How NOT to do it... Nik da Greek's FD thread
07-23-11, 05:44 AM
#1
Senior Member
Thread Starter
How NOT to do it... Nik da Greek's FD thread
Wotcher all. I've been told a few times I ought to have a build thread up here so since I'm off work after an operation I thought I'd take the time to write one up.
First thing to say is please don't read it if you don't have a sense of humour, cos this isn't going to be a nice neat clever thread full of genius tips and ideas, it's more a catalogue of blunders, mistakes and random bad luck (hence the title). You might lot learn anything from the entire thing, except that maybe **** happens. But you knew that...
Secondly, sorry about any problems with the language. I'm English (well, half Greek), so I speak...errrm, English. That means a few words might not mean what they mean to you guys. I could include like a glossary but I don't wanna sound patronising so best not, huh? Just take it that when something seems to be utter nonsense it may just be the English word is different to the American. Or, of course, that it is utter nonsense, always possible. I'm talking about things like bonnet = hood, boot = trunk, wing = fender, wing = err, wing... that sorta thing. Bear with us, yeah?
Right, that's enough dull stuff, on with the story. This is more a sorta retrospective, so I'ts written with 20/20 hindsight. A few years back I got fed up with riding my bike all year round and falling off in the snow and that, so I went and bought the first car I'd owned in about ten years. It was *cough* a Ford Probe 2.5 litre V6, which shows what I knew about cars then. In my defense, my last car before that had been a Morris Marina, probably the worst car ever to come out of the corpse of the late unlamented British Leyland. In fact, possibly the worst car ever.
Anyway, I was happy with my Probe, it had a roof and a heater so it was a damn sight better than two wheels, and it looked... well, it looked really bad to be fair, but in a comedy way that got children laughing, which is fine.
Terrible phone pic, sorry. It hustled OK for a big fat thing, being a Mazda MX6 in a fat suit, but it was too slow considering my other transport was a FireBlade. So, when a bloke at work said he was selling his RX-7 cos he couldn't afford to run it any more, I thought "that sounds like ideal practical winter transport to replace the Probe" and armed with everything I knew about RX-7s and rotaries in general (having watched the Fast and the Furious a few times and seen the 787B win LeMans, basically) I took it for a test drive.
Poor car was in a bad way. The discs were so warped when you braked your fillings fell out, I swear if I'd put them on a turntable and spun it up to 45rpm they'd have played the theme from Bonanza. It had a rumbling hub bearing on the rear. The boot was full of water, the oil was full of tar and it had a big dent in the bonnet where his neighbour (who hated him) had hit it with a hammer. Really. When I asked if he ran it on Super Unleaded petrol he didn't even know you were supposed to.
However, it had a recent engine rebuild to the tune of £5800 pounds, and since he was asking £5000 for the whole car it seemed like a good engine with a free car thrown in to me, and we agreed on £4600. That was about six years ago, when RX-7 Type Rs in the UK were up to the £10k mark. Bargain!
Here she is, about as bone-stock an FD as you'll see
The car was one of the earliest models, a '92 so the paint had that common Montego Blue problem where the primer didn't hold the topcoat very well, meaning the stone chips were a nightmare. A real shame, still one of my favourite colours.
Other than a de-cat unslilenced midpipe and a Racing Beat single exit, she was completely stock. At the time I didn't realise of course, but the stnadard ECU and stright-through pipe meant there were boost spikes and fuel cut all over the place, and the turbo switchover was like a sledgehammer rather than a nice smooth transition. I didn't know any better, thought it was fantastic. It was the fastest thing I'd ever driven on four wheels, and the visceral way it drove, the way it felt alive, was as close to riding a bike as I though I was gonna get.
First thing to say is please don't read it if you don't have a sense of humour, cos this isn't going to be a nice neat clever thread full of genius tips and ideas, it's more a catalogue of blunders, mistakes and random bad luck (hence the title). You might lot learn anything from the entire thing, except that maybe **** happens. But you knew that...
Secondly, sorry about any problems with the language. I'm English (well, half Greek), so I speak...errrm, English. That means a few words might not mean what they mean to you guys. I could include like a glossary but I don't wanna sound patronising so best not, huh? Just take it that when something seems to be utter nonsense it may just be the English word is different to the American. Or, of course, that it is utter nonsense, always possible. I'm talking about things like bonnet = hood, boot = trunk, wing = fender, wing = err, wing... that sorta thing. Bear with us, yeah?
Right, that's enough dull stuff, on with the story. This is more a sorta retrospective, so I'ts written with 20/20 hindsight. A few years back I got fed up with riding my bike all year round and falling off in the snow and that, so I went and bought the first car I'd owned in about ten years. It was *cough* a Ford Probe 2.5 litre V6, which shows what I knew about cars then. In my defense, my last car before that had been a Morris Marina, probably the worst car ever to come out of the corpse of the late unlamented British Leyland. In fact, possibly the worst car ever.
Anyway, I was happy with my Probe, it had a roof and a heater so it was a damn sight better than two wheels, and it looked... well, it looked really bad to be fair, but in a comedy way that got children laughing, which is fine.
Terrible phone pic, sorry. It hustled OK for a big fat thing, being a Mazda MX6 in a fat suit, but it was too slow considering my other transport was a FireBlade. So, when a bloke at work said he was selling his RX-7 cos he couldn't afford to run it any more, I thought "that sounds like ideal practical winter transport to replace the Probe" and armed with everything I knew about RX-7s and rotaries in general (having watched the Fast and the Furious a few times and seen the 787B win LeMans, basically) I took it for a test drive.
Poor car was in a bad way. The discs were so warped when you braked your fillings fell out, I swear if I'd put them on a turntable and spun it up to 45rpm they'd have played the theme from Bonanza. It had a rumbling hub bearing on the rear. The boot was full of water, the oil was full of tar and it had a big dent in the bonnet where his neighbour (who hated him) had hit it with a hammer. Really. When I asked if he ran it on Super Unleaded petrol he didn't even know you were supposed to.
However, it had a recent engine rebuild to the tune of £5800 pounds, and since he was asking £5000 for the whole car it seemed like a good engine with a free car thrown in to me, and we agreed on £4600. That was about six years ago, when RX-7 Type Rs in the UK were up to the £10k mark. Bargain!
Here she is, about as bone-stock an FD as you'll see
The car was one of the earliest models, a '92 so the paint had that common Montego Blue problem where the primer didn't hold the topcoat very well, meaning the stone chips were a nightmare. A real shame, still one of my favourite colours.
Other than a de-cat unslilenced midpipe and a Racing Beat single exit, she was completely stock. At the time I didn't realise of course, but the stnadard ECU and stright-through pipe meant there were boost spikes and fuel cut all over the place, and the turbo switchover was like a sledgehammer rather than a nice smooth transition. I didn't know any better, thought it was fantastic. It was the fastest thing I'd ever driven on four wheels, and the visceral way it drove, the way it felt alive, was as close to riding a bike as I though I was gonna get.
07-23-11, 06:11 AM
#2
Senior Member
Thread Starter
So, I set to work fixing the problems, new brakes all round first. How the hell he'd managed to warp every single disc was beyond me. I think he'd used it so infrequently the calipers were permanently semi-seized. Easy enough to fix, just expensive. The hub needed replacing where the bearing had gone flat, also easy but not cheap since you need the whole hub assembly. Thanks for that, Mazda. I was learning fast about how this car really wasn't gonna be economical...
The fishpond in the boot (trunk) was a bit trickier. You could leave it overnight bone dry, it'd rain and there'd be three inches of water in the spare wheel well by morning. I paid a glazier to take out and re-seal the rear screen. It'd been taken out for paint at some point, and there was no sealant in it at all. In fact, the only thing holding it in was the external weather strip and three bolts! How it never just blew out when the windows were open at speed was sheer luck, I guess.
