When you plate stuff yourself, what are you using for passivation afterwards? I've got the guts of a small plating line setup at my work, but I'm having trouble finding a supply / info on passivation :-/.

 

It's readily available here! It's either called gold or coloured passivate, one of the common ones.

First start on a near dead battery, I was surprise it went :

 

This is great. Love what you're doing here

 

WOW that fired up beautifully and ran VERY smooth. Excellent! You should be stoked on that!

Dale

 

When does the bidding start?

 

Cheers Guys

Always a relief when they start, especially after a full rewire and rebuild haha. I think the rattle at the start was the heat shield, I bent it slightly on the downpipe removing the motor so need to bend it back. The idle is also a touch high, might just need some miles on it or the TB may need a little adjustment after the rebuild.

Also the clutch needs a bit more bleeding as there is still some air there. I'll get these sorted then it's time for a test drive and some break in miles!

 

I did hear the air pump running on first start up, with the intake not hooked up it's pretty loud. Totally normal though.

Toss that intake on and for for a drive!

Dale

 

Thought I'd get up early and bleed the clutch on the FD so I could run it into work for the first test drive. I noticed the reservoir was low so topped it up and watched it slowly go down.... Generally not a good sign for a clutch that semi works.

Popped the slave out of the box and couldn't see any leaks so checked the master to find it was shot, the seal must have got stuck from sitting since November then broke when I started the car.





I've ordered a new master cylinder from Mazda which has to come from Japan so it looks like the FD wont be running until sometime next week, d'oh!

The worst bit was it has been leaking brake fluid into the drivers footwell, so I had to lift the carpet and give it all a good clean, glad I didn't keep topping it up!

For anyone considering the AutoExe front brace, I can confirm the gearbox cover and starter can be removed easily leaving it in place which is nice, I was hoping to not have to remove it for the bleeding.

 

That stinks, but better that happens now than on the road somewhere!

I recommend getting a new clutch slave and stainless braided clutch hose as well. When one component goes out the other 2 aren't far behind.

Dale

 

Yeah I've got a sbg braided line on there now and ordered a new slave with the master as I'd rather fit and forget and bleed it once!

The new master and slave will not arrive for 2-3 weeks though so I've also bought a rebuild kit for this master so I can get on with using the car and swap them out later.

 

I've been following this build for a while now but have never commented...to start the quality is top notch! I can see why you went with OEM replacements for master and slave cylinders.

In case you want to get the car on the road sooner: Exedy makes an identical master cylinder compared to OEM and it only costs $35.

I just replaced both on my car, the slave cylinder was a pain in the *** for me. Hopefully you have better luck lol

Link to master cylinder: MC495 - EXEDY OEM Clutch Master Cylinder - EXEDY Globalparts - Performance and OEM Clutches and Flywheels

 

Thanks for the link and kind comments . Hopefully the rebuild kit will arrive today to rebuild my old master to get me by until the new stuff arrives, that one you linked is considerably cheaper than oem!

 

What comes to mind is the clutch mod we used to do on the 626 GE, by using a clutch master from the 626 GD on the later models, since it has its own tank, and not the drain tube that the 90+ cars had.

 

I don't mind the shared reservoir, it makes sense as it's quite a crowded area and the master is divided so one chamber cannot drain the other. It's annoying that if the clutch master fails it drains into the footwell though. Far from ideal!

 

Interesting my 1999 S8 with 156,000 km clutch pedal just went soft. After seeing the above post, I thought, "Oh,oh!".



I tend to double clutch whether I need to or not, up and down, but I was thinking I was living on borrowed time. Ordered an aftermarket horror show from rock Auto (C$105 shipped), hope it works OK.

Luckily the clutch pedal went to the floor about 500 meters from home so I was able to roll in neutral right up to my front door.!

But scary that it went out so quickly. resevoir was still near the top (if not overfull).

Best to check the condition of the master cylinder reasonably often.

(BTW: Rockauto said the Exedy version was "out of stock".)

 

Yeah these things go bad eventually, FD's are old cars now, best to replace them with new and forget. My new one arrived from Mazda, they don't come with braided hoses now but otherwise are the same. Looks like a smart with plated fittings so I'm happy with it. I'll get it and the slave swapped out at some point.

It's good you caught yours before it started leaking too much, it's not fun to clean out of the footwell as it goes onto the foot rest then down under the carpet!

 

My local mechanic says it ls likely "bypassing" as the leak is not overly apparent. Order ed the slave (C$109) and the master (C$160) from Mazda Canada.

They say four business days up from LA.

Problem is my mechanic is 1.15 hours out in the valley. But I figure I can get there with only hitting eight lights if I stick to the freeway most of the distance.

Mechanic thinks that even if it hits the floor a few times i should be able to prime it up and keep going;.

 

"Rat Box"
LOL

 

I did not make it.



Last three miles (downhill) was by flatbed.

New OEM master and slave, plus new lines. Clutch works great now.

 

Thanks to you, i am now the proud owner of a small chemical factory. Those damn bling oem parts was just to damn sexy.

 

Glad to be of help .

I need to update this thread actually as there has been developments, been slacking.

 

Yes, get on that, I bloody love seeing your work, inspirational :-).

I cannot for the life of me find anyone over here in New Zealand that will supply my passivation solutions. Still farming out all my electroplating :-/. I've gotten into powder coating though with the relatively cheap Eastwood's kit, and its legit amazing / easy / clean. Would recommend.

 

I bought a kit from Gateros in the UK. They ship international, but its probably not cheap to NZ.

 

I've got a Caswell kit, but they wont ship any passivation stuff, its classed as a DG, so isn't really possible to send apparently. I'll keep hunting :-).

 

Gone a slightly different route with the car. Trying to make it a bit more Modern. Link ECU, DBW, direct fire ignition and a modern fuel system to cope with the higher ethanol content fuel that is becoming standard in the UK soon.

The base for this was a couple of new parts from Mazda.... New housings, plates, sump, front cover, rx-8 e-shaft, rotors and pretty much everything else new inside the motor with the exception of the stationary gears.



The new rotors were side clearanced, tip clearanced and balanced. The whole rotating assembly was balanced as we have a bit of a mix going on here with my original front counter weight, new rotors, rx8 e-shaft, aftermarket rear counter weight and flywheel.





To anyone considering the aftermarket rear counterweights available, I personally would not run one without getting the assembly balanced after seeing the amount of weight needing to be added to balance my assembly, try and source an oem rear counterweight if you can. They come up pretty light all the time according to the company that balanced my assembly. You can imagine what that does to the rear stat bearing over time!



New fuel system using Radium Auto parts, 1300 ID primaries and 1700 ID secondaries. The reason for the size is I'll be running a flex fuel sensor and want the option to run higher ethanol content fuels. Hardlines are stainless steel.







Cleaned up the UIM casting, removing the unnecessary brackets. I'll remove the final throttle brackets and get it blasted again when I'm sure I like DBW, for now they can stay! Gone with the later GM 90mm TB and FFE adaptor. With all the adaptor and uim ported to flow nicely with the 90mm TB.