http://www.flickr.com/photos/gysgtfrank/11973963114/http://www.flickr.com/photos/gysgtfrank/11973963114/ by http://www.flickr.com/people/gysgtfrank/, on Flickr

I got this far today.

 

Thanks ioTus. I got the chunky stuff off the car with a heat gun and a plastic scraper this evening. Tried getting the rest off with decal remover, but yeah, it's going to take a pinstripe eraser to do this right. I'm actually pleasantly surprised...I fully expected the paint to be a different shade underneath the moldings, but what I've uncovered matches really well. Crossing my fingers...heading to the paint store tomorrow to get a pinstripe eraser. Better make sure my batteries in my drill are charged. May need to borrow a corded drill to get the job done though.

fm

 

When you're using it don't camp in one spot for too long that's how you burn through the paint. Otherwise those things are friggin magic!

 

Finally finished my rewiring..planned out and placed the wires where they will be set on......A few more wires to untangle and then I can shorten a lot of wires

Next week i install the dash so I can measure the new lengths of the rewired harness ;D

Aiming for cleanest wire harness setup.

 

Well, I got an eraser and tried it out when I got home...ended up burning off the paint on the front fender. :p



The thing was just too wobbly on my drill and too hard to control. I ended up using a combination of Goo Gone, a plastic scraper, and glass scratch remover to get that gunk off. The Goo Gone and plastic scraper got the big boogers off, the scratch remover got the marks and left over residue off. Here's what it looks like now. The right-side of the factory 3-piece wing is there just to give me an idea what the car is going to look like. I'm very pleased.




As irritated as I am that I fuxored my front fender paint, it's not really that big of a deal as it's going to get a lick of paint as a part of it's makeover anyway.

fm

 

fungus - Damn dood so sorry to hear! it worked great when i was removing the goo from the fender arch trim


777CheekZ, awesome work man you're taking it a step further than myself with the whole dash removal thing check out this thread on ausrotary, it has really helped me understand the power system wiring, including the FD alternator upgrade and how to properly wire it into the system:
AusRotary.com • View topic - MOVING A BATTERY FROM ENGINE BAY TO THE BOOT!!

 

No worries...that part is going to get a stripe anyway, so it's no big deal. It's just gotta be that way until I get the $$ to do the stripes. Not your bad...I probably just didn't have it set up properly and went in way too aggressively. I think the moldings have been off before because it had the black tar tape along with the white 3M VHB tape on it.

Anyway, I absolutely love where this thing is going.

fm

 

Fungus, 20 years ago I had a similar issue. A sign painter friend said " Let me do something." He put a Brillo pad on a small roller and put dappled red One Shot (sign paint) along the strip. Then he repeated with purple. Then yellow. It actually looked really good on the sunshine silver.

 

Thanks Cookboy. I'm going to be going with an IMSA look, so that's why I'm not too broken up about the paint. That part will be painted right over.

Completely finished removing the adhesive from the side moldings this evening. I mocked up a fender flare from cardboard just to get an idea if I'm going to like them.

Here the 16x7 +43 offset wheels look way to tucked:



I jacked up the car and took the rear wheel off, then lowered it again. The wheel is now about 2" negatively offset from before. I think this looks much better.




16s are a tad too big for my tastes, so after evaluating the flared look and wheels, I looking at either a 13 or 14" wheel, either 8.5 or 9" wide in the rear. Probably 8" wheel in the front. Flares should allow nice fitment. Since I auto-x, I want smaller wheels to take advantage of the lighter unsprung weight.

There's a pic of Kentetsu's car I saw where he's running 13x8s under stock fenders and it looks amazing...and it performs as good as it looks.

fm

 

fungus - SO much yes!!!!

today:

cleaned the new, untainted s5 intake manifold. This time no fancy coatings. F* ceramic. It cracks, flakes, surface prep will destroy any machined surfaces... its not worth ruining a perfectly functioning part for some possible gains. I'm not even letting that ceramic coating shop anywhere near my header, its too nice and too expensive to experiment around with. I'm going to leave the intake raw aluminum, and just clean up the corrosion from time to time. At some point down the road I will be painting everything under the hood, however right now what i've got is a bunch of 25-30 year old used parts, cleaned as much as they can be. Its almost a ratter kinda look, very clean and tidy, but worn in. I'm liking it. I'm going to roll with this until I pull the engine and everything, at which point I'll go all out with polish and paint. I'm hoping that will be a long ways off, as I want to get around to driving her finally!!!

Also finished up my wiring diagram of the main ECU harness, glad to get that out of my brain and onto paper, it's been bugging me.

