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Hello... I'm just want to introduce myself. I am Dave from San Jose, CA. I recently got a hold of a 96 Civic EX from an old man who barely drove it. It had been sitting in a garage for who knows how many years. It is a manual and has only 79,000 miles. It was too good of a deal to pass up being free. He was a hoarder and I helped clean out his condo and he paid me with the car. So not really 100% free. Anyway, I didn't realize until recently that this may be a sought after car. I am in the middle of a 1986 GMC K2500 restore but want to do something with the Honda. Only there is nothing to fix except some body work.... He had a bad habit of bumping into things but nothing major. I'll definitely look around the forums for info but I will ask what is the first thing you would do to improve it? Everything is stock. The only thing I did was remove the muffler because it was rusted and had a hole in it. Sounds great without it, runs great and is fun to drive. I'm only familiar with SBC and LS engines. I have mostly worked on 80's Chevy Trucks. But this looks like it could be a lot of fun to modify. I had it towed home because the tires were flat at the time and the tow truck driver said I had better block it in with one of my other cars or it will be stolen. I took his advise and also removed the battery for now. A friend of mine had his Civic stolen right off the street onto a flatbed a couple of months ago. He says he had about 25k invested in it. That is a bummer.... Anyway, it's nice to meet you all and I hope to learn lots about this car.

 
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Welcome to the forum!

 
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Hello, Dave from San Jose.

First thing I’d do, assuming all else is good, is do the timing belt. They’re interference engines so you definitely don’t want it snapping. From the sounds of it, it’s probably the original belt too.

Do you have a rough estimate of how long it’s been sitting?

 
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Welcome nice score