Honda Cars : Honda Tuning: 1992 Honda Prelude - The Honda Paradigm | 2013 New Honda Car Reviews 0

The likelihood of you being familiar with this bright green ’92 Prelude is no doubt very high. Let us cast aside all clichés of anyone living under any sort of rock. If you are a Honda enthusiast who has Internet access, chances are you have seen or heard of the “Big Mike Prelude build.” If you happen to be living in an area where you are strictly relegated to getting your Honda news via snail mail, then you should still be somewhat familiar with this Prelude because it has graced the cover of Honda Tuning magazine once before (see July 2008 issue). Since that time it has seen quite the transformation; if you were to put this cover and the cover of the ’08 July issue side by side, the images would appear to be two completely different builds. Back then Big Mike’s Prelude was a nice, well-rounded project, spotlighting a chassis that wasn’t exactly the most popular of Hondas to build. Today, it represents one of the archetypes of how Hondas should be built and an inspiration to fellow enthusiasts worldwide. Yeah, to say that things have changed would be an understatement.

The two builds might as well have been two separate Preludes—many of his friends even thought that he should have started fresh with another BB4 chassis. Its first incarnation was subtle, clean, and made for a good cruiser. Things were different four years ago; the platform was new to Mike and it was an experimental time for the long-term enthusiast. The manifestation you see is far from experimental. Instead, it is a product of calculated, well-thought-out planning. Big Mike seized the opportunity to not only build one of the best Preludes, he wanted to take the unpopular chassis and transform it into one of the most recognized builds within the Honda community. The first step involved a change in color. The rich wine tone was laid down very nicely, but it just didn’t have that “wow” factor that captured the collective attention of others. Mike decided on a new paint choice by accident, as he explains: “I was driving one day when I spotted a truck that belonged to the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the color really stuck with me. I went home and did some research and discovered that there wasn’t really any fancy name for it. It was literally known as ‘U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service Green.’ The name itself was bland, but it really popped, and I knew I had to paint my Prelude that color.” Those who know Big Mike personally will tell you that he is very meticulous in nature and even more so when it comes to his projects. The body shop that applied the mint green tone not only had to paint every nook and crevice of his BB4, they had to do it three separate times due to Mike discovering minor imperfections in the paint. He also had a multitude of different parts he needed painted because he wanted to occasionally switch things up. Mike had utilized a rare AeroMagic front lip for much of the Prelude’s second stage before recently swapping to a molded Chargespeed lip with custom fabricated blinker delete plates.

His attention to detail translates to the interior of his Honda in a similar fashion, using a mix of OEM restoration and one-off custom creations. Every possible interior piece, minus the seats and door panels, have been replaced with OEM parts that Mike has collected. The space-aged OE dashboard display is further enhanced with AEM gauges providing information from the motor and Series 2 EMS unit. The dated factory seats have been removed, and holding Big Mike firmly in place are a pair of custom bucket seats rewrapped in authentic black bandana material with black suede. Rear seats are rewrapped to match the buckets while the headliner and door panel inserts have been refreshed with a layer of black suede. Mike even managed to source brand-new carpet straight from a Honda dealership.

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