Expensive Mistakes
Bought an FD=expensive mistake
Car only costed me $4,600 delivered
Compression test revealed 80 PSI on each rotor, rich smokey exhaust, clutch disc was almost non-existant
Rebuilt motor myself using OEM kit, compression 90's-100's Front/Back. new exedy clutch/flywheel, pettit ast, etc
Keeps flooding, has a low coolant light that won't turn off along with the alarm tone, exhaust still rich and smokey, but not as bad with newer cat'd exhaust installed. New OEM OMP lines since the SS lines defeat the purpose of them being clear.
TOTAL thus far and still not plated/registered $10,000+
Can't wait for it to finally be fixed so I can drive it for a short while before selling it. I'm going back to more reliable cars, which sucks because I love the looks of my FD.
Car only costed me $4,600 delivered
Compression test revealed 80 PSI on each rotor, rich smokey exhaust, clutch disc was almost non-existant
Rebuilt motor myself using OEM kit, compression 90's-100's Front/Back. new exedy clutch/flywheel, pettit ast, etc
Keeps flooding, has a low coolant light that won't turn off along with the alarm tone, exhaust still rich and smokey, but not as bad with newer cat'd exhaust installed. New OEM OMP lines since the SS lines defeat the purpose of them being clear.
TOTAL thus far and still not plated/registered $10,000+
Can't wait for it to finally be fixed so I can drive it for a short while before selling it. I'm going back to more reliable cars, which sucks because I love the looks of my FD.
Oh, first purchase I made was the HKS dual air intake kit BEFORE getting my car delivered. I was unaware it came with a TD06-20G single turbo kit installed. So yeah, if anyone is looking for an HKS dual air intake kit, I have one for sale with brand new filters...not listed yet.
Full Member
Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 123
Likes: 0
From: Italy
Shipped my 7 from Japan to Italy. Took 90 days, 2nd day there I opened the throttle hard and she blew! Maybe it should have been babied a bit after being on a boat too long. $4k for new engine (shipping costs a lot). What was said above about anything rubber being brittle, I replaced every hose during the engine swap and paid a guy 400 euros to build me a new wire harness, w/ new connectors and everything. Now I live in Germany, about 40 min from the ring, weather has been crappy since arriving here, so waiting for spring time to race it there.
Shipped my 7 from Japan to Italy. Took 90 days, 2nd day there I opened the throttle hard and she blew! Maybe it should have been babied a bit after being on a boat too long. $4k for new engine (shipping costs a lot). What was said above about anything rubber being brittle, I replaced every hose during the engine swap and paid a guy 400 euros to build me a new wire harness, w/ new connectors and everything. Now I live in Germany, about 40 min from the ring, weather has been crappy since arriving here, so waiting for spring time to race it there.
Last edited by 95R_Bathurst; Dec 31, 2011 at 12:09 AM.
Shipped my 7 from Japan to Italy. Took 90 days, 2nd day there I opened the throttle hard and she blew! Maybe it should have been babied a bit after being on a boat too long. $4k for new engine (shipping costs a lot). What was said above about anything rubber being brittle, I replaced every hose during the engine swap and paid a guy 400 euros to build me a new wire harness, w/ new connectors and everything. Now I live in Germany, about 40 min from the ring, weather has been crappy since arriving here, so waiting for spring time to race it there.
I wanna see videos of the 7 at the ring! make sure you take some!!
Full Member
Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 123
Likes: 0
From: Italy
Sweet! I'll be bringing mine from Japan in Feb. Will be arriving in March. Not sure how long the car will take to get there as a friend of mine said his Surf beat him there. He took a month of leave, which is what I'll be doing as well. Which base are you at? Oh, and I just rebuilt my engine, but I'll definitely keep that in mind once it arrives!
Thread Starter
Joined: Feb 2010
Posts: 1,105
Likes: 115
From: Sacramento, Ca
Air force guys? I wish I was lucky enough to be stationed in Japan or Ramstein. Lol. I'm at shaw in SC right now. But that's enough off topic for now :p
I ordered new SS omp lines and copper washers the other day. Upon removing my nozzles I tested them via the FSM and both were bad! So I paid to have them overnight Saturday delivery to me from ray at Malloy. (he really is the man by the way!) the shipping was more than the nozzles
but I don't have enough time to wait for them to come in to get the 7 back together before I have to go back to work. Lol.
I ordered new SS omp lines and copper washers the other day. Upon removing my nozzles I tested them via the FSM and both were bad! So I paid to have them overnight Saturday delivery to me from ray at Malloy. (he really is the man by the way!) the shipping was more than the nozzles
but I don't have enough time to wait for them to come in to get the 7 back together before I have to go back to work. Lol.
Came home with an Alfa.
My alfa only had 1300cc with 90 din hp. That would have been equivalent to a 180 hp na FC but the car only was 2400 lb.
No expensive mistakes yet.....
Most of my bone head moves have been correctable before they got too bad. I'm planning to revamp my build soon and shoot for 500whp. We'll see if that is a mistake or not.
Most of my bone head moves have been correctable before they got too bad. I'm planning to revamp my build soon and shoot for 500whp. We'll see if that is a mistake or not.
not cool!
And the biggest mistake I ever made was taking my car to Rick's Rotary Performance in Pleasanton, Ca a few years ago. Shady, unbelievably terrible work at truly astronomical prices. $128 to swap a fuel pump (which I can do in 15 mins), engine sitting on unbolted engine mounts, charged a rebuild, then charged extra for "installing injectors," and the list goes on for pages.
$128 for a fuel pump swap... compare that to other shops that work on Porsche, Ferrari, etc. I know a few guys who have Ferrari's and they LOVE their FD's because you basically get $200k performance car at a fraction of the price!!