Needless to say, the boot still leaked. On further examination, only two of the eight spoiler (rear wing) mounts were unbroken, and water was just pissing through. Doh! A good used wing and a tube of silicone put that right. I was starting to think I hadn't so much bought this car as rescued it....
The passenger wing mirror fell off after a month or so. Closer inspection showed it had been snapped at some point in the past, and then glued back on with Chemical Metal. Poor car...
Then the exhaust blew itself to bits. Hmmm. Racing Beat, stainless, yup, check... obviously not stainless enough to shrug off British road salt winters for long. I replaced it with the amusingly named HKS Silent Hi-Power. As I've pointed out before, this is a lie. Hi-Power it may well be, but silent, unless it's Japanese for ear-bleedingly head -vibratingly loud, it ain't. Looked awesome though
I also spent a couple of days with the Meguiars trying to rescue the paint, and whilst it came up lovely where there was still paint, nothing short of a respray was gonna solve the nosecone problems.
Bet it's a while since anyone saw an engine bay as stock as this...
It didn't stay that was for too long. I've always been a hopeless tinkerer, can't leave well enough alone, so I started changing bits here and there, mostly from the wonders of eBay.
Nothing special, just some hardpipes, ARC filter box (lovely quality, really **** design as 50% of its air is sucked right out of the radiator), Blitz BOV, that sorta stuff
For some strange reason I also put a set of bug-eye twin headlights on. At the time, I thought they were fantastic, but now I look at them and cringe. Oh well, they had angel-eye halo rings like a Bimmer, maybe that was why I thought they were cool. Also started replacing all the miles of perished vaccuum lines and hoses with silicone, a tedious and thankless task if ever there was one!
Only other mods were an Amemiya steering column mount boost gauge, cos what's the point of a turbo car when you don't know what it's boosting at? THis was when I realised how shoddy the boost pattern actually was...
and most importantly, a holy ikon of Agios Nikolaos, patron saint of Crete, and also mine by dint of namesake. I told the ikon seller I needed a really lucky picture to keep my car from harm, and he assured me ol' St Nick was the dude...
The fishpond in the boot (trunk) was a bit trickier. You could leave it overnight bone dry, it'd rain and there'd be three inches of water in the spare wheel well by morning. I paid a glazier to take out and re-seal the rear screen. It'd been taken out for paint at some point, and there was no sealant in it at all. In fact, the only thing holding it in was the external weather strip and three bolts! How it never just blew out when the windows were open at speed was sheer luck, I guess.
Needless to say, the boot still leaked. On further examination, only two of the eight spoiler (rear wing) mounts were unbroken, and water was just pissing through. Doh! A good used wing and a tube of silicone put that right. I was starting to think I hadn't so much bought this car as rescued it....
The passenger wing mirror fell off after a month or so. Closer inspection showed it had been snapped at some point in the past, and then glued back on with Chemical Metal. Poor car...
Then the exhaust blew itself to bits. Hmmm. Racing Beat, stainless, yup, check... obviously not stainless enough to shrug off British road salt winters for long. I replaced it with the amusingly named HKS Silent Hi-Power. As I've pointed out before, this is a lie. Hi-Power it may well be, but silent, unless it's Japanese for ear-bleedingly head -vibratingly loud, it ain't. Looked awesome though
I also spent a couple of days with the Meguiars trying to rescue the paint, and whilst it came up lovely where there was still paint, nothing short of a respray was gonna solve the nosecone problems.
Bet it's a while since anyone saw an engine bay as stock as this...
It didn't stay that was for too long. I've always been a hopeless tinkerer, can't leave well enough alone, so I started changing bits here and there, mostly from the wonders of eBay.
Nothing special, just some hardpipes, ARC filter box (lovely quality, really **** design as 50% of its air is sucked right out of the radiator), Blitz BOV, that sorta stuff
For some strange reason I also put a set of bug-eye twin headlights on. At the time, I thought they were fantastic, but now I look at them and cringe. Oh well, they had angel-eye halo rings like a Bimmer, maybe that was why I thought they were cool. Also started replacing all the miles of perished vaccuum lines and hoses with silicone, a tedious and thankless task if ever there was one!
Only other mods were an Amemiya steering column mount boost gauge, cos what's the point of a turbo car when you don't know what it's boosting at? THis was when I realised how shoddy the boost pattern actually was...
and most importantly, a holy ikon of Agios Nikolaos, patron saint of Crete, and also mine by dint of namesake. I told the ikon seller I needed a really lucky picture to keep my car from harm, and he assured me ol' St Nick was the dude...
07-23-11, 06:28 AM
#3
Senior Member
Thread Starter
Well, so much for Saint Bloody Nick....
Me and the car (called the Armageddon Rag after the book by George R R Martin of Game of Thrones fame, in which the hero drives a 1st Gen Rex and is basically a trip through everything I admire about American counter-culture. Except Kerouac. But I digress...) lived in blissful harmony for a year or so. Most of the blatant neglect was sorted by now, and I even started to put right stuff that wasn't broken.
Then, on the way to work one evening at about 8 o'clock, downpour of Biblical proportions, I was trying to work out how long a cubit was so I could get the dimensions for my Ark sorted. Hit standing water out on the bypass at... well, at quite some speed to be fair... back end came round, smashed into the Armco barrier, sent the car round the other way, back across two lanes of 70mph road miraculously without hitting another car (phew), smashed into the four-inch kerb, spun back round, went off into the scenery via a thick post-and-rail wooden fence, through a couple of small trees, and planted itself into a very prickly thorn bush.
Whoops.
Ugly, ain't it?
The underside was worse, though to be fair, the top was pretty bad. It had dented every single panel, even the roof! There was a fencepost stuck through the numberplate at the back, wedged so hard between the diff and fuel tank it's a miracle it never punctured the tank.
All the suspension arms and their mounts were mullered, torn to bits. From the front, the driver's front wheel was on full lock while the passenger one was dead ahead.
I was a bit luckier. The only damage I got was nerve damage to my left arm from where I smashed the centre console with my elbow (the two small fingers on my left arm went numb and stayed all pins-and-needles for a couple of months, and have never been quite the same since). The only other injury was I got smacked round the back of the head by my steering wheel club lock, which to be fair, was the least I deserved
Me and the car (called the Armageddon Rag after the book by George R R Martin of Game of Thrones fame, in which the hero drives a 1st Gen Rex and is basically a trip through everything I admire about American counter-culture. Except Kerouac. But I digress...) lived in blissful harmony for a year or so. Most of the blatant neglect was sorted by now, and I even started to put right stuff that wasn't broken.
Then, on the way to work one evening at about 8 o'clock, downpour of Biblical proportions, I was trying to work out how long a cubit was so I could get the dimensions for my Ark sorted. Hit standing water out on the bypass at... well, at quite some speed to be fair... back end came round, smashed into the Armco barrier, sent the car round the other way, back across two lanes of 70mph road miraculously without hitting another car (phew), smashed into the four-inch kerb, spun back round, went off into the scenery via a thick post-and-rail wooden fence, through a couple of small trees, and planted itself into a very prickly thorn bush.
Whoops.
Ugly, ain't it?
The underside was worse, though to be fair, the top was pretty bad. It had dented every single panel, even the roof! There was a fencepost stuck through the numberplate at the back, wedged so hard between the diff and fuel tank it's a miracle it never punctured the tank.
All the suspension arms and their mounts were mullered, torn to bits. From the front, the driver's front wheel was on full lock while the passenger one was dead ahead.
I was a bit luckier. The only damage I got was nerve damage to my left arm from where I smashed the centre console with my elbow (the two small fingers on my left arm went numb and stayed all pins-and-needles for a couple of months, and have never been quite the same since). The only other injury was I got smacked round the back of the head by my steering wheel club lock, which to be fair, was the least I deserved
07-23-11, 07:16 AM
#4
Senior Member
Thread Starter
Well, I wasn't having that. At first I had fantasies that she might be rebuilt, but it was just beyond reasonable possibilty. Too much damage, basically to everything. The mechanic and the insurance assessor both couldn't believe I'd come out of it uninjured. After extended and increasingly bitter argument with my insurance company, they eventually agreed to pay the full insured value of five grand, and let me buy back the wreck for 25%.
