Hi Everyone. I've been tooling around the RX8Club forum for some time but I've come across an opportunity that I thought you guys would have some insight on.

I was at a buddy's house this weekend and his neighbor was over and we got talking about my 8. He happened to mention that he had an '85 RX7 that he was looking to unload. Out of curiousity I decided to take a look at it.

The car has been sitting for a little over a year. It currently does not run. When it was parked the engine flooded and it hasn't run since. He claims before it flooded it ran great and that if I bought it he would have it running before changing the ownership. The body is in fair shape (except for the hack job done on the paint). I couldn't find any rust on the body but there was some bondo work on the driver's side rear wheel well. The engine has 157,000miles and he wants $800 for it.

I'm thinking about picking this up as a project car but am worried about what I may be getting myself into. I'm no mechanic by any means but am pretty handy. What I can't do myself I know enough people knowledgable enough to give me an hand. Assuming the engine runs, to get this thing looking decent, I figure I'd need to do the following: Full paint job, replace all the bumper moldings (sun faded), replace the sun-roof (bad silicone job to fix leak), replace both interior door panels (some rips on the upholstery), new rims and tires.

What are your thoughts on this? Are parts for the 1st Gen's fairly easy to get? Reasonably priced?

I just thought I'd get some input on this before I went through with it. Any opinions are very much appreciated... Good or Bad.

Sorry about the long post. Guess I got carried away a little.

Thanks for the help.

 

even if the engine is OK, at 155K it's not likely got a lot of life it it. Sure guys will tell of rotaries lasting a lot longer, but thats with a careful maintenance schedule, something this car does not sound like it has had. I have bought dead-but-clean RX7s for $100, and this one sounds lke it needs a lot of work to get anywhere near presentable, never mind the mechanical unknowns. My advice is step back and spend the $800-1200 on a nice clean car. With any old car you either payup front or down the road (or soemwhere in between). Might be nicer to spend say $1500 on a nice runner and have a car you can play with and drive rather than a dead-end project that sits in YOUR yard for a few years with your bank account $800 lighter. there are a LOT of RX7s around! Enjoy the hunt, take your time. There are deals everywhere if you look-
good luck. I had to find my dream car in California (thank you ebay!) and look where I live...
Stu Aull
80GS
Alaska

 

pictures would help. be aware that parts are getting hard to find to make a car "showable"

mazdatrix and victoria british(now blackdragonauto.com) has a good amount of rather pricy parts. Good luck at the wreckers, most places waont carry cars this old and the ones that do are usally stripped. I had been at this for 8 years now, and it has been a slow process to collect the parts. .
be aware of rust, inspect under the rear bins by the wheel wells.

this brings me to an opinon tha I have, but will post on a new thread for that.

 

I would agree. You should look for a clean one. Not abused, runs well, does not
leak or have any rust - however 1,500 wont bring much -

 

Is it a GSL or GSL-SE, both of which have 4 wheels disc brakes, and an LSD, these are the more desirable cars in my mind.

While I don't consider 155K a lot for a rotary, I have never paid more than $350 for a running 1st Gen and have owned 5 over the past 5 years. Still own three by the way.

getting it to run shouldn't be too difficult, very basic maintenance from the sound of it.

Check for rust beneath the storage bins, this is the major problem on a 1st gen, remove the bins to check. Take a Phillips head screwdriver.

 

Look for one that is clean & well maintained with documents. This sounds like a can of worms. I paid $3500.00 for mine but it only had 45,000 original miles on it.

 

I'm all for buying non-running stuff and repairing it yourself, but $800 is a bit steep for a non-running car. Sure, there's a chance that you can deflood it and have a great car. Then again, there's a chance that you can't. I don't mean to badmouth that owner, but if he doesn't know how to unflood a rotary, how do you know that the car has otherwise been maintained well?

Personally, I'd offer him $400 for it, and then try to deflood it. If all else fails you can probably part it out for close to that amount.

 

Thanks for all the help guys. I don't think I'm going to go through with it. Thanks for making my decision an easy one.