I knew nothing about these cars before I bought mine and drove it for a summer thinking these first gen rotaries were gutless or mine was due for an engine rebuild. Can’t remember how many times I stalled it at intersections. I decided to give it a tune up with new plugs, rotor, cap, points and condensers. I read up on how to set the dwell without the distributor cap on and figured out how to set each set of points. I discovered the one vacuum advance dash pots was not working and replaced it. The grounding wires for the points mounting plates were also broken but looked okay because the insulation was still good, that solved the bouncing tach needle issue. Spent several nights trying to get the leading and trailing timing set though. The previous owner had someone replace the ignition wires and the guy mixed up the leading and trailing wires from the cap to the coils. He had to mess with the timing so much just to get it running. Couldn’t believe how good it ran afterwards.

installed a giant wing, leds under the car......Removed on Day 1 !!!!

Pics!

Bought a SE from a young lad who had gotten the thing into a no start condition. The young man's dad delivered the car and we went to unload it but it was like trying to push a boulder uphill. The thing just would not roll or budge off the trailer. Had to use a come along and winch it off. I was like "what the He**"....
First thing I did was pull the front wheels and see if maybe a cailper was stuck....
Kid had bought new drilled and slotted rotors and installed them - with the inner wheel bearings backwards, no bearing races on both the inner and outer bearings and the seal was backwards to boot.
I told his parents its a good thing he never got it started to drive it like this because he would had an accident or worse within a block or so......

I wish I had taken a picture....

Then there was the re-wriring he did....

Moved the driver side door latch u hook on the pillar rather than properly adjust the door.

Bondo over rust, every nut tightend as much as possible. Half a carb rebuild, fuse block blown? Lets put spade fuses in it. Swap a perfect brown interior for a trashed black cat piss smelling one, hacked radio not even screwed in running 2 book shelf home speakers, duck taped wires together, rtv sealed a. Sensor into the radiator (no it didnt work) and so many more.

Put a V8 in it, but thats why ive got the motor now

Had a challenged child spray it in acrylic and left it to die for 20 years

Bondo. Lots and lots of bondo to mold the entire car. Hate the body work so much but love the car.

I just thought of another one. The previous owner put in the wrong size battery and to make it fit the hold down fittings crafted a piece of black plastic pipe between the top of the battery and the wire. I guess that was better than letting it flop around. I know why he put in the wrong battery, it was because the cross reference used lists the wrong battery. And several battery places have the same wrong one listed.

Have had the car for about 3 weeks and my list keeps growing.

So far the biggest is the gap between my turbo and block. About 2mm(?) because when they put it on they didn't use a gasket and of the 4 bolts that hold it on we have..
1 nut Finger tight
1 outright Missing a stud
1 nut that wasn't even touching the turbo
1 nut that was KIND OF tight.

Noticed on the right head light motor assembly is missing the rod that moves the headlight. The previous owner made one from a wood plank. Will post pictures tomorrow. lol. BTW looking for a metal rod to replace the wood one with.

New OEM rods available from Black Dragon and Mazdatrix.

Headlight Rods, Hood Rod Clips, Gas Caps, Overflow Tanks

this is the solution

previous owner also installed the battery with positive facing the vent and the metal touching so it arched. also had the battery strapped down...

lets just say its turned around and has a proper tray holder now

Installed the auxillary port sleaves and used the RB Holly manifold.

caulk all the drain holes for the sunroof and hatch

Okay that doesn't even make sense. What's the point in that one? :scratch: :lol:

Here's something even dumber, drilled holes in the battery tray.

Attachment 675795

Of course that tray is there to catch battery acid. Here's the result:

Attachment 675796

And here's my repair:

Attachment 675797

.......parked it outside in a hail storm

I'm on my 4th since 88, and I guess I've been lucky. The dumbest thing any of them did was sell to me.

When I bought my 82 there was a horrible loud clunk from the front end when I would turn. Checked it out and found that the po had installed a larger front sway bar but didn't install the bushings in the center...then I found I also had a bent strut and a spindle that had gotten so hot that it was purple, blue, green, yellow and just a hint of the original steel....the horn was wired in to the dash instead of the steering wheel, and my fuel dor and hatch buttons were just gone....

Let it set until it rusted to hell around the rear hatch.

Dumbest thing they ever did?..
SELL IT TO ME!..you should see it NOW..(sucker..lol!)

Sold it to me :P

Ooh I want in on this thread. :D

Here's my list so far:

1. Installed what look like desktop computer speakers in the storage bins.
2. Smoked in it.
3. Put his butts out on the A-pillar trim.
4. Seems to have attempted to paint the black rubstrips by brushing them with black residential paint. Badly.
5. Applied nasty purple tint. Badly.
6. Installed some sort of GPS/laptop holder thingy using the bolt for the passenger seat rail.