So many things going on at once, planning the whole ECU / ignition / wire tuck project, its hard to keep track and i've been jumping around a bit when i get too worn out on one part. I've almost got the whole charging, starting, and grounding system figured out, but havent cut or pulled any cabling yet. First thing first is to see about hooking up the factory harness and turning the key - see if things light up after the tuck. If they do, then forward to the ECU install. If not - then I have more basic issues to address first

I'm very curious to see if I lose any systems or circuits from having the ECU not plugged in. My biggest concern is there may be some power wire that normally gets routed through the ecu and back to the harness, or a ground wire in the ecu harness that would otherwise be grounded through the ecu casing. More diagrams to read

Tomorrow, however, I will be taking a much needed break, and shredding it, dirt jump mountain bike style, followed by delicous burgers and dank seattle micro brew.

 

You could take a stiff brass brush to the intake manifold to slightly polis it and then hit it with high temp clear. That would keep the corrosion away for a long while. Then to clean it just use mineral spirits. Or...

Just have it polished. lol.

 

Today I had breakfast.

oops… this isn't Facebook Let me try again

I looked for my FB RX7… haven't exactly found her yet…

I will..

 

I took her for a sweet drive through the canyon. The weather is beautiful and she is running well.

Eloy, a cop from a town 50 mi. away is coming to test drive her tomorrow... He may be "the one" for her. I have turned away a creep who wants me to come down on my price so he can use her as a parts car. I have parked her in back, hiding for weeks, but Eloy saved a newspaper clipping and is following up. I will post the results of his test drive.

 

Ms. Diy, I fully understand what your going through selling your car, my parents went through this in 96' when they sold their 74' Bronco. Took us till' a few weeks before leaving the state to find a buyer who wasn't gunna strip it or try to low ball us. Finally they sold it to a dude who first built it for his wife and now has made it into a truly sick trail rig, he was a real gear head, sounds like if ya gotta ler it go you may have found "The One" for it. As for what I have done odds and ends after changing my granddad's oil.

 

I called the potential buyer to nail him to an hour of day... He put me off for another couple of weeks... He's a cop and said they were doing a warrant sweep today. Oh well... Guess she's with me a little longer. But REALLY I'm trying...

PS I've taken to calling her by her name again (not the term "the Mazda" to protect me from attachment).

 

Kim,

I was thinking about you this morning wondering if you had found a better job or if Smooth was in your past. Glad you still get to drive her around and hoping you find that better employment opportunity I know is out there.

 

Checked the fluid levels and then fired up the GSL-SE and took her for a drive just to get her warmed up.

On the GSL-EV I worked on fitting the charge plug under the gas cover. Here is what it will mostly look like. This was just to check the fit of everything. I have some bare metal so I need to paint it before I put everything in permanently. I think it will turn out pretty well.

I am going to put a little label on the door that says "110/240 VAC only!" when I figure out something that will look period correct. Anyone have a picture of the "unleaded fuel only" emblem on a black car?

 

Armed with rolls of red and orange vinyl electrical tape, I did some mock up. Left the cardboard flares off as I know I'm going to get ZG flares.

Jim Downing called...said he's missing his car.











fm

 

attempted to help my buddy set timing. The dizzy was off the engine. We cant find any info on restabbing it. Anybody care to share their secrets?

 

https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...tyleid=17#menu
I searched "stab distributor".

 

https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...tyleid=17#menu Search thing is amazing.
Edit, sorry for double post.

 

Today i tried to install the new aluminum radiator.

It's significantly shorter than the OEM, so the factory fan shroud would not fit. So i tried cutting a hole in it to pass through the lower radiator hose, only to find out its also a good inch narrower than factory, so there would be nothing for the shroud to bolt on to anyways. So i ruined a mint condition factory fan shroud, yay for me.

And then, because the lower hose is so much higher, its at an extremely awkward angle towards the S5 lower water pump hose and no way will any part of the OEM lower radiator hose fit, even if cut down. Hm. We'll see if i can get a flexible universal hose tomorrow, and it looks like I'll have to be going with e-fans after all.

 

ioTus,
Don't you love working on cars? I feel your pain. I've been following Aaron Cake's Cosmo build on Youtube and am amazed at the patience he has with these kinds of issues. He runs into them a lot (off camera, of course).

fm

 

Yes, "Love", that's the word. haha! When you're doing something custom, this is kinda how it goes. Every step of the way you have to earn it

 

Thanks. What I'm having a hard time understanding is: once your set the engine to TDC and you line up the marks on the dizzy what do you line it up with on the engine?