It took less than a year for Kenny Littlefield to build his 1993 Honda Del Sol. And we say that in the literal sense. In fact, Littlefield claims credit for almost all of the custom mods-from the sick dash treatment to the custom amp rack behind the plush MOMO buckets. Even with a lot of help, accomplishing an undertaking of this magnitude is not easy, so we give mad props to Kenny. After all, it's no mystery that this Sol was purpose-built to assault the show scene, and as you will see, he's put together a serious battle plan.
First Glance
The soft look of the del Sol's factory sheetmetal was eliminated with a full skirt treatment, front clip and wing from Wings West. The pieces are color-matched in PPG yellow and the paint is set off with a custom vinyl scheme by Speedesign in N.J. The door handles were also shaved to keep the Sol's profile smooth. APC lights freshen the look out back.
The fenderwells bust big chrome in the form of 18-inch MOMO Sport wheels which are wrapped in 215/35ZR-18 BFGoodrich Scorcher T/A rubber. The tires leave colored stripes if you light them up-give it up to BFG for making a tire that not only shows well, but sticks almost as well as the company's hi-po, high-end street tires. And what can we say about the wheels? They're MOMOs, they're tight as hell and they offer an open view to the Powerstop cross-drilled rotors fastened snugly to the Honda's hubs. The outside of this Sol, however, is only a teaser-because inside is where things really get interesting.
Bite This!
Check out the dash. That's right, Littlefield cut two del Sol dashes and seamlessly molded them together creating a "double-hump" look, then integrated an LCD screen into the passenger side hump for use with the floor-mounted Sony DVD or PlayStation. Just in case the wild dash doesn't grab you the first time, he installed a set of APC indiglo white-faced gauges to draw your attention toward that general direction.
Custom shag and vinyl abounds; damn near every trim piece, button and knob was painted for full effect. A set of MOMO Sport Racer seats replaces the factory fart catchers and the driver and passenger are held fast to the supple Italian hide by MOMO four-point harnesses. If you're gonna plant your ass in custom seats, MOMOs are top o' da line.
The sound system is wicked and combines two of the premier names in audio: Polk Audio and Kenwood. What's more, he designed the system and custom-built the enclosures himself! A Kenwood KMD-X91 head unit acts as the command center and features 44 watts and four-channel max output. This unit drives the juice through a Kenwood 501F amp and two Kenwood 401Ms to the awaiting Polk lows, highs and mids from a custom amp rack behind the seats.
As speakers go, Polk is arguably one of the best in the biz. Polk's quality is realized in this Sol in the form of four 5.25-inch mids, three tweets and four 12-inch subs which thump hard-very hard. Two of the mids and the small tweeters are mounted in custom kick panels on the doors and the subs are mounted in a custom enclosure that Littlefield designed to not only fit a nitrous bottle, but the roof too! To tie the system together, Littlefield went with Stinger wires.
Liquid Motivation
Littlefield's del Sol sports the 1.6 SOHC hooked up to a slushbox, but he managed to find a few ways to inspire it. The Honda's main motivation arrives via the bottle through a Venom VCN2000 nitrous system that can deliver a 20- to 180-shot depending on jetting and the stoutness of the engine (Littlefield runs a 40-50 shot).
How, you ask? The system works with closed-loop fuel systems, is controlled by two dual processors and is programmable via a laptop with the company's software. A patented nitrous solenoid and valve eliminates the need for jetting, allowing the processors to control delivery of the potent poison from a 10-pound bottle-in this case mounted in Littlefield's custom sub enclosure. The Venom kit also includes a dash display that informs the user of rpm, pulsewidth, mode, throttle position and air/fuel mixture. The processors also detect any problems with the mix and shut down the system before things get terminal, a lot better than crossing your fingers before you squeeze it.