I found a truck scale today thanks to turbojeff and weighed my 87 base, which has a five lug swap, 91 Coupe wheels with 205/60 Potenzas, stock exhaust, and all the weight removed that I listed in the thread "inventory of weight reduction".

With my fire extinguisher, steel doughnut spare, stock aluminum jack, and ~2 gallons less than a full tank of gas, the car weighed 2420 pounds. The rear axle weighed 1220, for a 1200 / 1220 distribution front to rear, or 49% / 51%.

I'm pretty happy the result. The car is completely streetable - it has a heater, blower motor, emissions, and won't set off car alarms when it drives by.

 

Nice! And you didn't really hack anything, just removed some of the stuff you can live without.

 

Well, I "hacked" out most of the dashboard reinforcement, but the car looks and sounds stock. Now to get it to pull 170rwhp . . . that would be great.

 

what exactly did you remove?

 

Wow. That is quite inspiring. I need to go weigh my car sometime.

 

Copy 'n pasted from the thread "inventory of weight reduction" :

Over the past year while my FC was just a project and not driven, I removed items from the car which I did not find essential. The car was a stock 87 base with no sunroof, stereo, bins, but a/c. I'm guessing it was in the 2600-2700 pound range.

Here is a list of what I have removed, their estimated weights in pounds, and a total.

Hood (steel - alum. wt.) 30
Bumper Support 25
Washer Bottle 5
AC Compressor 10
AC mount bracket 1
AC bracket studs, bolts 1
AC Evaporator 10
AC dryer 2
AC Condensor 7
Tow Brackets 10
Tow Bracket bolts 5
Exhaust hangers 1
Engine bay brackets 1
Air Pump silencer 3
Brake Ducts 1
Dash reinforcement 10
Logicon & wires 5
Tar 35
Rubber mats 10
Rear anti-sway bar, mounts 10
TB Mod parts 2
Two (front) pulleys 1


Total of weight removed: 185

 

OC any pics of your fc with the cobra wheels?

 

How extensive is the sound deadening tar? Just on the floorboards?
I assume you chipped it all out by hand?

 

Personally I think the bumper support, washer bottle, tow hooks, Logicon and anti-sway bar are pretty dumb things to remove from a street car. Weight savings should be from removing redundant or unnecessary items, which these really aren't.

At least the spare and jack are there. Removing those is really dumb...

 

Well us guys tend to need those tow hooks less than boosted rx-7 owners...
But yes I cant seem to understand why people remove their spare and jack, Ive used mine a few times, who knows what I would have done without it.

 

Seems you lost a lot of parts that you really should have kept. Removing the bumper support=absolutely stupid. Now the damage is that much worse if you get in an accident Exhaust hangars? You realize that a lot of strain on the exhaust parts from the absence of hangars can crack the manifold, and cause pieces to break off as rust builds. All for 1 measly pound.

What a big waste, now your car is missing lots of convenience parts to be .15 seconds faster in the 1/4. It's a ******* street car, you don't need to save every pound on the street! If it was a race car, then yeah, weight reduction is necessary, but on the street it's really dumb to strip stuff off. The only effect it'll have on the street is that you'll get better gas mileage. Maybe you'll save $10 over the course of a year.

 

mine prolly weighed around 2200 at one point, but i put all the carpet back in, so it prolly is only at around 2350 now. mines still slow though, LOL

 

Thank you for the constructive and positive comments. They have really helped me reach my goals for my FC modifications, and I feel enriched to have made your acquaintence.






. . . jackass

 

Heh heh- I thought you were gonna be all diplomatic there for a second...

 

Every little bit counts!

 

yes, theres a few pics of my car on the board with the wheels. do a search for 'action pics of my 7" in this forum. and a search for 'cobra wheels' in the wheels and tires forum. PM me any questions.

 

wow, NICE!

and a rear weight bias too.. that's pretty cool.

my car weighs 29XX... turbos ain't light.

 

LOL you guys are such light weights. I think I dropped my mk3 like 300lbs or so, so I should be around 3200ish!

 

2400 must be fun .

questions: what did you replace the logicon with? cables? winches and pullies?

my thoughts on the rebar: with it; its designed to absorb impacts, without it the frame will directly take the hit, and since its designed to fold in the event of a major crash it will. you didnt just make the car a deathtrap but any crash damage will be more "severe" then without it. you may want to think about putting something in there, like a 2x4, i dunno

mike

 

The car is great, but turbojeff gave me a ride in his FD, which is quite a bit faster than my car, so 2400 is relative to the power and suspension / tires it comes with. It definately feels lighter than before, especially during tight turns.

The logicon came out because I refuse to troubleshoot some electrical engineers modular circuits just go get my heater and fan to work. I am replacing it with three choke cables and a rheostat. They won't look ghetto; they all look the same: neat round black handles with a round black knurled **** for the heater speed. The cables do the heat / cold, def. / panel vents, and rec / fresh functions. I don't need labels on them to remember which one will do what, and the center console will be a lot simpler looking that way.

My stereo surround is pissing me off and it's going in the trash, too. I will build another surround like the kind that the Porsche 928 comes with. I'm thinking of replacing the top rectangular vents with two round ones further down the console, so I can mount a few gauges right at the top where I can see them easiest.

I do need to tie the front frame rails together to stiffen up the chassis, and will probably fab a metal or composite beam just for that purpose, but I have been accident free as a driver for the past 7 years and I don't intend to get in any accidents. I have avoided many accidents by dodging cars in the past; you just have to dodge an idiot sometimes to escape a crash.

 

I think there are better things to remove @ 1lbs than your brake ducts too.

 

Hmm lets see, I've removed:
Every aspect of emissions control
Complete A/C system but left the blower and heater (I'll burn, but NOT freeze)
Anything I felt was irrelevant behind the seats(which was damn near everything)
Sound deadening tar and rubber mats
Stereo
Power steering
Plus ran a single exhaust to add power and save weight.

Less weight is the equivalent to adding horsepower. Why? Simple. You are changing the power the weight ratio to your favor. It doesnt take a genious to figure out that a 3000 pound car with the same horsepower as a 2600 pound car will lose.

 

God job integra, my removal list is very similar to yours. Good job, keep up the good work.

-Markus

"I dont have carpet anymore. Had interior Repainted/clearcoated"

 

The stock brake ducts are not functional. They direct air at the splash guards which cover the rotors, and the calipers are at the back of the axle.

 

heres OC's pics for ya guys pic 1