Acura RSX Type S - The Chameleon

Acura RSX Type S

Although you may not recognize it now, odds are you've seen this RSX Type-S before. It arrived in the first batch delivered to this country with a single-digit VIN number. Since then it's been painted three times and seen action on every front of the tuner-marketing scene. Most recently it reset the record as the fastest RSX to lap Buttonwillow Raceway's full course. But getting there wasn't easy, or direct.

Acura brought the car in as part of its press fleet in 2001. As you can imagine, press cars live a pretty hard life. Journalists tend to wring the snot out of them with acceleration, braking, and taco eating on the go tests. The bright silver car did its duty though, posing for photos and introducing North America to the brilliant K-series engine and its horrid cable linkage shifter. While the abuse inflicted by the hands of cruel editors may have seemed harsh, it was nothing compared to the damage it was about to incur as it entered the world of motorsports.

Instead of being crushed with the rest of the fleet, the car was handed over to RJ deVera. For those who don't know him, deVera has been involved in dozens of SEMA car projects as well as hosting a tuner show on MTV and having a cameo in the original The Fast and the Furious. His notoriety in the car show scene has overshadowed his racing projects, but behind the scenes deVera has dabbled in everything from drifting to road racing. The RSX seen here was never intended to go to car shows, but strangely it was never meant to race either.

Upon receiving it, deVera had the car slathered in Bondo and mold release agent. From there, molds were built and two complete carbon-fiber RSX bodies were created. It was all part of an ill-fated drag-racing program. A monster turbocharged K20 engine was built by AEBS in San Diego with a target goal of 1,100 bhp. But, aside from a couple of photo shoots, the program never really got off the ground. One complete car eventually went to Jojo Callos and the other body was later sold to Jeremy Lookofsky, who mated it to Shaun Carlson's tubeframe Neon chassis and shipped it to Hawaii. The original car was a mess, and by all means it probably should've been destroyed at that point, but deVera got it in his head that he wanted to build a Honda Challenge car out of it.

He brought it out to a NASA event at California Speedway in the summer of 2003. This was the first time I met him and his crazy race car. The car had his own RO_JA brand body kit and wheels, it was painted in a slightly darker shade of silver with blue Honda wings, and there was a Comptech custom racing exhaust, header, antiroll bars, and strut bars. The interior was thoroughly tricked out with a custom chromoly rollcage and fancy tinwork. Most impressive though were the Pepsi, Valvoline, and other logos that were on the Charge Speed carbon-fiber hood. He even had little matchbox-sized replicas.

He was racing with a provisional license and was slow as hell. But the car was beautiful and there were two magazines and a camera crew documenting his every move. This amounted to more exposure than the series had ever received up to that point. As a competitor who lived for the Honda Challenge series at the time, I wanted him to stick around.

I tried to give him advice on driving but like any rookie he blamed the car. It wasn't until I got behind the wheel a few months later that I realized just how bad it was. Highly adjustable suspension components are great, but in the wrong hands they can be scary. The shop that installed the Zeal Function V-6 coilovers raised the dampers up out of their saddles and then dropped the spring perches down on them. This pretty much completely closed the dampers at their static ride height so that any cornering load would bounce the car off of its bump stops. I should have checked this before going out on the track but instead I found out the hard way by exiting the track sideways off Buttonwillow's fastest turn.

I thought deVera was going to kill me, but instead he crawled under the car with a screwdriver and helped scrape the 80 pounds or so of mud out from the undercarriage. It must have been the delirium of having busted knuckles and mud flicking in our eyes but at that point we committed to making the car go fast. In the off-season I failed to load the car on the trailer with enough tongue weight and jackknifed it while entering the freeway. Time for paintjob number two-Lamborghini Sunburst Orange this time.

By the middle of the '04 season, the car was running at the front of the H1 field and hitting car shows between events. The wheels and tires went from 17x7 wheels with 205 series tires to 18x9 with 245s all the way around. An ATS final drive compensated for the larger diameter. The guys at Endless USA re-valved the dampers for 18kg/mm front and 30kg/mm rear Swift springs. The stock front brakes were replaced with Stoptech four-piston calipers and two-piece rotors. We found some aerodynamic grip with a Versus Motorsport front splitter and rear wing setup. The car was working great in the corners and the braking zones, but it was close to 300 pounds overweight and the motor was a dud.

Even with Toda cams, a thin head gasket, and an hour of Hondata tuning, it would only put out 217 wheel-hp on a very generous Dyna-Pac dyno. That was about 30hp short of what we were expecting from it. Our best guess was that the motor had been overheated or otherwise traumatized during its press car days and it never really recovered. These things have a way of working themselves out though. I missed a shift and zinged the motor. Half a lap later it spit a rod out into the splitter. The tow truck guy picked it up and showed it to me through the windshield.

We were at a crossroads. With a fresh motor we had a strong shot at the championship, but campaigning the heavy strut-car against older, lighter, double-wishbone Civics was expensive. And the lack of exposure wasn't selling a lot of soda or oil with deVera's sponsorship money. On the other hand, Sport Compact Car and Super Street had just held the first U.S. Time Attack a few months earlier. "Didn't you say there was a drag motor somewhere?" I asked.

Things get a little fuzzy here. The car bounced back and forth between five reputable shops in Southern California. Some conversations weren't pretty and others were downright ugly. Still somewhere in the middle there was some really nice fabrication done with a return line for the fuel system, plumbing for the Accusump and oil cooler, and a gorgeous one-piece downpipe and exhaust crafted from Burns stainless materials. Close to two years later, the car ended up at XS Engineering where everything was buttoned up and dialed in to the tune of 450 wheel-hp.