So then I was on the hunt for a decent shell to swap the good bits onto. My local rotary expert, Jason at Super 7 Autos, turned up an imported Type R in Vintage Red (the fastest colour by far) that had never been registered in the UK. We swapped the engine and any other good bits out of the Mon Blue one, since there was no provenance on the motor in the red one and we knew the blue one was good.
It was pretty much back to square one. A totally bog stock FD
Other than a very inscrutable Jap "Peformance By Lotary" decal in the back window. Very odd.
This car had GET racing coilovers (an obscure Jap brand who specialise in track work). They had incredible ability... on the track. On the road, they were bloody awful. Like most Jap suspension, they don't understand the balance between damping and springing, thinking that "sporty" equals bone-shakingly hard springs with damping struggling to keep up. I made a note they'd be the first thing to change, but it took me years as it happened!
The first proper mod was to get some decent wheels sorted out. Sometimes, eBay really can be your friend. A set of old-style Volk Racing GTP two-pieces came up, and as I watched and watched, the price stayed low. Eventually I realised th eguy had listed them in the wrong category, they were like under windscreen wipers or something. I ended up winning them for IIRC £187 (I dunno, about $300 or so?).
When I went to collect them, I realised I'd scored even bigger than first thought. They'd come of some lad's Supra Mk IV and were a proper 17"x10" with a 265 tyre on the rear, 17"x9" on the front. Awesome. He'd got them on the car when it came from Japan. He didn't like them, they were tatty and he'd bought some nice chrome fashion wheels to go on instead. He showed me them, they were fake two-pieces with bolt heads moulded into them. The tyres on the back were 215 wide. Is it robbery if the guy's a fduking retard?
Well, that's a bit harsh, he was a nice enough kid even if he did live with mum and dad still, so I robbed him of his £400 a corner wheels and ran. He even let me off the odd £7 for collecting them. My conscience bothered me for all of ten minutes!
Got them refurbished for around £700 quid, including assembly and still had paid less than a pair of them new would have cost. Looked pretty natty, too;
I'd rescued the bug-eye headlights from the old blue car. The driver's side one needed a bit of repair where the Armco had broken it, but I fixed in a bit of carbon fibre and every time I saw it, it was a reminder not to drive like a total bell-end. Especially in the rain. By now I had the modifying bug pretty good, so a load of small things followed, a B&M shortshifter (fantastic thing, makes the gearchange like a rifle-bolt to operate, even if the trans tunnel did need a bit of grinding to make it fit!).
Got a MazdaSpeed strut brace, then a Trust SM intercooler with homemade ducting because it was rubbish leaving it like this;
All the air just bled all over the place. So I bodged up some ducting and made a little top plate to still allow air to the intake.
Replaced the ARC airbox, lovely though it was, it was just too compromised a design with some Apexi Filters. By now I'd discovered the internet, and once I'd got over the idea it was just for industrial-grade **** and filth, found the UK RX-7 clubs like Mazda Rotary Club, and especially FDUK. I finally started to get some idea of what I should be doing and why...
I also went on a polishing binge, doing up the hardpipes and intercooler and basically everything else I could easily take of, get done, and back on without incapacitating the car for too long. If I could find a secondhand one, that made it easier. It takes ages to do a UIM properly, so easier to have a spare and then swap them over. I love polishing, even though it's pretty dull. I can put my MP3 player on and ignore the world.
Annoyingly, the lacquer on the Volks' polished rims just couldn't take the British winter and went through, so I got the entire wheel done in the same Anthracite colour the spokes were. I think they look better like that anyway, and the addition of a bit of red rim tape like they use on the bikes at leMans lifted them nicely. It also reflects light at night, which is childish but fun
In case you're wondering why I keep moaning about British winters, the local councils rarely pay to keep a fleet of snowploughs all year (except in the far North) so what they do is just spread tonnes of salt on the roads to keep the ice off. That means for up to three months of the year, you're bathing the car in highly corrosive sodium chloride solution. This is what it looks like, what it does is just eat any unprotected paint or metal;
So then I was on the hunt for a decent shell to swap the good bits onto. My local rotary expert, Jason at Super 7 Autos, turned up an imported Type R in Vintage Red (the fastest colour by far) that had never been registered in the UK. We swapped the engine and any other good bits out of the Mon Blue one, since there was no provenance on the motor in the red one and we knew the blue one was good.
It was pretty much back to square one. A totally bog stock FD
Other than a very inscrutable Jap "Peformance By Lotary" decal in the back window. Very odd.
This car had GET racing coilovers (an obscure Jap brand who specialise in track work). They had incredible ability... on the track. On the road, they were bloody awful. Like most Jap suspension, they don't understand the balance between damping and springing, thinking that "sporty" equals bone-shakingly hard springs with damping struggling to keep up. I made a note they'd be the first thing to change, but it took me years as it happened!
The first proper mod was to get some decent wheels sorted out. Sometimes, eBay really can be your friend. A set of old-style Volk Racing GTP two-pieces came up, and as I watched and watched, the price stayed low. Eventually I realised th eguy had listed them in the wrong category, they were like under windscreen wipers or something. I ended up winning them for IIRC £187 (I dunno, about $300 or so?).
When I went to collect them, I realised I'd scored even bigger than first thought. They'd come of some lad's Supra Mk IV and were a proper 17"x10" with a 265 tyre on the rear, 17"x9" on the front. Awesome. He'd got them on the car when it came from Japan. He didn't like them, they were tatty and he'd bought some nice chrome fashion wheels to go on instead. He showed me them, they were fake two-pieces with bolt heads moulded into them. The tyres on the back were 215 wide. Is it robbery if the guy's a fduking retard?
Well, that's a bit harsh, he was a nice enough kid even if he did live with mum and dad still, so I robbed him of his £400 a corner wheels and ran. He even let me off the odd £7 for collecting them. My conscience bothered me for all of ten minutes!
Got them refurbished for around £700 quid, including assembly and still had paid less than a pair of them new would have cost. Looked pretty natty, too;
I'd rescued the bug-eye headlights from the old blue car. The driver's side one needed a bit of repair where the Armco had broken it, but I fixed in a bit of carbon fibre and every time I saw it, it was a reminder not to drive like a total bell-end. Especially in the rain. By now I had the modifying bug pretty good, so a load of small things followed, a B&M shortshifter (fantastic thing, makes the gearchange like a rifle-bolt to operate, even if the trans tunnel did need a bit of grinding to make it fit!).
Got a MazdaSpeed strut brace, then a Trust SM intercooler with homemade ducting because it was rubbish leaving it like this;
All the air just bled all over the place. So I bodged up some ducting and made a little top plate to still allow air to the intake.
Replaced the ARC airbox, lovely though it was, it was just too compromised a design with some Apexi Filters. By now I'd discovered the internet, and once I'd got over the idea it was just for industrial-grade **** and filth, found the UK RX-7 clubs like Mazda Rotary Club, and especially FDUK. I finally started to get some idea of what I should be doing and why...
I also went on a polishing binge, doing up the hardpipes and intercooler and basically everything else I could easily take of, get done, and back on without incapacitating the car for too long. If I could find a secondhand one, that made it easier. It takes ages to do a UIM properly, so easier to have a spare and then swap them over. I love polishing, even though it's pretty dull. I can put my MP3 player on and ignore the world.
