There are only two things every man truly needs. One of them is a nice car. The other is a good woman. While every individual has a unique concept of what a nice car should be, a good woman should have universally endearing traits, especially in the context of the car-building hobby. A good woman puts up with all your late nights and dirty fingernails, and doesn't get offended if you spend Saturday evening bolting up your new header and high-flow cat rather than going out for dancing and drinks at the club. Cars and performance parts come and go, but a woman that understands and accommodates all of your automotive shenanigans with unconditional devotion is a rare commodity indeed.
That said, San Marcos, Calif., resident Bay Trinh is one of the luckiest guys I know. His wife Kim is actually the one who sent us the tech sheet and write-up on Bay's 1997 Integra. It almost seems like she is more excited than her man to see the car in the pages of 2NR, and for that she deserves mad props.
This Integra isn't the Trinhs' first import. They also currently own two Civic hatchbacks, one from 1993 and one from 2000. Early in their relationship, Kim found out that Bay is a devoted motorhead. At first she got upset because he would spend more time with the cars than with her, but she soon recognized the passion with which he pursued his goals, and that building his dream import was central to her husband's psyche.
Eventually, Kim Trinh talked her man into opening up his own performance shop. After a year of selling car parts out of his brother-in-law's cell phone store, Bay made enough money to move out and into a proper facility. That facility is Extreme Racing Motorsports in San Marcos, and that's where Bay would work late nights getting the Integra just where he wanted it.
The first area to receive attention was the exterior. Tovi's Auto Body in San Marcos gets credit for the work. Tovi's shaved the door handles and rain gutters along the roofline, prepped the car and bathed the panels in oh-so-sweet Candy Apple Red PPG. Tovi's also added the specialty body panels. Kit components include a mixed-and-matched set: Veilside front bumper and mirrors, C-West rear bumper, and Buddy Club side skirts. The rear wing is a JUN GT spoiler, and the front quarter panels have been replaced with Z3-style vented panels from VIS. For added visual stimulation, Trinh had a set of S15 style headlights with HID bulbs grafted into the front end. And of course he's got a carbon-fiber hood to top things off.
The interior was also rearranged to better suit Trinh's taste, but for this task he employed no one other than himself. He got rid of the Integra seats and bolted in a set of buckets from a Del Sol, then re-skinned the seats and other interior surfaces in vibrant red and black cloth. A Momo steering wheel and carbon-fiber auto shift knob facilitate input, while a set of Indiglo gauges provide feedback on speed and rpm. An array of Autometer gauges provide feedback on his engine's condition. Readouts for boost pressure and EGT are present on the driver's A-pillar, oil pressure and air-fuel ratio in custom pods laid over the instrument panel, and oil temperature and volts in the lower center dash.
For the stereo, Trinh collaborated with the talent at North County Mobile in Oceanside to build an ICE that's capable of powering a small apartment complex. Most of the goods are mounted in the trunk in an attractive split-level design that incorporates three Phoenix Gold X-Max subs, dual Phoenix amps mounted on the rear seat backs, a bass enhancement unit, crossover, three Phoenix capacitors and a massive Phoenix equalizer that allows for extreme frequency customization. Up front, a Panasonic mobile DVD/CD player and 7-in. LCD screen head the system up.
Trinh also set up the suspension himself. Coil springs with 5-way adjustable Tokico shocks drop the car as low as its driver wants, while Suspension Techniques anti-sways and DC Sports strut tower braces lend the chassis more rigidity than your Johnson at a Playboy pool party. For improved braking prowess, AEM provided the Bay man with a full set of big rotors and performance pads for both front and rear assemblies, along with a pair of enlarged four-piston calipers to provide the grips up front. Braided stainless steel lines keep the stop pedal firm. Finally, Trinh upgraded the factory rolling stock with 18x7-in. Simmons DM Series in a dark metallic finish. Toyo rubbers, sized 215/35ZR18, provide contact with the pavement.
All this is great, but I can read your mind, young tuner. What exactly does this Integra run on? Gas of course. As far as mechanicals, the B Series mill runs a stock bottom end, except for a Moroso oil pan bolted up underneath for improved lubrication capacity. Head internals remain stock as well. A BBK 70 mm throttle body links up with a port-matched Skunk2 intake manifold, and a Tanabe Racing Medallion exhaust pipes waste out the rear. Of course, that isn't all Bay Trinh has up his sleeve. He also installed a full Drag Gen 3 turbo kit, which includes a cast manifold, T3/T4 hybrid charger, front-mount Spearco intercooler core with all necessary plumbing, Deltagate wastegate, HKS blow-off valve, MAP sensor bypass and Vortech FMU fuel management unit. The only part that didn't fit properly was the air filter, so Bay improvised and used an HKS mushroom-style filter. AEM cam gears make cam timing adjustments a snap, and a full array of AEM fuel system components-fuel rail, regulator and filter-help provide uninhibited fuel flow for the forced induction system.
Bay Trinh deserves most of the credit for taking this Integra to the level it's achieved thus far, but I think we all agree he wouldn't have been able to do it without his wife's unequivocal consent. It goes to show behind every great man is an equally great woman, even in this crazy world of modified import show cars. Maybe now Bay should start on a new project, one for his lady so she can cruise around in the style he himself has become accustomed to. As a final note, Bay would like to give a shout out to Lawson at AEM for the support he gave Bay and Extreme Racing Motorsports during this project buildup.