Hey Everyone, I'm buying my first RX7 in the next few weeks, and I'd greatly appreciate any advice current RX7 owners have to offer. I did a quick search through the forums and didn't turn up much. Mainly, I'd like to know what I should be looking to spend for a late 80's non turbo or turbo II car to use at the start as a daily driver and later turn into a weekend racer/autocross car.

Essentially my Matrix's upkeep has become too expensive (I'm looking at replacing a rod at 75,000 miles, and I know the maintenance on an RX7 will be frequent, but it should be cost effective. I'd like to go the turbo route eventually, but for now I just need a drivable car to replace my Matrix after I sell it.

I was thinking the pricing would probably range between about $800 (for a car with no major flaws) to $3000 (for a well-maintained turbo-II)

 

I think your prices are a lil off, you will probably find a well-maintained TII for $5000+ and one with no major flaws for atleast $1500+ (For an N/A).

Theres a few very helpful sites, like aaron cake's - http://www.aaroncake.net/

 

I have a 1988 n/a with 98,xxx miles on it. I bought it for only $1500 and so far its a vary good car and I have nothing bad to say about it.

 

Thanks for the link, some nice info on there for new buyers. My real world budget for an NA RX7; preferably one with less than 50 thousand miles on the motor, is probably about $2000. I have seen someone trying to sell a 5 spd NA RX7 in the area for $1000, so I'm going to see if I can test drive that first. Body looks great, nice wheels, so I'm optimistic. I know it was for sale for about 2 months, last time I saw it was a month ago though so I might have missed the boat on that one.

 

First gen with a 12a is reliable as hell, at least mine is. but it takes 15 mins to warm up in winter. about 7 to 10 in summer. my 88 GXL was comfortable though, and if your wanting to go turbo, the 2nd gen NA is definantly the way to go. *** long as you change fluids and do proper maintanence, the 2ng gens are pretty reliable too.

DONT BE LIKE ME!!!! and buy a car that was not maintained properly. my engine died after 8k because the owner didnt know anything about the car really.

 

So you can add a turbo to the 2nd Gen NA motors? I was thinking if I bought an NA and wanted a turbo later that I'd have to buy the whole turbo motor. It looks like the motors themselves are reasonable though, if you search around a little. For now, I just need something driveable. If I want to mod it later it should effective, at least compared to my current car where getting 50 HP costs $4000.

 

If you can't keep up with maintenance on a Matrix why oh why do you think you want an RX-7?

No, no it won't be.

 

well i got my 87 n/a rx7 44k oiginal from the original owner all original and i have all the papers for when it got all the tune ups from the dealer the original purchase paper and he took damn good care of it and it was $3800 so that wasnt to bad if you are going n/a look into porting first if you looking into going turbo you will be better off just buying a t2 now save you alot of money and time and if its all stock its still going to be a good daily driver but yes you can turbo a n/a not trying to sound like an *** but look up on this forum and you will find blenty about it

 

ok first off didnt you post this yesterday.. here is the link if you forgot...

https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...ght=buying+rx7

i did a search for you here is some info

https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...ght=buying+rx7

https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...ght=buying+rx7

https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...ght=buying+rx7

and here is anouther site with info

http://fc3spro.com/TECH/h2b.html

the search button is your friend. this subject has been covered many times....

 

I know there'll be plenty of maintenance, but I'll probably be doing significantly more of the work myself. As for the Matrix, most others have had great luck with them, mine has been one problem after another. I tend to get a little angry when I'm still making $400/month payments and having to pay out of pocket for repairs. I'd like to assume that with an RX7 the repair bills shouldn't workout to more than my current car payment, I'll be buying the car with cash.

I'll be test driving a car in the area tomorrow; the early gen-II I saw on the side of the road for $1000. I spoke with the owner over the phone, and he apparently doesn't know what he's got. I asked him if the RX7 was still for sale he had no idea what I was talking about till I mentioned the word Mazda, at which point he said "oh the little mazda." The car does have an overheating problem, but he said he'd go below $1000, so if I can get the car for around $700 I can afford to buy a new engine if need be. Best case scenario if the engine's not toasted from years of life in phoenix, I might be able to have it on the road by the end of the week.