In fact, Rick's Rotary was the main reason why I got a FD in the first place. I bought a blown vr locally, and had the engine rebuilt and replaced turbos with BNRs. I've had mine almost 4 years and absolutely no problems with almost 20k since rebuild. I STILL have yet to get an aftermarket ecu (only using Petite, but still at 10psi ) and when I picked up my car, he just said "it will last forever!"
During my rebuild, I bought a Griffin radiator instead of the Fluydine or Koyo, and so there was some grinding to do to get to fit right, which cost extra, prolly $120 or so ... I had no problem with that.. my choice, I shoulda got the Koyo... but the Griffin is a good quality unit, always have temps around 180-185.
Looking over the last 4 years, best thing I did was get BNR's, even if I only run stock boost... otherwise Im sure I would have replaced the twins with who knows how many defunct units and instead Ive had no problems... I know, some you (theorie) can swap these babies out in no time flat....
heck, I just went out over New Years and had a blast doing 4th gear pulls 70-120 against other Porsche's, Vettes, M3's ... and my stock fd held its own pretty damn well -- the cold air helps a bit!! Not to mention everyone standing in line getting movie tickets and turning around to look at the FD! win win!
Thanks Ricks!
So I bought my FD about three weeks ago. Since my purchase, I have purchased many toys for it and reliability upgrades as well as the usual tune ups. On my first weekend working on it, I snapped the vacuum lines on the pressure tank like old candy canes. Ran to the store and got some cheapo vacuum hose until my silicone hose comes in. I was removing my charge relief valve hose and shattered the 90 degree elbow that goes to the valve. Got some heater hose and rigged that one up. While removing some harness connectors, the casings cracked. Not much I can do there. Removed damn near everything today in preparation for Azeknightz custom solenoid rack and a full vacuum hose replacement. While I was at it I installed new turbo coolant lines (what a nightmare btw) and of course, broke a nipple off the primary turbo inlet pipe. Got the part ordered through Ray. Seems like all the most expensive parts are the easiest to break -.-
Im no newbie mechanic. Ive been working on cars for years and ive learned to take careful accountability of both my tools and hardware from the car. I know work on multi million dollar fighter aircraft in the air force and maintenance discipline from work truly follows you home. My 7 has 40650 on the clock and I've concluded that everything that was at one point rubber under the hood has now become very brittle plastic. I cannot imagine the pain of working on a 7 with 80k on the clock @.@ I've still got much left to do but I'm awaiting parts
So here's the question. What's your most expensive mistake or time consuming screw up you've encountered while working on your 7?
Im no newbie mechanic. Ive been working on cars for years and ive learned to take careful accountability of both my tools and hardware from the car. I know work on multi million dollar fighter aircraft in the air force and maintenance discipline from work truly follows you home. My 7 has 40650 on the clock and I've concluded that everything that was at one point rubber under the hood has now become very brittle plastic. I cannot imagine the pain of working on a 7 with 80k on the clock @.@ I've still got much left to do but I'm awaiting parts
So here's the question. What's your most expensive mistake or time consuming screw up you've encountered while working on your 7?
lots of brittle under the hood!TRev
Joined: Mar 2006
Posts: 550
Likes: 3
From: Predominantly educated metropolitan area
Waiting for afgmoto1978 to chime in. He has single handedly spent more money on mistakes than every forum member combined in terms of cost. That guy has gone through like 10 motors and countless turbos, ecu's, you name it. Lol.
Expensive mistake: Not understanding the water temp gauge - didn't shut down when the needle went to what I thought was "warm". 1/2 way between horizontal and the hot mark is too hot. Never quite recovered properly - was probably getting tired at the time - with a good rebuild somewhat later it runs better than new!
The most expensive mistakes are caused by not searching this forum lol.
its always fun breaking something or screwing something up THEN finding out on 7club someone already did that and gave a warning to others.. nothing better then reading something like that to kick you in the *** while youre already down...
also paying x12434 for a part when you can get it from 7club or ray for cheaper................
just a heads up, if youre staying with the twins, you can get replacement parts on the forum for PENNIES. alot of the twin parts you can buy 4-5 of them before they equally new price...
its always fun breaking something or screwing something up THEN finding out on 7club someone already did that and gave a warning to others.. nothing better then reading something like that to kick you in the *** while youre already down...
also paying x12434 for a part when you can get it from 7club or ray for cheaper................
just a heads up, if youre staying with the twins, you can get replacement parts on the forum for PENNIES. alot of the twin parts you can buy 4-5 of them before they equally new price...
My biggest mistake is taking it to a shop. Dudes scammed me a couple of dollars telling me to replace parts that didn't need to be replaced. Me being new to the fd and not as mechanically inclined as I am now, I had no choice but to agree to their suggestions and pricing. I don't want to get into detail because im ashamed to say and it will get me pissed.
Let's just say I spent about 3000-3500 dollars more than what I should have spent.
Now I have trust issues with both my cars, not only the fd and I try to work on them myself. Although I have to plan ahead because I will have to trust a shop if and when a major problem does occur to my cars to a point where I am unable or don't have the tools to fix.
Let's just say I spent about 3000-3500 dollars more than what I should have spent.
Now I have trust issues with both my cars, not only the fd and I try to work on them myself. Although I have to plan ahead because I will have to trust a shop if and when a major problem does occur to my cars to a point where I am unable or don't have the tools to fix.
Junior Member
Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 36
Likes: 0
From: Washington
Most expensive mistake I made was not installing the r1 oil cooler correctly and lost my oil all on the freeway. The ported motor had 4k on it and I had installed the oil cooler for my single turbo. Oh well went to college on that deal...
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