Annoyingly, the lacquer on the Volks' polished rims just couldn't take the British winter and went through, so I got the entire wheel done in the same Anthracite colour the spokes were. I think they look better like that anyway, and the addition of a bit of red rim tape like they use on the bikes at leMans lifted them nicely. It also reflects light at night, which is childish but fun
In case you're wondering why I keep moaning about British winters, the local councils rarely pay to keep a fleet of snowploughs all year (except in the far North) so what they do is just spread tonnes of salt on the roads to keep the ice off. That means for up to three months of the year, you're bathing the car in highly corrosive sodium chloride solution. This is what it looks like, what it does is just eat any unprotected paint or metal;
07-23-11, 07:51 AM
#7
Senior Member
Thread Starter
I also figured it was time I had more than a very vague idea what the engine was doing. As we all know, the stock temp gauge only moves to let you know your engine overheated ten minutes ago and is now in the throes of terminal water seal failure. Went for some GReddy stuff cos I love the nice, clear look (and cos everyone and their dog has Defi and I like to be different!)
Also replaced the stock bus-sized steering wheel with a Sparco one and proepr Jap boss that means you can just plug the horn in without having to **** about trying to bodge the brass ring contact like on Momo bosses. Had to re-trim the wheel myself where the alcantara had worn through. A note to anyone thinking of doing this themselves....don't! Worst job ever, took me so long and so many attempts it took about a week for my blood pressure to return to normal. Makes a massive difference to the driving feel, though, especially with a spacer to bring it into your chest a bit more.
Relaced little tatty things that irritated me, like the boots for the handbrake and gearstick, y'know, that horrible flaky vinyl **** that Mazda thought could pass off as real leather? Yeah, right...
Also moved the gauges after about a week. They really pissed me off stuck on the A pillar, I kept bashing my hand on them all the damn time. So I got a dash-top mount from a Scooby (Subaru? Scooby Doo? Dunno what you call them in America?) and put that in place of the central speaker. Turned out there wasn't even a speaker in there anyway, so I wasn't losing anything.
The exhaust that the car came with was a really huge mild steel Jasma-approved affair that was way too quiet, so I got a Blitz NUR spec which was much better, and nowhere near as loud as the old HKS one had been (sadly that was squashed flat in the accident anyway) since the car also had a cat still.
Next thing to sort out was the rear fog light. Don't think you need them in America? but they're a legal obligation here, you can't get the car registered on the road without one and it'll fail the yearly MOT (Ministry Of Transport) test without. The one that came on the car looked like this;
which I think you'll all agree looks bloody awful. It looks like what it is, an afterthought. A common way round it in the UK is to get a red bulb in one of the reversing lights, or paint the lens red, but I feel that's a bit of a bodge. The old blue car had a really clever solution, quick how to here if anyone cares...
1) cut open the back of the reflector unit
2) seal up with silicone to stop crap getting in
3) wedge aftermarket light unit into the (very small) space behind reflector
4) bingo! rear fog light you only know about when it's on
However, I'd done that already and wanted to try something different so I went for a rain light from a track car
A bit of home-made stainless bracket bodgery
get a bit courageous with the hole saw
Also replaced the stock bus-sized steering wheel with a Sparco one and proepr Jap boss that means you can just plug the horn in without having to **** about trying to bodge the brass ring contact like on Momo bosses. Had to re-trim the wheel myself where the alcantara had worn through. A note to anyone thinking of doing this themselves....don't! Worst job ever, took me so long and so many attempts it took about a week for my blood pressure to return to normal. Makes a massive difference to the driving feel, though, especially with a spacer to bring it into your chest a bit more.
Relaced little tatty things that irritated me, like the boots for the handbrake and gearstick, y'know, that horrible flaky vinyl **** that Mazda thought could pass off as real leather? Yeah, right...
Also moved the gauges after about a week. They really pissed me off stuck on the A pillar, I kept bashing my hand on them all the damn time. So I got a dash-top mount from a Scooby (Subaru? Scooby Doo? Dunno what you call them in America?) and put that in place of the central speaker. Turned out there wasn't even a speaker in there anyway, so I wasn't losing anything.
The exhaust that the car came with was a really huge mild steel Jasma-approved affair that was way too quiet, so I got a Blitz NUR spec which was much better, and nowhere near as loud as the old HKS one had been (sadly that was squashed flat in the accident anyway) since the car also had a cat still.
Next thing to sort out was the rear fog light. Don't think you need them in America? but they're a legal obligation here, you can't get the car registered on the road without one and it'll fail the yearly MOT (Ministry Of Transport) test without. The one that came on the car looked like this;
which I think you'll all agree looks bloody awful. It looks like what it is, an afterthought. A common way round it in the UK is to get a red bulb in one of the reversing lights, or paint the lens red, but I feel that's a bit of a bodge. The old blue car had a really clever solution, quick how to here if anyone cares...
1) cut open the back of the reflector unit
2) seal up with silicone to stop crap getting in
3) wedge aftermarket light unit into the (very small) space behind reflector
4) bingo! rear fog light you only know about when it's on
However, I'd done that already and wanted to try something different so I went for a rain light from a track car
A bit of home-made stainless bracket bodgery
get a bit courageous with the hole saw
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07-23-11, 07:54 AM
#9
Senior Member
Thread Starter
and there you go, nice unobtrusive fog light that also happens to be really good for discouraging tailgating idiots, cos it's bright enough to burn retinas out at a hundred yards!
Ping!
Also did the '99 spec mod on the rear lights to lose the old lozenge shaped weirdness. You probably all know this one, spearate the light (I like to use really hot water rather than a heat gun cos there's less chance of frying the sometimes quite brittle plastic).
End up with this...
Mask off circles the right size like this...
Spray satin black, glue it all back togather with either the orignal glue re-heated or like I did, loctite so you're sure it's nice and waterproof, and presto! '99 spec lights
Ping!
Also did the '99 spec mod on the rear lights to lose the old lozenge shaped weirdness. You probably all know this one, spearate the light (I like to use really hot water rather than a heat gun cos there's less chance of frying the sometimes quite brittle plastic).
End up with this...
Mask off circles the right size like this...
Spray satin black, glue it all back togather with either the orignal glue re-heated or like I did, loctite so you're sure it's nice and waterproof, and presto! '99 spec lights
07-23-11, 08:07 AM
#10
Senior Member
Thread Starter
Still, we are two countries separated by a common language after all
Some great people here in England, the rotorhead community is small but rock-solid. Made so many great life-long friends since getting in on it!
Lol, never meant to drift it in the first place. Pure cack-handeness I can assure you. Yeah, the lights were dreadful, looking at them now I honestly can't tell you what the hell I was thinking
07-23-11, 08:21 AM
#11
Senior Member
Thread Starter
Right then...
There then followed a period where I was just changing everything seemingly, spending all my cash on bits and bobs (y'know how it is) but there was still no real plan to it all. Sometimes it was necessity, like the eagle-eyed will have noticed in the previous pics that the car had a cassette deck stereo. Well, that was no use, I didn't even still own any cassettes! So replaced the head unit with a CD one, plus a ten-disc changer in the boot and a front aux-in so that I can plug my MP3 player in.
Also swapped the old blue Sparco gear **** for a nice JDM Trust one. Which was burning hot in summer and freezing cold in winter. Doh! The Sparco one had come all the way from the Probe with me, but it was blue and just cos it's the same as Paul Walker had on his Mitsi Eclipse was no excuse lol.
Some mods were forced upon me, for example the cat collapsed, making the car run like a bag of ****, so I was on the hunt for my fifth different exhaust combination. Turned up this from a FDUK member who was selling up to buy a BMW. Takes all sorts, I suppose, Bavarian Murder Weapons have never really floated my boat to be honest...
It's an ARC 100% titanium full system. Absolutely 100% beautiful, too
Plus it has the best ever company motto on it. Just think, some poor Jap technician had to hand-stamp this into titanium. In pure Engrish/Japlish
The rest of my time and effort went on tidying up the engine bay and suchlike. I'm a bit of a tart, can't stand seeing a beautiful shiny car and under the bonnet it's all scabby and filthy. Some detail pics for you;
Amemiya AST to replace the eezee-split plastic Mazda one
GReddy elbow to replace my rather bodged red-sprayed stocker. M's Hyper Grounding Wire earth kit...hmmm. Make any difference? Nahhh, probably not. Looks cool though.
