Hey I'm Phillip, people call me Moon

I am I Honda guy at heart, but they offer nothing affordable and RWD.

I recently bought a 1987 Base RX7 from Auction for $450! My plans have been to build a car to learn to drift with, I was hoping to come across a AE86 or Nissan 240(fastback), but when I saw this I couldn't pass it up.

I like RX7's, FC seem to hold a special place in my heart. I'm going to modify with car with the goals of having it be an enjoyalbe street car, with it's main purpose being drifting/auto-x (more towards drifting).

I've got two friends that are "rotary enthusiast"(that's safer than torquecentral's reference right?). That get mad when I metion LS1 swap, so I looked to my friend wallet and he said "Hell No" even to the LT1 swap. N/A Rotary seems more cost effective for my goals.

I've been reading on this thread: https://www.rx7club.com/2nd-generation-specific-1986-1992-17/new-rotary-thing-581267/

And it's answered a few of my questions. If I can formulate anymore I'll uset the search button, and If I do not find a clear enough answer I'll live up to this threads title.

Oh yea pic: (Chrome is gone... except the wheels)


Oh and uh, I'll just be another resident broke college student working at Toys"R"Us.

 

Hi.

If you can't find it with a search, you need to search again.

 

If you do live up the the threads title you won't get much help, if any.

What exactly is your question? Or were you just posting to tell the rest of us that you'll be an annoying child if you don't get help.

Many will tell you that you chose the wrong car to learn drifting. No personal experience but just by reading and searching you'll find that the FC is rather difficult to drift and not a good learning tool.

 

lol, I shouldn't really live up to the thread title.

I was just posting to say Hi. But you just answered another question I was going to ask. One of my rotary friends said when he first tried drifting in his FC the "rear wheel steer" got the best of him. Besides that, is it that the FC gets to much grip and it's reluctant to drift?

It may not be the best, but it's far better than my Honda.

 

well not to dump on ur honda or anything( i did enough dumping on the one last night) but a honda compared to a 7 is unbelievable

 

the best way that I fixed that is I didn't replace any of the bushings, after time you will learn to control it. Do a full tune up(all fluids and oil, sparkplugs and oil filter and fuel filter), and start by making sure the car is sound.

things that are important to buy before you drift(these are some products I like and have on my car)
full racing beat exhaust system
ful racing beat suspension kit
4 kyb agx struts(ebay is cheap for kybs)
racing beat front strut tower bar

those are some Items that will help you start drifting
I also found it better that when I bought 17 inch mustang gt rims(1998) it was a lot easier to make the car drift and control it.

goodluck

 

I've replaced so far:

*Sparkplugs (although I screwed up the placement of leading and trailing) You should have seen my face when I took these out of the box. I think my mouth made the words "WTF" even if I didn't say it out loud.

*Fuel Filter (not on, I haven't found the location yet, one of the reason I'm on here)

*Oil (made the mistake of buying Synthetic because I thought it would be better... my mistake)

*Air Filter (not stories with this one, excpet the old one looked like it had gum stuck to it?)

..oh and a rear tire (we towed it from the Auction yard and the one before the replacemtn blew. I ruined my damn Pacer chrome )

That's all so far. But thank you for the advice lupin

 

You can get rear wheel steering eliminator bushings if you want to drift. From what I read it's a great drift car, but not for beginning drifters for the reason you said. A search through these forums should give you plenty of info. If you don't want to drift, ditto. Look up handling, power, brakes and weight reduction.

I find the Haynes manual helpful. It'll tell you exactly where the fuel filter is. It's on the drivers side near the back. The Haynes manual will also give you a good list of maintenance items to do. Most people recommend doing a 60,000 mile tuneup. Seems like you've changed the major things, but there are plenty more. Save yourself some temperature headaches and get an OEM thermostat now if it doesn't have one (Mazda dealer, www.rx7.com, etc.; $16). I'd have a mechanic look it over too. The rotary's main enemies are overheating, knocking and oil (low or unchanged).

