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Got my S2000 back in the spring of 2011 after dreaming about one for many years. Since there was only 1 S2000 sold by the dealers between 1999-2008 in our country I had to search for it from abroad. I was looking at them from the internet, and found a good looking car from the UK. I had a local guy go do a test drive it for me, and bought it after that. He dropped it off at the harbour and it was shipped here after that. I had never even seen an S2000 when I went to pick it up, let alone drive one. A pretty breathtaking experience to say the least! 
Hereīs how it stood when I bought it. Completely stock 2002 UK-Spec in my favourite colour for the AP1, Monte Carlo Blue.
I actually got a set of wheels for the car before I bought it.
I found a set of BBS RS-II.s for sale in Japan, and got them shipped here.
These rims are 2-piece, and they were put together with these rather irritating titanium rivets.
I tried drilling the rivets, and cutting them off with a Dremel-tool with no luck, so we took out the angle grinder..
A couple of exploded cutting blades, and a lot of bright-white sparks later the wheels were taken apart.
Some polishing of the lips and painting of the centers took place, and here they are put together with new bolts.
I threw on some Yokohama Parada Spec.2s and threw the wheels on the car. Crossover-offroad-convertible anyone?
Obviously something had to be done to the ride height so I donīt get people running under my car while standing at the lights. The budget for the summer was pretty much spent at this point with buying the car, paying the ridiculously expensive import tax to our country (Almost as much as I paid for the whole car + shipping from UK!), and the wheels. But I managed to buy a set of FK lowering springs to cure the worst of it. Was still high as hell though.
The rest of the summer went driving like this. Racked up some miles, hit the country lanes and twisties when ever I could and also attended a few track days. Some random pics.
As you can see from the pics I also managed to scrape the front left corner on a guard rail slightly, so it was a good excuse to order this.
Well, as always the summer ended too soon and it was time to put the S away for the long and dark winter. We rent a garage for the winter with a couple of my friends, and once we got the car in there the tear-down could begin..
The rear arches had some rust, so we started with taking care of that.
Cutting off the rotten bits one by one..
A lot of thanks to my friend Juhi for taking care of the sheetmetal-work, couldnīt have done it without him!
I also modified the front beam a bit to accept the AP2 front bumper.
And installed a Megan Racing 3" Catback that I got from a fellow finnish S2000 owner.
After the rust was taken care of I started doing prep work for paint. Once I had matted the surface and taken off everything that was in the way for painting we put the car on a trailer and took it to my friends paint shop where I continued doing the prep work.
Test fitting the AP2 bumper.
Primer layed on, sanding process starts all over again!
Fresh paint, turned out great!
Refurbed and polished the headlight lenses before putting them back on.
Starting to get it back together again..
Giving the wheels a fresh coat of paint and a polish. A slightly different shade of gold this time.
And after two nights of assembling I could take the first ride of summer 2012.
Next up was the installation of the BC-Racing coilovers I bought. No pics of this, but this is how it looked after that.
The wheels were sitting two far inside the fenders so I threw on some 30mm spacers to cure that.
As you can see in the last picture I managed to break the rear bumper already after just a few days of driving after painting... I had forgotten to attach two bolts that attach the underside of the bumper to the bottom of the car. Resulting in the bumper catching air inside itself and ripping off at around 180km/h flying into the hedge. I was amazed to see it was still pretty much intact and could be ghetto rigged on with some zip ties and screws. This gave me a good excuse to buy the AP1 USDM rear bumper that I had dreamed of, because I **** the big license plate space in the EDM bumper.
Some random pics again from throughout the summer.
Eventually I got the USDM rear bumper and a BYS rear lip painted and installed.
Managed to bend the front fenders a few times during the summer..
Also got new shorter license plates since the old ones would not fit the US rear bumper.
We did a photo shoot for a local magazine at the end of the summer to wrap it all up. Here are some shots.
After that it was time to take the car back to the garage for the winter. Itīs a bit over 100km.s to the garage so it takes a while to get there..
The plans for this winter are polybushing the suspension since a lot of the adjustment bolts/bushes have seized so that I canīt adjust camber or toe at all at the moment.