There then followed a period where I was just changing everything seemingly, spending all my cash on bits and bobs (y'know how it is) but there was still no real plan to it all. Sometimes it was necessity, like the eagle-eyed will have noticed in the previous pics that the car had a cassette deck stereo. Well, that was no use, I didn't even still own any cassettes! So replaced the head unit with a CD one, plus a ten-disc changer in the boot and a front aux-in so that I can plug my MP3 player in.
Also swapped the old blue Sparco gear **** for a nice JDM Trust one. Which was burning hot in summer and freezing cold in winter. Doh! The Sparco one had come all the way from the Probe with me, but it was blue and just cos it's the same as Paul Walker had on his Mitsi Eclipse was no excuse lol.
Some mods were forced upon me, for example the cat collapsed, making the car run like a bag of ****, so I was on the hunt for my fifth different exhaust combination. Turned up this from a FDUK member who was selling up to buy a BMW. Takes all sorts, I suppose, Bavarian Murder Weapons have never really floated my boat to be honest...
It's an ARC 100% titanium full system. Absolutely 100% beautiful, too
Plus it has the best ever company motto on it. Just think, some poor Jap technician had to hand-stamp this into titanium. In pure Engrish/Japlish
The rest of my time and effort went on tidying up the engine bay and suchlike. I'm a bit of a tart, can't stand seeing a beautiful shiny car and under the bonnet it's all scabby and filthy. Some detail pics for you;
Amemiya AST to replace the eezee-split plastic Mazda one
GReddy elbow to replace my rather bodged red-sprayed stocker. M's Hyper Grounding Wire earth kit...hmmm. Make any difference? Nahhh, probably not. Looks cool though.
07-23-11, 08:36 AM
#12
Senior Member
Thread Starter
The loss of the airpump due to the loss of the cat meant I no longer had to have restrictors in the intake hoses to stop the moooing you get when the stock resonator is lost with the airbox. So that was a bonus, more colour coding.
Also replaced the bonnet stay with hydraulic lifters. These were another eBaytatsic find, Sokies from Malaysia. Cost a third the price of Teins and have worked for four years without a single problem. Massively good when working under the bonnet, too.
Cusco brake master cylinder stopper makes a huge difference to how the brake pedal feels, firms it up loads and much more predictable feel. Without it, you can see the whole servo flex when you press the pedal!
Spent a fair old time working with alloy sheet to make up a heat shield for the Apexi intakes, too. Made it all from thin plate held together by Dzus quarter-turn fasteners so it came out in a few seconds.
Also eventually bodged up a small intake duct to help with intake air temps. The SMIC can be pretty effective, but only if it's getting air to it in the first place...
But I'm getting ahead here, because before that came a load of problems. After two years of pretty much 100% reliability, I kept getting loads of problems. The rats' nest was falling apart, and even some of the lines I'd replaced were giving trouble. Silicone is all very well, but get a tiny nick in it and it's almost impossible to spot unless under tnesion or pressure. So I was getting random running issues that would only show up when hot and were impossible to find easily in the workshop. We decided the best way forward was to refresh the rat's nest and whilst we were at it, put on an Apexi Power Commander (pretty much the default aftermarket ECU). After all, the car had mods to exhaust, intake, and everything else by now, so it was overdue to get some mapping sorted for it.
This is the only physical evidence of what was actaully a lot of work...
Oh, and it shows my nice new not-too-hot-or-too-cold FEED gear ****, too :0)
Also replaced the bonnet stay with hydraulic lifters. These were another eBaytatsic find, Sokies from Malaysia. Cost a third the price of Teins and have worked for four years without a single problem. Massively good when working under the bonnet, too.
Cusco brake master cylinder stopper makes a huge difference to how the brake pedal feels, firms it up loads and much more predictable feel. Without it, you can see the whole servo flex when you press the pedal!
Spent a fair old time working with alloy sheet to make up a heat shield for the Apexi intakes, too. Made it all from thin plate held together by Dzus quarter-turn fasteners so it came out in a few seconds.
Also eventually bodged up a small intake duct to help with intake air temps. The SMIC can be pretty effective, but only if it's getting air to it in the first place...
But I'm getting ahead here, because before that came a load of problems. After two years of pretty much 100% reliability, I kept getting loads of problems. The rats' nest was falling apart, and even some of the lines I'd replaced were giving trouble. Silicone is all very well, but get a tiny nick in it and it's almost impossible to spot unless under tnesion or pressure. So I was getting random running issues that would only show up when hot and were impossible to find easily in the workshop. We decided the best way forward was to refresh the rat's nest and whilst we were at it, put on an Apexi Power Commander (pretty much the default aftermarket ECU). After all, the car had mods to exhaust, intake, and everything else by now, so it was overdue to get some mapping sorted for it.
This is the only physical evidence of what was actaully a lot of work...
Oh, and it shows my nice new not-too-hot-or-too-cold FEED gear ****, too :0)
07-23-11, 08:51 AM
#13
Senior Member
Thread Starter
These were the dyno results from all the changes...
Not earth-shattering, but not terrible for stock twins. Don't forget that Euro dynos all seem to apply much harsher correction factors than US ones. Dunno why, but horsepower figures always seem much lower for the same state of tune compared to American ones.
The car rewarded me by snapping the powerplant frame. *Sigh*. Not unusual, I know, but it was rather irritating after spending ages putting loads of niggles right. Put in a good used one with a bit of additional seam welding on it for added strength. Then concentrated on some bodywork...
Now, dunno about you guys, but what attracted me to FDs as much as anything was the look of them. Gotta be one of the loveliest stock bodies ever. So it always mystifies me a bit when people change them beyond all recognition. If that's your thing, fine, I'm not saying I'm right and everyone else is wrong, but I just don't "get" Fortune kits or massive winged canard-ed JGTC replicas. What I wanted was a car that still looked like an RX-7... only more so.
With that in mind, I collected a carefully selected set of parts in order to preserve and enhance the stock look. Maybe I failed, you're welcome to tell me how **** it looks, I don't mind. It's how I wanted it to be, and I'm happy with that!
So....MazdaSpeed 15th Anniversary front nose
Stock rubbery Mazda sideskirts and Abflug rear spats
Border Racing Type II front wings (fenders?)
Border Racing vented driver's side headlight cover (back to pop-ups, thank God! What was I thinking!?)
Here she is outside work... Brighton Railway station in Sussex. I drive a 300 tonne, 100 mph vehicle for my day job lol
At a show at Santa Pod Raceway
Yep, needs spacers for the front wheels badly, I know. The Border wings are very subtly wider than stock...
Also showing off genuine Gandor Super Mirrors..
Urgh, weird retouching, sorry. That's at Rotorstock, the English equivalent of Sevenstock
Not earth-shattering, but not terrible for stock twins. Don't forget that Euro dynos all seem to apply much harsher correction factors than US ones. Dunno why, but horsepower figures always seem much lower for the same state of tune compared to American ones.
The car rewarded me by snapping the powerplant frame. *Sigh*. Not unusual, I know, but it was rather irritating after spending ages putting loads of niggles right. Put in a good used one with a bit of additional seam welding on it for added strength. Then concentrated on some bodywork...
Now, dunno about you guys, but what attracted me to FDs as much as anything was the look of them. Gotta be one of the loveliest stock bodies ever. So it always mystifies me a bit when people change them beyond all recognition. If that's your thing, fine, I'm not saying I'm right and everyone else is wrong, but I just don't "get" Fortune kits or massive winged canard-ed JGTC replicas. What I wanted was a car that still looked like an RX-7... only more so.
