spending about RM300 there, yeah, two dummy tips and labor, its "complete".

I decided to go with matte black paint instead of gloss. Kinda fits well. Make it more "racecar" look. Gloss finish will be, would you put it.. tacky?

I've been using the AMS Terra diffuser a good 4 years now, it has gone thru so much with the car. So many tragedies, so many repaints, so many funny occurrences. I'll update more on that later.

That's all for now, its a step by step process. Lets hope i can keep this progress till the end.

Trial and Error

The next step. Was lowering the car. I couldn't stand the wheel gap. Look at it. The back is lifted up so high, you can see its undercarriage from normal eye level. There was a four. FOUR finger gap at the back wheel. Even my ex doesn't have a four finger gap. Geddit?

The stock suspension is comfortable, but i think it was too soft, the body roll on those stock springs are fucking ridiculous! Its like riding on a boat, wait no, like riding a fucking dinghy. Rolls left and right at every turn.

So i got these springs, it was recommended by a fellow member. These Eibach sport springs are quite famous and quite a number of other members were using it as well, I picked it up for rm800,

After installing the springs, the wheel gap dropped significantly, the front was a 1 1/2 finger gap, while the back is a two finger gap. She had a two finger rule btw.

It was low, but not low enough,but at the time it was good enough. Adjustable suspension was out of my budget. But the springs will do. So after changing the springs, the changes are very noticeable.

Ride was harder, every bump and dip on the road can be felt up the ass! More ever that was the only negative. On the positive side, the body roll has lessen, and because the car is much lower to the ground, less air is going under the car thus making the car accelerate better and also improves fuel consumption.

So at the time, the springs was enough. Till i get the budget i have, i'll switch to full adjustable suspensions.

Stage 1

My build begins. So 1st stage of my HPD build was changing the rims and tires. The CRZ comes stock from the factory with Enkei rims, wrapped with Bridgestone Potenza RE050A tires. 16 inches. Its a stupid size considering most markets got the 17 inch tires and rims. Took me awhile to decide to change the rims and tires. Couldn't get the appropriate design I wanted.

I will say it now. Its doesn't look that good with this rim. Lol. Another thing i hated. THAT WHEEL GAP. I ABSOLUTELY HATEEEEED IT. So after 3 months of using the car, I went to klang one day, and I found the shop which gives the highest trade in value, and changed my rims and tires.

Most of the shops offered me RM1k for my rims and tires, but this shop, Js Tires, offered me for RM1.5k, it was a no brainer, the moment i parked at the shop and walk in, the staff which I assume was the manager turned and asked me, "are you part of the club?" then straight away offered my RM1.5k for my rims and tires. I took it.

Looked around the shop and and set my eyes on the rims called Advan Racing RGII rims. It was 17 inches which i think its a better size all around, the boss suggested me to use either Continental or Falken tires, well for a bit more, I chose the Continental Max Contact MC5 215/45/17 tires. Here are the comparison photos.

Due to the inward curve of the rims, it made it look smaller as if it was 16 inches. But somehow i fell love with this design. I still hate that wheel gap though. The rims are lighter that the stock ones, it only weights 6.9kg each. Not sure how heavy was the stock rims and there wasn't much change in power delivery and fuel consumption.

Had to fork out an extra of RM1.5k for the tires as the trade in only covered the cost for the rims, oh well. It was well so far, at that time, worth it.