I also have to take off the gearbox since 5th gear wonīt go on anymore.
I also have some bigger plans, but more of them if my budget allows me to do them this winter!
Thanks for reading, I will keep the topic updated with pics whenever something happens.
Hereīs how it stood when I bought it. Completely stock 2002 UK-Spec in my favourite colour for the AP1, Monte Carlo Blue.
I actually got a set of wheels for the car before I bought it.
I found a set of BBS RS-II.s for sale in Japan, and got them shipped here.
These rims are 2-piece, and they were put together with these rather irritating titanium rivets.
I tried drilling the rivets, and cutting them off with a Dremel-tool with no luck, so we took out the angle grinder..
A couple of exploded cutting blades, and a lot of bright-white sparks later the wheels were taken apart.
Some polishing of the lips and painting of the centers took place, and here they are put together with new bolts.
I threw on some Yokohama Parada Spec.2s and threw the wheels on the car. Crossover-offroad-convertible anyone?
Obviously something had to be done to the ride height so I donīt get people running under my car while standing at the lights. The budget for the summer was pretty much spent at this point with buying the car, paying the ridiculously expensive import tax to our country (Almost as much as I paid for the whole car + shipping from UK!), and the wheels. But I managed to buy a set of FK lowering springs to cure the worst of it. Was still high as hell though.
The rest of the summer went driving like this. Racked up some miles, hit the country lanes and twisties when ever I could and also attended a few track days. Some random pics.
As you can see from the pics I also managed to scrape the front left corner on a guard rail slightly, so it was a good excuse to order this.
Well, as always the summer ended too soon and it was time to put the S away for the long and dark winter. We rent a garage for the winter with a couple of my friends, and once we got the car in there the tear-down could begin..
The rear arches had some rust, so we started with taking care of that.
Cutting off the rotten bits one by one..
A lot of thanks to my friend Juhi for taking care of the sheetmetal-work, couldnīt have done it without him!
I also modified the front beam a bit to accept the AP2 front bumper.
And installed a Megan Racing 3" Catback that I got from a fellow finnish S2000 owner.
After the rust was taken care of I started doing prep work for paint. Once I had matted the surface and taken off everything that was in the way for painting we put the car on a trailer and took it to my friends paint shop where I continued doing the prep work.
Test fitting the AP2 bumper.
Primer layed on, sanding process starts all over again!
Fresh paint, turned out great!
Refurbed and polished the headlight lenses before putting them back on.
Starting to get it back together again..
Giving the wheels a fresh coat of paint and a polish. A slightly different shade of gold this time.
And after two nights of assembling I could take the first ride of summer 2012.
Next up was the installation of the BC-Racing coilovers I bought. No pics of this, but this is how it looked after that.
The wheels were sitting two far inside the fenders so I threw on some 30mm spacers to cure that.
As you can see in the last picture I managed to break the rear bumper already after just a few days of driving after painting... I had forgotten to attach two bolts that attach the underside of the bumper to the bottom of the car. Resulting in the bumper catching air inside itself and ripping off at around 180km/h flying into the hedge. I was amazed to see it was still pretty much intact and could be ghetto rigged on with some zip ties and screws. This gave me a good excuse to buy the AP1 USDM rear bumper that I had dreamed of, because I **** the big license plate space in the EDM bumper.
Some random pics again from throughout the summer.
Eventually I got the USDM rear bumper and a BYS rear lip painted and installed.
Managed to bend the front fenders a few times during the summer..
Also got new shorter license plates since the old ones would not fit the US rear bumper.
We did a photo shoot for a local magazine at the end of the summer to wrap it all up. Here are some shots.
After that it was time to take the car back to the garage for the winter. Itīs a bit over 100km.s to the garage so it takes a while to get there..
The plans for this winter are polybushing the suspension since a lot of the adjustment bolts/bushes have seized so that I canīt adjust camber or toe at all at the moment.
I also have to take off the gearbox since 5th gear wonīt go on anymore.
I also have some bigger plans, but more of them if my budget allows me to do them this winter!
Thanks for reading, I will keep the topic updated with pics whenever something happens.
haha id go a little lower if i was you, but thats just my preference, love the workmanship!
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