With that in mind, I collected a carefully selected set of parts in order to preserve and enhance the stock look. Maybe I failed, you're welcome to tell me how **** it looks, I don't mind. It's how I wanted it to be, and I'm happy with that!
So....MazdaSpeed 15th Anniversary front nose
Stock rubbery Mazda sideskirts and Abflug rear spats
Border Racing Type II front wings (fenders?)
Border Racing vented driver's side headlight cover (back to pop-ups, thank God! What was I thinking!?)
Here she is outside work... Brighton Railway station in Sussex. I drive a 300 tonne, 100 mph vehicle for my day job lol
At a show at Santa Pod Raceway
Yep, needs spacers for the front wheels badly, I know. The Border wings are very subtly wider than stock...
Also showing off genuine Gandor Super Mirrors..
Urgh, weird retouching, sorry. That's at Rotorstock, the English equivalent of Sevenstock
Last edited by Nik da Greek; 07-23-11 at 08:54 AM.
07-23-11, 09:10 AM
#14
Senior Member
Thread Starter
Of course, the week before Rotorstock we had major drama. I noticed (quite easy to spot admittedly) that the primary turbo wasn't boosting up. Didn't understand how this was possible, the secondary, yeah, OK, but surely the primary should work all the time? (In fact, one of the main problems I'd had was the crossover flap in the wastgate housing sticking so when the secondray switched in it was just dropping all it's boost stright out the open exhaust. Very annoying, and made an awful noise, plus had the effect of the car stopping dead like a sailboat luffing its sail! This was the opposite was round).
So, under the bonnet, stripped out the turbos and found;
Ooops. No trace of the missing blades was ever found, and I stripped everything back to the LIM trying to find the shrapnel. Just vanished, the motor must have ate them, God knows how it never broke any tips, and spat them out. However, the turbo was fooked, there was a massive groove round the housing where the impeller had been wearing it away.
*sigh* A good used turbo pack solved that issue, and she made it to RotorStock all cool. ("She" is called Ruby, by the way. Short for Rubysaurus Rex. Sorry about that, my wife named her).
Next mod was essential... headlights. I'd swapped back to pop-ups with the new bumper (yayyy!) but had to change back to stock sidelights from the US-style crystal ones. These had the bulbholder at the wrong angle, adn what with being recessed further back, they caught on the headlights when they raised. So, I got some stock sidelights, de-fried-eggified them (took them apart to remove the orange filter part and put chrome bulbs in) and whilst they were apart putin LED strips like the new Audi have. Awesome, they were near enough brighter than the headlights now.
Anyone who's ever driven their FD after dark (brave of you lol) knows you may as well have a firefly in a jamjar gaffa taped to the bumper as use th eheadlights. So, it was time for an HID upgrade...
Old H4 halogen ones (groovy sidelights, huh?)
New HID ones. Like night and day, literally!
Just as an aside, to keep my polishing fetish happy, I did up a scrap rotor that now takes pride of place on the mantleshelf in my lounge. Even the wife has to admit, it's a proper piece of modern art. Bastard to polish, though!
So, under the bonnet, stripped out the turbos and found;
Ooops. No trace of the missing blades was ever found, and I stripped everything back to the LIM trying to find the shrapnel. Just vanished, the motor must have ate them, God knows how it never broke any tips, and spat them out. However, the turbo was fooked, there was a massive groove round the housing where the impeller had been wearing it away.
*sigh* A good used turbo pack solved that issue, and she made it to RotorStock all cool. ("She" is called Ruby, by the way. Short for Rubysaurus Rex. Sorry about that, my wife named her).
Next mod was essential... headlights. I'd swapped back to pop-ups with the new bumper (yayyy!) but had to change back to stock sidelights from the US-style crystal ones. These had the bulbholder at the wrong angle, adn what with being recessed further back, they caught on the headlights when they raised. So, I got some stock sidelights, de-fried-eggified them (took them apart to remove the orange filter part and put chrome bulbs in) and whilst they were apart putin LED strips like the new Audi have. Awesome, they were near enough brighter than the headlights now.
Anyone who's ever driven their FD after dark (brave of you lol) knows you may as well have a firefly in a jamjar gaffa taped to the bumper as use th eheadlights. So, it was time for an HID upgrade...
Old H4 halogen ones (groovy sidelights, huh?)
New HID ones. Like night and day, literally!
Just as an aside, to keep my polishing fetish happy, I did up a scrap rotor that now takes pride of place on the mantleshelf in my lounge. Even the wife has to admit, it's a proper piece of modern art. Bastard to polish, though!
07-23-11, 09:24 AM
#15
Senior Member
Thread Starter
So that's pretty much it for part one of my Rex's life...or maybe part two since it's the second Rex, though it kept half of the original... arrgh! Too confusing!
As you'll see in part two (three?) the car is now like George Washington's axe...it's had eight new handles and five new heads, but it's still 100% orignal and authentic!
This is why I named the thread how NOT to do it. If I'd had a plan in the first place, and known where I was going, I could have got the same car I have now soooooo much quicker, and cheaper. The number of times I've upgraded a part only to find it needs upgrading again later cos something else has changed and it's no longer man enough for the job.... not to mention seven different exhaust configurations, etc, etc.
With that said, it's been (mostly) a fun journey, I've learned so much whilst still only knowing 10% of fkall lol, and I wouldn't change it for the world. Need a break now cos my eyes are starting to cross, but coming soon, how we turn a pile of old rubbish scrap metal like this...
...into something completely different lol
For the moment, here's a pic of the old downstairs khazi (bathroom?) before we re-did the house. Fair to say a) I'm a rotorhead and b) I've a very tolerant and understanding wife!
As you'll see in part two (three?) the car is now like George Washington's axe...it's had eight new handles and five new heads, but it's still 100% orignal and authentic!
This is why I named the thread how NOT to do it. If I'd had a plan in the first place, and known where I was going, I could have got the same car I have now soooooo much quicker, and cheaper. The number of times I've upgraded a part only to find it needs upgrading again later cos something else has changed and it's no longer man enough for the job.... not to mention seven different exhaust configurations, etc, etc.
With that said, it's been (mostly) a fun journey, I've learned so much whilst still only knowing 10% of fkall lol, and I wouldn't change it for the world. Need a break now cos my eyes are starting to cross, but coming soon, how we turn a pile of old rubbish scrap metal like this...
...into something completely different lol
For the moment, here's a pic of the old downstairs khazi (bathroom?) before we re-did the house. Fair to say a) I'm a rotorhead and b) I've a very tolerant and understanding wife!
07-23-11, 10:20 AM
#16
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hehehe, fun and inspirational story, buddy! Props for not giving up! We have all been there, and theese cars are like a drug...!!!!
Having an RX7, is like having a high-maintanance mistess. Treat her nice, and she will give you thrills you dont get @ home
Treat her bad, and she will rob your wallet even more, and not take two millisecs to tell your wife about it too
Having an RX7, is like having a high-maintanance mistess. Treat her nice, and she will give you thrills you dont get @ home
Treat her bad, and she will rob your wallet even more, and not take two millisecs to tell your wife about it too
07-23-11, 01:44 PM
#20
Senior Member
Thread Starter
LOL, to be fair, the Probe ain't that bad, just very heavy. I think the MX-6 is probably a better car cos it's lighter but it doesn't have the pop-up headlights, of course. I'd certainly have a '6 as a daily driver, that 2.5 litre V6 is a great lump, especially with the variable intake cleverness.
Thanks for all the kind words, gents, much appreciated.
A little interlude now... my polishing obsession had got into everything that was easily done, excpet the alternator, mainly because it looked like being a total pig to do. However, it was really letting the side down now so I got a secondhand one and stripped it down. Easy to say, not so easy to do, especialy drifting the rear armature bearing out of the rear housing!
