Seibon Carbon Fiber Hoods

When you decide to start making your Accord unique looking, you have a variety of choices. One of the products that I have just added to one of my web sites is the Seibon carbon products line.

I have visited their web site, talked to various people and read a lot of articles, and I like what I have learned. This seems to be a quality company that makes a very good product.

When you begin to manufacture carbon fiber products you have several critical choices to make. One of these is will you be making your products out of one complete sheet of carbon fiber or using multiple pieces (which may be cheaper). Seibon decided to use only whole sheets which offer more strength and resists chipping and breaking much better than the alternative.

Another decision is the use of an integrated mold rather than having the carbon fiber sheet wrapped around the skeleton. This resists splintering and breaking more than the other technique.

Another feature I like is the "wet" look. This is achieved by using a clear coating on the finished product. The alternative is a Gel coat which produces a duller finish. If you are not painting the finished product you have to find a company that produces the type of finish you like.

This should not be confused with something called "wet" or "dry" manufacturing. Simply put, with dry carbon, you get the most strength and save the most weight. The weaves and quality are more consistent, but they are generally 3 to 4 times more expensive than wet carbon.

Wet carbon products are hand-laid, and are more prone to small defects like wavy weaves and tiny bubbles. They do not save as much weight as their dry carbon counterparts. But on the plus side, you get an incredible combination of visual attraction, weight-deduction, and most importantly, price.

All of Seibon products use the "wet" technique. So your choice is one of weight and strength vs. a great price and good looking products.

One of the products you should look at is the line of four different hoods for your Accord by Seibon. My web pages will show you what they look like. Remember, that you might have to do some adjustments to get a professional fit, but this is true of most aftermarket carbon fiber products.

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Body Parts for That Unique Look

Most people that I know who are "in to cars" are attracted to both the looks of a car and its performance. In the past I have written several blogs about how to increase the performance of your car. Now I'll talk a little bit about the looks.

One caution is in order. One of the best pieces of car advise I have ever received is "don't fall in love with the sheet metal." This means that the looks of the car should not convince you to buy a particular car. What's under the body is more important. This is great advice if you are buying a car.

How about if you have a car? Now what can you do to the car to make it look unique. Well you do have a lot of choices. Just think of all of the cars you have seen with special paint jobs, and interesting wheels and tires. These are simple and straight forward changes to your stock cars.

But if you want something even more different looking then you should be thinking about body part changes. What this means is that you remove a stock part and replace it with an aftermarket part or you add something like an air foil or spoiler to a car that did not have one.

So we will be taking a closer look at some of the body parts you can add in the next few blogs.

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Siebon Carbon Fiber Body Parts

I have been looking around for different products to add to my two web sites:
www.accordmania.com and www.accordtopia.com. I would like to make one of them oriented to performance parts for the Honda Accord and the other orientation towards appearance items.

Yesterday I took a look at different types of body panels that are available for the Accord, and I decided to add the Siebon Carbon line. It seems this company has their act together and they offer one of the widest selection of individual carbon fiber components. You can go from hoods, trunk lids, side skirts, eye brows, front and back spoilers, front lips and other pieces.

One thing that I did not see was a complete body kit package. If you want to go this route you will have to purchase each piece.

However just in looking at hoods, you have a choice of four different styles. So if you have some creative juices flowing, this is a good way to let them out. Pick one of the styles, and get creative on the paint work.

What are your favorite companies for modifying the body on an Accord?

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AEM V2 Cold Air Intake

Cold air intake or performance air intake systems come in a lot of different configurations. Most of them are some type of air tube to control the air flow into the engine and a filter on the other end. Cold air intake systems draw air from outside the engine compartment and short ram intake systems locate the filter within the engine compartment.

Typically the cold air intake will deliver a little more power and torque increase than a short ram, because the colder the air the more oxygen it contains. And it is oxygen that allows the fuel in your engine to burn.

So is a longer colder air system always better? The folks at AEM say no. They have a system called the V2. It has a dual chamber design, which allows two streams of air through the tubes that creates multiple frequency sound waves to produce the largest area under the curve of any intake system on the market. These sound waves help charge the cylinders with more air throughout the entire rpm range.

The interesting thing about the V2 system is that some filters are located within the engine compartment (short ram approach) and other models have the filter outside (cold air intake approach). AEM tests both the length of the tubing and the temperature and select the best combination for a particular car engine. This means that regardless if the V2 system for your Accord is located inside or outside of the engine compartment, you are getting the maximum results.