The motor was the original K20A2 AEBS drag engine, which included sleeves bored out to 2.2 liters, Arrow rods, Ross pistons, massive head porting, and oversized valves of unknown diameter. I wish I knew more but it runs now and I'm not taking it apart to check. To keep the power out of the ludicrous realm, stock Type-S cams were used with an out-of-the-box HKS turbo kit. Finally it was tuned for VP MS109 fuel with an HKS F-Con V-Pro ECU. The relatively small turbo spooled instantly with an almost perfectly flat power curve from 3,000-8,500 rpm.

To complement the new powerplant, a higher capacity Mishimoto aluminum radiator was installed for better cooling. For traction the tires were replaced with BFGoodrich R1 slicks, the splitter and wing were upgraded with the biggest stuff that APR makes, and the rear antisway bar was replaced with a 32mm ASR speedway bar. To cut a little more weight, a carbon-fiber hatch and FAL polycarbonate windows were installed. Finally, to freshen it up for new sponsorship, the car was painted again. This time it was made to look like Ayrton Senna's helmet. For those who don't know, Senna was a Brazilian F1 driver and is arguably the greatest wheelman who ever lived.

Out on the track, the car became a monster to drive. It usually only went a lap or two before losing boost. Two days before the Super Lap Battle it even sheared all the teeth off Fourth gear on a simple up-shift. Typically though it would either blow the intercooler piping off or the turbo would back off of the manifold, dumping the hot exhaust pressure into the engine bay. To combat these issues, TRS Racing upgraded all of the clamps with heavy-duty pieces from Baker Precision. Every line and wire behind the engine was wrapped in heat-resistant sheathing. The studs on the manifold were upgraded and the engine was locked in place with a special set of solid engine mounts from Hasport. But, despite our efforts, it never ran consistently enough to dial in the suspension settings or hot tire pressures.

When it did go, it was terrifyingly fast. The power randomly transferred from one drive wheel to the other. The Sparco steering wheel was replaced with a larger-diameter version for some additional leverage against the torque steer. Even still the wheel wanted to rip out of my hands as I struggled to predict which way it would pull next. We tried both a gear-type Quaife limited-slip differential and a clutch-type OS Giken. Both had the same symptoms. The car used the entire track on the straights and was nearly impossible to keep on the racing line in the tight corners. But it was on the sweepers that it was the scariest. The power typically shifted to the outside wheel. To keep the torque steer from pulling the front end off the inside of the track, leverage was applied to the outside to stay in the gas. It felt completely unnatural to drive, but then again so did blocking muscle cars in the corners and walking on them on the straights.

As much as I would have liked to have solved these problems, this RSX's time attack days may be over. With the car clocking a lap time of 1:58 flat at the most recent Super Lap Battle, it is solidly ranked right up there with the fastest Unlimited FWD Class cars this year. But with the model no longer being in production, the marketing impact of campaigning a new car just isn't there. That's not to say the car is finished though. It's once again moving onto its next assignment. The car is being prepared for deVera and I to co-drive in NASA's Western Endurance Racing Championship. With a stock K24 engine and some massive auxiliary lights, it's going to see more track time in each race than it's seen in the last five years. Since things tend to go bump in the night, don't be surprised if it changes colors again. And the next time you look at an old race car, just know that there's probably a lot of history underneath its latest coat of paint.

Motor World Hype '02 RSX Type-S

Engine

Engine Code: K20A2

Type: Approximately 2,200cc inline four, aluminum block and head, turbocharged, and intercooled.

Internal Modifications: AEBS sleves overboared with Ross pistons, Arrow rods, oversized valves, Prototype Racing baffled oil pan, Toda valvesprings, and titanium retainers.

External Modifications: HKS bolt-on turbo kit, including GT2835 turbo, internal wastegate, exhaust manifold, blow-off valve, FMIC, and air filter; Burns stainless downpipe and side-exit exhaust; Mishimoto radiator; Setrab oil cooler; Accusump oil pressure accumulator; and Odyssey battery.

Engine Management Modifications: HKS F-Con V-Pro EMS, Walbro 255lph fuel pump, custom returning fuel system, and RC injectors.

Drivetrain

Layout: Transverse front engine, front-wheel drive

Drivetrain Modifications: Exedy twin-plate clutch and aluminum flywheel, OS Giken limited-slip differential, ATS 5.0:1 final drive

Suspension

Front: Custom valved Zeal Function V-6 coilovers, Swift 18kg/mm springs, Comptech titanium STB, no antisway bar

Rear: Custom valved Zeal Function V-6 coilovers, Swift 30kg/mm springs, SPC adjustable upper control arm, ASR subframe brace and 30x188mm/1,000-inch wall thickness antisway bar.

Brakes

Front: Stoptech 328x28mm vented two-piece rotors and four-piston calipers, Raybestos pads, Goodridge SS lines

Rear: Stock 10.2-inch-diameter rotors and calipers, Endless pads, Goodridge SS lines

External

Wheels: RO_JA by Rays R2-5 18x9

Tires: 245/40/18 BFGoodrich g-Force R1

Body: Versus Motorsport RO_JA body kit, Charge Speed carbon-fiber hood and rear hatch, APR splitter and GT300 rear wing, FAL polycarbonate windows

Interior: Custom chromoly rollcage with high-density padding, Sparco Pro 2000 seat and steering wheel, Takata six-point harness and pads, MOMO (ugly but comfortable) shift knob, Safety Solutions inner and outer nets, halon fire extinguisher, and HKS guages.

Source: http://www.modified.com/