Worth it, though, as you can clean like ten years' worth of carbon deposits out whilst it's apart. This pic shows the hidden screws holding the array to the rear housing (circled) and the bush contactors that are the real pain in the **** when it comes to re-assembly (arrowed).
This is the front housing mid-polish with a real quick photoshop to see if my colourscheme plan would work or not. Note the really irritating snapped spoke, that was when the polishing wheel caught it and span it round in the vice before I could stop it. Doh! Glad I didn't have my fingers in the way...
This is the tricky part, you have to get this bearing through the rear housing and let the sprung-loaded brushes touch the brass ring...
But you can't do it like this cos the screwdriver's in the way and as soon as you release them the brushes spring back. And you can't do it from the other side because those hidden screws (remember them) can't be then reached to be done up... cos the armature's now in the way.
Eventually, a friend on FDUK let me in on the secret of how to solve the Chinese puzzle. The blind bearing socket in the rear housing has a tiny hole through which you can thread a small allen key from the back. This then wedges the brushes in and you can slide the bearing through.
Simple when you know how, impossible unless you do! By God, the number of swear words I invented doing this job, the polishing was fiddly and irritating enough without the difficulty re-assembling it all afterwards. Still, worth the effort, I reckon;
The red is brake caliper paint (basically the same as Hammerite, if you have that in America?) which puts up with heat and a fair amount of solvents and stuff as well. The pulley is from Billet Bitz here in England, a guy who's made stuff for Formula One teams in the past, so knows a bit about milling alloy beauty out of billet.
I think it's fair to say that this is a job I hope to never have to do again!
Thanks for all the kind words, gents, much appreciated.
A little interlude now... my polishing obsession had got into everything that was easily done, excpet the alternator, mainly because it looked like being a total pig to do. However, it was really letting the side down now so I got a secondhand one and stripped it down. Easy to say, not so easy to do, especialy drifting the rear armature bearing out of the rear housing!
Worth it, though, as you can clean like ten years' worth of carbon deposits out whilst it's apart. This pic shows the hidden screws holding the array to the rear housing (circled) and the bush contactors that are the real pain in the **** when it comes to re-assembly (arrowed).
This is the front housing mid-polish with a real quick photoshop to see if my colourscheme plan would work or not. Note the really irritating snapped spoke, that was when the polishing wheel caught it and span it round in the vice before I could stop it. Doh! Glad I didn't have my fingers in the way...
This is the tricky part, you have to get this bearing through the rear housing and let the sprung-loaded brushes touch the brass ring...
But you can't do it like this cos the screwdriver's in the way and as soon as you release them the brushes spring back. And you can't do it from the other side because those hidden screws (remember them) can't be then reached to be done up... cos the armature's now in the way.
Eventually, a friend on FDUK let me in on the secret of how to solve the Chinese puzzle. The blind bearing socket in the rear housing has a tiny hole through which you can thread a small allen key from the back. This then wedges the brushes in and you can slide the bearing through.
Simple when you know how, impossible unless you do! By God, the number of swear words I invented doing this job, the polishing was fiddly and irritating enough without the difficulty re-assembling it all afterwards. Still, worth the effort, I reckon;
The red is brake caliper paint (basically the same as Hammerite, if you have that in America?) which puts up with heat and a fair amount of solvents and stuff as well. The pulley is from Billet Bitz here in England, a guy who's made stuff for Formula One teams in the past, so knows a bit about milling alloy beauty out of billet.
I think it's fair to say that this is a job I hope to never have to do again!
07-23-11, 01:59 PM
#21
Senior Member
Thread Starter
I also invested in some better brakes at this point. Never had enough cash at the right time to afford a secondhand BBK when they come up, and can't justify the cost of a new one for a street car, so came up with the best alternative, a set of Racing Brake OE replacement discs and pads all round. I like these cos they're slotted so look cool, (possibly) dissipate heat better and don't have the (alleged) cracking issues that may arise from cross-drilled rotors. Certainly work better than stock, combined with a good clean and refurb of the stock claipers. After all, this was one of the quickest-stopping production cars in its day
So, I thought it was pretty much done now. Spent a lot of weekends at shows and in the club scene here in the UK. As another interlude, I got dragged in to take some photos by a mate who was having to sell up his BNR33 GTR Skyline. It was his pride and joy, but he had to sell up, couldn't afford the car any more. This thing was a beast, it could literally rearrange the space/time continuum. Since it had a few Border parts too, it seemed a good opportunity to take some pics of the two iconic Jap cars together...
Just look at the size of the damn thing! It was awesome to drive, sooooo fast, but very strangely uninvolving. For all it was far quicker than my Rex, it was nowhere near as alive, as exciting.
This is the heart of the beast...HKS V-Cam variable cam set-up costs more than some entire RX-7s!
Right, that's enough of that big ol Datsun then lol. I was glad to spend so mucvh time up-close and personal with it, though, it confirmed that I'd made the right choice of car. Sometimes, outright speed isn't everything, feel is much more important... not that I could afford a £90k car anyway...
So, I thought it was pretty much done now. Spent a lot of weekends at shows and in the club scene here in the UK. As another interlude, I got dragged in to take some photos by a mate who was having to sell up his BNR33 GTR Skyline. It was his pride and joy, but he had to sell up, couldn't afford the car any more. This thing was a beast, it could literally rearrange the space/time continuum. Since it had a few Border parts too, it seemed a good opportunity to take some pics of the two iconic Jap cars together...
Just look at the size of the damn thing! It was awesome to drive, sooooo fast, but very strangely uninvolving. For all it was far quicker than my Rex, it was nowhere near as alive, as exciting.
This is the heart of the beast...HKS V-Cam variable cam set-up costs more than some entire RX-7s!
Right, that's enough of that big ol Datsun then lol. I was glad to spend so mucvh time up-close and personal with it, though, it confirmed that I'd made the right choice of car. Sometimes, outright speed isn't everything, feel is much more important... not that I could afford a £90k car anyway...
07-23-11, 02:18 PM
#22
Senior Member
Thread Starter
Of course, my car was just waiting for its next opportunity to ambush me and rape my wallet. It was just biding its time...
I'd noticed it was using more and more oil, though there was no obvious leak anywhere. It smoked horribly at idle, and got more and more smokey the longer it idled. The endless traffic jams getting into Brighton for work were especially embarassing as people would laugh and point for all the wrong reasons, it was like a dry ice machine.
Eventually, it got the point where it was getting through about half a litre of oil in one tank of petrol, so around 250 miles, and even my mechanical insensitivity realised something had to change. The oil control seals were the most likely culprit, but whatever it was, the motor was going to have to come apart. I kinda figured this may as well be the time to go big or go home so I started to stockpile parts for the big re-build;
Ignition amp
flush-mount bonnet pins
MazdaSpeed Type I rear spoiler (wing?) in fetching purple metalflake (really!)
KnightSports vented FRP bonnet (hood) in fetching weird HOK candy burgundy that in anything other than direct sun just looked brown
Set of Ohlins (manufactured under license by Sokie) coilovers with Swift springs
Scabby as hell, and leaking, but a refurb should see them right. As an aside, these Swift springs were even more stupidly over-specced than the GET ones I already had. You could literally stand on one (I'm 14 stone plus) and it wouldn;t compress by one millimetre! They had to go...
Some hubcentric spacers from DM Motorsports here in the UK< top guys, really top quality products
Airpump delete idler pulley, also DM Motorsports
and probably most importantly, a Garrett T04S single turbo setup that had come off a mate's car that had blown up whilst mapping (gutted) and he was breaking.
One of the apex tips had clouted the turbine wheel on the way out, so it needed to be sent for refurbishing as well
Besides, it was in a pretty gruesome state and could do with cleaning up and refreshing.
Oh, and a bit of electrickery to keep an eye on what it was all up to
I'd noticed it was using more and more oil, though there was no obvious leak anywhere. It smoked horribly at idle, and got more and more smokey the longer it idled. The endless traffic jams getting into Brighton for work were especially embarassing as people would laugh and point for all the wrong reasons, it was like a dry ice machine.