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Air Filters | Why they are important

I'm interested in more performance out of my cars, and I assume if you are reading this blog that is one of your interests also.

One of the ways to increase the stock horsepower in a car is to improve the air flow both into and out of the engine. In another blog I'll talk about the engine exhaust.

The more air that comes into the engine, the more oxygen is delivered to the cylinders. When this extra oxygen is mixed with the proper amount of fuel and burned, more horsepower is developed.

In prior blogs we discussed different types and brands of cold air intakes, and I stressed some of the features of them. The one area I did not cover in any detail was the air filter. Factory air filters, and most of them you can purchase in the local auto parts store are made out of paper. This can result in several things.

First while they trap dirt and debris they also restrict the air flow. So less air means less power. Second, they become dirty and when they do, the only thing you can do is throw them away and buy a new one. Over time you will be spending a lot of money on paper filters.

The after market cold air intake companies have answered these problems with unique design for their air filters and special materials. The designs allow more air to flow through even when the filter becomes dirty. And many of them allow cleaning of the air filter, and typically these particular companies will offer a lifetime guaranty for their filters. Let's see the stock filters offer the same.

Two of the most typical of these aftermarket brands are AEM and K&N. AEM has a filter they call the DryFlow and it can be cleaned when it becomes dirty. K&N also has a great filter, but they use a light oil bath on their filter. Both improve the air flow and even the catching of very small particles before they harm your engine.

I would use and trust either brand. Since I can use only one at a time, I'm currently running with a K&N in my Ferrari.

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So Who Do You Believe About the Crash Test?

The local paper and the TV news shows were all highlighting the recent test by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, of two cars smashing into each other.

The cars struck in something called "offset" or not quite a true head on collision This type of test more realistically simulated what happens when a car wanders over the center line and hits a car coming in the other direction.

As I'm sure you have heard the smaller car received the most damage and potential damage to its passengers. The Insurance Institute said that the Smart ForTwo had “extensive” damage...

...into the area where the driver sits. The institute's findings indicate a human would have a high likelihood of sustaining head and leg injuries.

For the Honda Fit a driver of the Fit in a similar accident would have hit the steering wheel through the airbag in addition to sustaining leg injuries.

Of course the car manufactures had a different conclusion such as this type of accident is very unlikely. An 80 mph collision (each car going 40 mph) was a rare type of accident. One of the companies said it was a “rare and extreme” accident. “

So what's your opinion?

Mine is that it just proved some laws of physics. Its safer to be in a larger vehicle than a smaller one. That being said, most of my cars have been small sport cars, so I don't always listen to myself.

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Another Dumb Idea from Congress

The US Congress seems to be making one dumb decision after another. I'm not sure why. Is it pressure from lobbyists, demand from constituents, an attempt to do good but not understanding the problem?

I give up. Please help me understand one of their recent decisions. We all know the economy is in the pits. One of the causes, but certainly not the major one, is our dependence on foreign oil. So as a reasonable decision Congress passed a prior law that gave a tax credit for folks who purchased a hybrid automobile. Sounded like a reasonable decision to me. An extra incentive to save gas.

Now the kicker. According to mixedpower.com the tax credits are going away or already gone. One of the restrictions on the $3,400 credit was that it applied to only the first 60,000 cars from a specific manufacturer. So if you want to purchase a Toyota Prius - no tax credit. How about the brand new Honda Insight? Sorry, no tax credit. Both Toyota and Honda have reached and passed the stupid 60,000 limit. I guess when you reach that magic number the world's oil problem just goes away (just like I would like our Congress to do).

Anyway there are still some left for you to purchase and receive the credit, and that is a hybrid from Ford or General Motors. If you are interested in Ford, they offer Ford Escape Hybrid and its twin SUV, Mercury Mariner Hybrid, the Ford Fusion Hybrid mid-size sedan and its twin the Mercury Milan Hybrid. For General Motors the Chevrolet Malibu hybrid and Cadillac Escalade hybrid are available.

Now some more bad news. Ford is approaching the 60,000 limit and the tax credit is designed to decrease at particular times. It drops from the current $3,4000 to $1,700 or in half after March 31st. And then to $850 after March 31, 2010.

I guess the reasoning was by that time we, our esteemed Congress, would have solved the oil crisis, and the tax credit incentive would no longer be necessary. If you believe that, I have a nice bridge for sale, but I expect a young couple who looked at it earlier today will be back to buy it. So you had better make me an offer real fast. .

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