Synthetic oil is fine if you get the right brand. Check the FAQ. Otherwise it will shrink seals and leave deposits, shortening your engine's life.

 

I looked in the FAQ, I bought the wrong stuff. (Vavoline High-Milage Sythetic)

The engine has 151xxxmiles, I'm going to go ahead and get that Thermostat before I work on it again. I also see I need to buy a Haynes manual, and flush the cooling system. Any other things that I can do? o2 sensor and battery are also on the list.

The Alternator seems fine, as does the starter. I don't want to ask too many question because I know the answer will be search, but what is the main issue with the N/A S4 besides the idle and 5&6th ports sticking?

 

your very smart lol

alot of people are very quick to say "SEARCH!" (eventhough im sure that if no one asked n00b questions, the old guys would have nothing to do all day).

problems with the N/A S4? I have an S4 and my main problem is the 3,500 RPM hessitation (its in the FAQ). They say the cure is better grounding, Which seems to be true, even on a small scale.

If you have any questions you might be hessitant on posting (for fear of being flamed or bashed) go ahead and PM me, i'll try to help (even though im still a noob lol)

Good luck with the car, and welcome to the family.

 

ewww that chrome is heinous, im glad its gone.

 

By back you mean... front, I'm assuming.

 

Supposedly the reason the 86 is supposed to be better and probably the 240sx, and the reason you don't see many people drifting Miatas and RX7's is the independent rear. A solid rear axle makes a car a lot more predictable to control in a slide like that. But you can still drift in it. If you don't spring for an LSD you'll probably find it's easier to drift one direction than the other, which might mess up your learning curve. Other than that, welcome to the club. As for the big v8 swap, I still ask myself why anyone would wish that kind of heartache on themself. Where else are you going to find a 1.3L engine with 3 moving parts that's capable of 400+ hp reasonably affordably.

 

+1 i bought my 7 primarily because of the rotary and they are the shiz nit

 

Same here
Nice sign redlecire6662000

 

Anything else you can do? I'm just going to copy and paste a post I made in another thread a day or so ago. I'll filter out the things that don't apply, but..a lot of it should be done ASAP with any used FC.



1: Check compression. ALWAYS check compression if you are having any sort of engine trouble before continuing with a project/buying parts to fix it, etc...it can save hundreds of dollars, and it's always nice to know the condition of your engine.

2: Check electronics on the engine. Check the TPS, if it is within range, set it perfectly. Set the timing also. There are write-ups on the forum / maybe in the Archives, if you need any help with how to do this. Do the emissions removal for just about everything but the BAC. Anything you didn't remove during the emissions removal, remove and throughly clean / replace with a new gasket.

3: Check for vacuum leaks. If you have the means, and want your car to be nice and reliable for years to come (DO THIS AFTER CHECKING COMPRESSION), you can replace all gaskets and vacuum hoses. Gaskets can be bought from www.mazdatrix.com, and hoses can be bought from www.hosetechniques.com. If you want reliability and to kill all future/current problems, this is the best bet. All of the RX7's that I get, I immediately tear down and replace all of the external gaskets/lines.

4: Now is also a good time to replace all belts, inspect your OMP for correct operation, thermostat, coolant filler caps, coolant hoses, HEATER HOSE (This is very important! It is known to crack! Oil drips when changing the filter and deteriorates the line, and can cause massive engine failure if it were to break off while driving!), and inspect your oil cooler lines for leaks. There is probably more that I'm forgetting, but that is most of it.

5: Check/replace your pulsation dampner!! Search on the forum to figure out what this is / how if you don't know, but while you have the manifolds off is the best time to check it. It is a little mushroom-shaped (has a yellow plastic cover on it) *solenoid* on the end of your primary fuel rail (the one under the intake manifolds). When these fail, generally, if you don't know about it, you'll end up with a nice little/big fire in your engine bay. It's...very important to check this.

The oil cooler lines, thermostat, pulsation dampner, and the heater hose lines are probably the most important thing you can check on your engine. They are the few things that can cause catostropic damage in just a couple of second of failure. Everything else is details.