Eventually, it got the point where it was getting through about half a litre of oil in one tank of petrol, so around 250 miles, and even my mechanical insensitivity realised something had to change. The oil control seals were the most likely culprit, but whatever it was, the motor was going to have to come apart. I kinda figured this may as well be the time to go big or go home so I started to stockpile parts for the big re-build;
Ignition amp
flush-mount bonnet pins
MazdaSpeed Type I rear spoiler (wing?) in fetching purple metalflake (really!)
KnightSports vented FRP bonnet (hood) in fetching weird HOK candy burgundy that in anything other than direct sun just looked brown
Set of Ohlins (manufactured under license by Sokie) coilovers with Swift springs
Scabby as hell, and leaking, but a refurb should see them right. As an aside, these Swift springs were even more stupidly over-specced than the GET ones I already had. You could literally stand on one (I'm 14 stone plus) and it wouldn;t compress by one millimetre! They had to go...
Some hubcentric spacers from DM Motorsports here in the UK< top guys, really top quality products
Airpump delete idler pulley, also DM Motorsports
and probably most importantly, a Garrett T04S single turbo setup that had come off a mate's car that had blown up whilst mapping (gutted) and he was breaking.
One of the apex tips had clouted the turbine wheel on the way out, so it needed to be sent for refurbishing as well
Besides, it was in a pretty gruesome state and could do with cleaning up and refreshing.
Oh, and a bit of electrickery to keep an eye on what it was all up to
07-23-11, 02:37 PM
#23
Senior Member
Thread Starter
While the parts were being assembled/refurbished I found other things to get on with. Just like the engine, the performance ofthe stereo had been going steadily downhill. It finally annoyed me enough to get in new speakers all round, and when I went to swap them out, I found why the originals were struggling.
Check that out! The butyl seal holding the cone to the cage had rotted away completely, leaving th ewhole lot free to flap around helplessly. Shocking! The rear speakers are a funny size, but a bit of shopping around found some that fit straight in. Before;
After, JBL GTO series;
Fronts are a bit more straightforward, though you have to get a bit brutal to remove the original cone from the cage cos they're bonded on with mega hardcore glue
Much better, though be warned you may need to trim the plastic mounting back if you get ones with too deep a basket for the magnet. These are Sony just cos the rest ofthe stereo gear already was.
I'm not mad into ICE (if all you care about is the stereo in an RX-7 you probably bought the wrong car in the first place lol) so I couldn't be arsed faffing about with tweeters and sound staging and all that old bollocks. Some bass would be nice, but there's little enough boot (trunk!) space as it is without filling it with a sub.
Some parts started to come back from being done up.. the Ohlins refurbished and with sensible spring rates on them
I polished the compressor housing of the turbo myself, came up alright *cough*
..and the turbo itself came back. I'd opted to have it all ceramic coated to deal with the temperatures. The coating was alleged to be red, but it kinda came out pink rather than red. Ho hum, it's how it performed, I suppose.
HKS cast manifold
Turbo with ceramic turbine and polished compressor
Downpipe
So, in addition to an HKS front-mount intercooler and a FEED copper radiator plus a full set of Billet Bitz alloy pulleys, it was all in place. Just a matter of throwing it all together and hope it stuck!
Check that out! The butyl seal holding the cone to the cage had rotted away completely, leaving th ewhole lot free to flap around helplessly. Shocking! The rear speakers are a funny size, but a bit of shopping around found some that fit straight in. Before;
After, JBL GTO series;
Fronts are a bit more straightforward, though you have to get a bit brutal to remove the original cone from the cage cos they're bonded on with mega hardcore glue
Much better, though be warned you may need to trim the plastic mounting back if you get ones with too deep a basket for the magnet. These are Sony just cos the rest ofthe stereo gear already was.
I'm not mad into ICE (if all you care about is the stereo in an RX-7 you probably bought the wrong car in the first place lol) so I couldn't be arsed faffing about with tweeters and sound staging and all that old bollocks. Some bass would be nice, but there's little enough boot (trunk!) space as it is without filling it with a sub.
Some parts started to come back from being done up.. the Ohlins refurbished and with sensible spring rates on them
I polished the compressor housing of the turbo myself, came up alright *cough*
..and the turbo itself came back. I'd opted to have it all ceramic coated to deal with the temperatures. The coating was alleged to be red, but it kinda came out pink rather than red. Ho hum, it's how it performed, I suppose.
HKS cast manifold
Turbo with ceramic turbine and polished compressor
Downpipe
So, in addition to an HKS front-mount intercooler and a FEED copper radiator plus a full set of Billet Bitz alloy pulleys, it was all in place. Just a matter of throwing it all together and hope it stuck!
07-23-11, 03:04 PM
#25
Senior Member
Thread Starter
The car went in to Super Seven for the work to be done. I don't mind a bit of amatuer mechanic-ing but I know my limits and and I neither have the time nor the expertise to start building engines in my garage. At the same time, I helped a mate take his engine out and put it back in after a rebuild, and tbh I couldn;t face doing it again on mine. OK when you're young and fit but I'm old an fat so I thought I'd give it a miss.
Super 7 do paint and body as well, so it was a chance to get the bonnet (hood!) painted to match, and a new secondhand tailgate (boot? lol) fitted. The old one had th esame problem as my old Montego Blue car all those years ago, rain was getting in, but this time not enugh to fill the boot. The first I knew of it was when the rust came through from inside, so it seemed easiest just to swap it over. Let battle commence!
Not sure if the pick-up look will ever catch on? REPU for the new millennium?
Streetported engine and ancilliaries all back in place
...and spinning ! Yayy!
The battery had to move to the boot to make space, got a nice little SARD alloy box for it. Perhaps a bit too little, it was tough finding a strong enough battery small enough. Finally went to a local battery factors and walked around with a tape measure till I found one. Turns out it comes out of a Skyline anyway!
HKS FEED-branded intercooler. A lot of the ancilliaries came from a FEED-built car a mate was breaking, a lot of the turbo parts came from an Amemiya built one, so we were hoping they'd be sound.
Got a toothy smile at last! Yes, I know it looks like it's on the ****. Dunno why.
This stuff is all way too clever for the likes of me, too
When it was all up and running there was a problem with a boost leak, could hear exhaust leaking from somewhere. Finally traced to this...
A bit of the apex tip from the last motor it had been on stuck in the poppet of the wastegate! This is the little murderer that killed an entire engine!
Super 7 do paint and body as well, so it was a chance to get the bonnet (hood!) painted to match, and a new secondhand tailgate (boot? lol) fitted. The old one had th esame problem as my old Montego Blue car all those years ago, rain was getting in, but this time not enugh to fill the boot. The first I knew of it was when the rust came through from inside, so it seemed easiest just to swap it over. Let battle commence!
Not sure if the pick-up look will ever catch on? REPU for the new millennium?
Streetported engine and ancilliaries all back in place
...and spinning ! Yayy!
The battery had to move to the boot to make space, got a nice little SARD alloy box for it. Perhaps a bit too little, it was tough finding a strong enough battery small enough. Finally went to a local battery factors and walked around with a tape measure till I found one. Turns out it comes out of a Skyline anyway!
HKS FEED-branded intercooler. A lot of the ancilliaries came from a FEED-built car a mate was breaking, a lot of the turbo parts came from an Amemiya built one, so we were hoping they'd be sound.
Got a toothy smile at last! Yes, I know it looks like it's on the ****. Dunno why.
This stuff is all way too clever for the likes of me, too
When it was all up and running there was a problem with a boost leak, could hear exhaust leaking from somewhere. Finally traced to this...
A bit of the apex tip from the last motor it had been on stuck in the poppet of the wastegate! This is the little murderer that killed an entire engine!
