I've got the sticker from my old 89, $29,999.

 

Also, Mazda started to try and get the weight down.
Getting it under 3000 lbs. was a big deal, and there are a lot of compromise parts that are made of plastic that were designed to get the weight down.  Examples are the end links and the thermostat housing neck.

I think in general, the Kouki cars are much better made than the Zenki FC's.  Just look at the interior - the center console bezel and door panels are much nicer in the Kouki FC's.



-Ted

 

is it at all possible to get the S4 thermo sender?

 

Mark, I seriously don't think the problem with the S5's temp gauge is the sender - it's the gauge itself. I bet the gauge could be modified like the FD guys do to make the reading linear.

I think some of the cost cutting was to offset the added cost of many of the new standard features, and also the added quality of many of the parts. Lord knows the S5 radio console is a quantum leap better than the S4's!

Anyhow, it's hard to understand some of Mazda's logic .

Dale

 

Yeah I don't know, Jason said the same thing. All I know is with a spare S5 gauge set in my S4 car, the water temp gauge reads exactly right and exactly the same as the S4 gauge did.

Why there is a S5 cluster in my carI have been trying to figure out why my speedo is off by 5MPH even though I have swapped rear end gearing and tranny gears... so I thought maybe the speedo itself was off since 5MPH is the maximum factory deviation).

Dale: BTW, your wiper switch is on its way back to you all rebuilt!

 

I'll vouch for that. I just picked up a brand new s4 Water Temp Sensor to retrofit In my s5 TII. It's not enough to have a GReddy Water Temp Guage and my Handcontroller for my LT8 telling me the temps.

s5's, as I understand It, received hand-me-down parts from a surplus of s4's parts thus resulting In some s5's having non typical options and functions. That Is as I understand It and I'd probably not say for all given models.

 

Come to think of It, I believe It was the last year of the s5's that went through this. Correct If needed.

 

theres no s5 na with an lsd. except the gtus

 

two threads on the same subject in the last 24 hours merged.

 

thank me for that one :P

anyway, what about the 'verts? They are supposedly the most expensive of the bunch, so I'd love to know where mazda went cheap on convertibles.

 

The verts were built on a seperate/different production line than the coupes were, so other than standard S5 things like the PD, gauges, stabilzer bar end links- stuff like that; they pretty much stayed the same thoughout the production run.

 

awesome.

someone mentioned the FD guys modify their temp guage to make the reading linear, I'd really prefer to keep the stock guage, is it possible to do this with an fc?

 

Temp gauges (and gas level gauges) were designed to run non-linear for your typical stupid consumer.  Surveys have showed that if the needle moved too much, most drivers would become overly worried.  The gauges were characterized to only move when necessary.  So you're basically undoing what most car manufacturers design into the system.


-Ted

 

that might be out of context but an s5 is about 150lbs more than an s4. or to put it another way my 20b is within 110lbs of a gtus...

 

exactly!! on the gas gauge there is so much buffer built in to it. once i drove around for about 40 mies after it passed "E" then i put 3 gal in and it just barely bumped back up to "E".

 

From what I can see the S4 Turbo is 2850lbs and the S5 is 2987lbs (+137lbs), but the weight of the S4 didn't include power steering and anti lock brakes which narrow the gap quite a bit if, in fact, the S4 was equipped with these options.

 

The temp gauge still has no scale, so it's not that much more useful. An aftermarket gauge is much better.

 

Just a FYI
1988 TII list was $22535 (PS option was $500) did not have leather, CD, or anti lock brakes.
1989 TII list was $27254 (Leather option $1000) No CD.

 

Not sure if it's aluminum but mine HAS an underbelly pan...it's not particularly heavy either

 

yes, I am fully aware of this, thus the reason I said I'd like to keep the stock guage, so I wouldn't get the reply "get an aftermarket guage"

what do you mean 'has no scale' ??

I will retain the stock guage, so I'm wondering if there is a way to make it better while it's there.

 

No scale, as in it has no temperature markings. It's either cold, hot, or somewhere inbetween. It's not like an aftermarket gauge where you can say it is exactly X degrees, you can only say it is so far between hot and cold.

That's the exact reason why I have an aftermarket water temp guage in my car.

 

my hazard light flashes O.o weird..

 

I see, I would still like to know more about this though.

 

or take an aftermarket gauge, that is temp rigged into the car, and remove the gauge plastic and mark the scale on the factory gauge.

Then throw out the aftermarket gauge

 

I was thinking of something like that... except using an external digital guage and marking the stock one, or simply taking a mental note of which points are what temperature. But my guage doesn't ever move above 'normal' in the middle of the guage. So would switching to an s4 sender fix this? and would the guage be linear?