I'm sure I'll uncover more going forward. :(

Bringing these things back is a labor of love, y'all! :)

had a stripped nikki, and a rats nest.
de badged the whole thing.
had the fuel lines reversed, and the one way was on the incoming line.
house paint.
rear housing coolant lines near the beehive cemented and blocked off.
just cut a hole so a an 83 trans would fit, and left it like that. no trim.
no front bolts on the driver seat.
bypassed the fusible links.
plumbers tape (strap) to hold the gas tank on.
rewired the radio so all outputs go to the front 2 speakers (moar power)
... im sure there's more, but im getting mad now just thinking about what ive been through in the past year.

I just purchased a 1980 that a previous owner had decided he wanted a black interior instead of the wine it had. Achieved with rattle can. Carpet too. Spray paint. Not dye. The center stack is the worst, though the overspray on the body (doors and door sills in particular) really give an insight to the pure genius of that individuals interior design skills. I'll post pics when I get around to documenting a build thread.

Okay, it has been a while since I've been on the forums, but I have to post on this thread.

First off: I bought a gsl-se body with the intention of swapping in my engine for the one that i could tell was about to spit out an apex seal, so i paid $300 for it. 6 YEARS AGO, and it still gives me new reasons to be upset every day.

First thing was cutting a massive hole in the transmission tunnel so he could put a 12a tranny onto a 13b engine, why? I don't know.

Then I noticed that He had repainted the car, an issue that is a recurring nightmare.

Over the years I have noticed multiple things about this paint job:
1) it was done with house paint.
2) it was done with a paint brush and a roller
3) no prep work was done, so it has more flakes than a Head & Shoulders commercial.
4) by no prep work, I mean he just painted right over the old paint.

The list goes on and on, but the paint is my most recent reason for going grey as a result of this car.

Previous owner replaced the motorized antenna with a non-motorized type but left the old antenna motor rattling around in the body panel.

about the stupidest mod i see is gilmer drive belt systems

why people put these on, yet do not own a supercharger.. is beyond me

all to often bodged to make fit over water pump spigot mismatches or bodged over the various alternator shafts

noisy, utterly unreliable and eats belts that cost lots more than V belts

and with no way to time the engine accurately
that will invariably be the fundamental reason the engine was eventually lost later down the track

The dumbest thing was the p o had a bad wreck with a fire. When I got it, the interior was brand new. The foam under the door upholstery was melted, the rear differential had a stock number tag on it, so did the rear valence, and you could see where it was welded.

Spray painted the windshield trim and wiper arms black without masking anything off. Looked great as you can imagine.

knot right
 

The fuel pump had been installed with an additional twist, causing the inlet hose to knot up against the housing (out of sight). Ran okay on the flat, but quite sluggish on hills.

Previous owner: My Father

He threw away a set of the aluminum rear window louvers because they were coming apart!!!!! AAAAGGGGHHHHH!!!!

The previous owner installed an FD engine using FD motor mounts (the dumb squishy stock liquid filled kind that suck ass for anything other than a power plant frame equipped stock FD, and even then are too soft). He took channel stock and modded it to cradle the motor mounts. The engine would easily rock back and forth. He also chopped off the stock FB motor mount pedestals for clearance.

Oh and he painted the engine bay competition yellow mica... because FD engine? https://www.rx7club.com/images/smilies/scratchhead.gif

https://www.rx7club.com/forum/attach...1&d=1195622501

https://www.rx7club.com/forum/attach...1&d=1195622501

https://www.rx7club.com/forum/attach...1&d=1195622501

https://www.rx7club.com/forum/attach...1&d=1195622501

https://www.rx7club.com/forum/attach...1&d=1195622501
Kinda glad he never got it running.

This is what it looked like when I got it.
https://www.rx7club.com/forum/attach...d=229804&stc=1

Previous 2 owners couldn't figure out why the 2nd turbo wouldn't produce boost over the span of 3 years...both told me the turbo was a brick. The only thing wrong was the vacuum line to the charge relief valve had popped off and was hanging out in plain sight. Id think Google would solve this kinda ignorance...apparently not

Sweet, what's the displacement in that thing, 2X4?

Yeah. It requires 1 to 2 HP (human power) to move the car. Pretty sweet, right?

On my 79 the external voltage regulator went out so the PO used a large gauge amp power wire (with translucent red insulation of course) to run from the alternator output to the positive post of the battery. Caused good times having unregulated voltage going to the battery. I removed that and put in an S4 alternator and updated the wiring to match.

Car had been in a small collision. PO did a decent job of getting the bodywork done but didn't know how to adjust the headlights. They would go up and down constantly when opened. So instead of adjusting them properly or disconnecting the motors and leaving them up he installed two el cheapo driving lights. Luckily he chose to use existing holes to mount the lights and switch.

Here's one I hadn't entered before. Place a feel good device spliced into the fuel delivery line from the firewall to the Nikki.

It's something new every time I dig in further.

Most recently I discovered the in tank fuel pump was wired in with butt splices with no heat shrink to protect the hot wire from potentially sparking in the tank should it come out and hit anything.

Next I found the stereo head unit was wired in without use of any butt splices... Just stripped ends twisted together and then sloppily wrapped with electrical tape.

I'm sure I'll find more too...

But the weight savings!

:lol:

Lol, and I'll have to agree with the smoking in the car, it turns the grey cloth a gold shade, most noticeable is/was the head liner, nasty