I vaguely remember having some hand in this. I made blocks anyway, Did I give them to you? Green foam ones..

 

You did—in the sense that you started making these ducts from a cut up used one that Duane from CWR had made (he made a select few, I tried to buy the mold for them BITD), but you never finished them or sent me the bucks. You did give me the idea for the carvable foam though. Here are the progress pics you sent me!

 

Sadly my memory is really bad. It's been a serious issue that I deal with. The result of working with chemicals for almost 20 years and being lax about proper respirators etc.
I remembered something to this effect, in any event I'm glad you did eventually get the parts you needed!

Thread is awesome, keep it coming!

 

Between 2007 and 2009, changes were minor, mostly aimed at comfort/reliability on track:

1. New built/cryo'd trans from KD Rotary
2. Maval manual steering rack
3. Ditched the A/C
4. Added Sparco EVO seat/fixed rail/harnesses, aftermarket steering wheel

I drove the car to and from the track, and it always got me home (with a couple close calls). In 2010, I started trailering and going faster (and wanting to go even faster), and stuff started breaking so I decided to spend some $$ and make it more trackable and more what I ultimately wanted. No point in waiting, car's not getting any newer.

Coming up:

Brake upgrades, JRZ coilovers, brake ducts, suspension freshening, weight reduction, appearance mods, downforce, etc.

 

I'm just smiling ear to ear.

Crispy

 

You said you tracked the car in the early 2000s. Do you remember a guy named Craig farr. With a ssm fd?

 

I do indeed! Craig was part of our local DCRX7 list with me, Crispy, Rich, and others, and a good guy. Fast driver too.

 

I have known craig through SCCA for the past 7 years.

my dad actually bought that car Sunday. i was very impressed with all the mods that he did back then, and to think that was almost 15 years ago and the car is still an awesome car. pulls hard and has lots of low end power, but i am used to my big single car.

 

We all are still in regular contact with Craig. So glad to see where his car ended up.

Regards,
Crispy

 

Hey all,
Clearly I suck at build threads, and have a TON of stuff to cover that isn't up here, but somebody pinged me looking for pics/info on the Doug Rippie Z06 brake duct adaptation I did, so here they are.

This was a bitch, but the end result is awesome. They are HUGE, the inlet duct is like 4.5", and the outlet is 3.5". So, I grafted on a pice of a standard 3" bumper inlet duct you can get from any racer parts store, attached with pip rivets and sealed with shoe goo. It's mated to same-style bumper ducts at the nose which fit perfectly with the enlarged opening I get with my lip spacer (pictured)... a short 3" brake duct hose connects the two. This routing requires REMOVAL of both fluid tanks, so I don't have a washer tank anymore, and the coolant overflow was relocated to a generic one in the engine bay (pictured).

Then, I had a local shop make 3.5" backing plates to the rotors that are very similar to the 3" ones I had from N-Tech (and are now for sale). The back of the duct is connected to the rotor duct with 3.5" hose. The duct is screwed into the chassis with a self-tapping screw. You also have to trim the fender liners.

BUT, after all that, the wide flat section of the duct means you can turn the wheels and not lunch up the brake duct hose.

 

I've no idea why every picture comes in upside down. Maybe a moderator could fix it, and/or maybe the tech dept at IB could fix this stupid problem.

 

Once you open the attachment it is not upside down

 

Really like the brake ducting.
Post up some more pics of your lip spacer!

 

Here's some info/pics on the lip spacer. It's a bit of an embarrassment that I haven't been able to bring it to the community yet.

https://www.rx7club.com/group-buy-pr...pacer-1050945/

 

I have tons of other mods and developments I could share, but I'm shitty at taking pictures and documenting everything.

 

So you're just lazy? Sounds like a bullshit excuse

 

I have priorities ;-)

 

track car 1st, project thread 2nd. I get it, but it's always helpful when more experienced people like yourself share ideas. Thanks for posting the brake duct pictures (even if upside down).

 

Looking good Pete!

 

Would you say its mandatory to remove the washer/coolant overflow tank?

Awesome work!

 

I bet you can just get by with smaller versions of both (as he did with the coolant overflow). I'm going to start doing some poking around on this soon.

Vibrant makes some nice washer tanks / pumps:
http://vibrantperformance.com/catalo...Path=1022_1249

Shoot. You might just be able to use the rear washer tank and wire/plump it.

 

You absolutely need to remove both tanks to use these... they are literally right in the way. The overflow was pretty easy, and there are a lot of places you could probably find to put it—you might even be able to wedge it in to the near-stock location, but I like to be able to see it since there's no dipstick to check. The overflow I used is from JAZ product, and holds 1 quart, just like my oil catch can. What I like is that they are natural colored, and semi-translucent so you can see how full they are without some sight glass contraption.

The washer tank you could do a mini one like CrispyRX7 did, or just use the rear one with a little wiring/hose routing, but I'd removed that too!

 

While I'm on the brake topic, I wasn't sure everyone was aware these were available, but a few years ago I worked with TiSpeed (now Hard Brakes)to have titanium brake backing plates made for our rear calipers. These do help in isolating heat from the piston. They are available here:

D283 Titanium Brake Shims Mazda RX-7 [TS-T-D0283] : Hard Brakes - Titanium Brake Backing Plates, Brake Shims, Brake Heat Shields

 

Out of order update:

So, I hit the track last month at Summit Point as a warmup after being off for two years getting the single turbo set up. Everything ran great, and I posted a 1:21 on two year old, cycled out tires. HOWEVER, the strangest thing—the alternator tensioning bolt backed itself out and rubbed on the hood and dented it! I have no idea how/why this even happened, the cinch bolt was tight and the alternator/belt hadn't moved.

 

In short, it's not fixable without paint, so I decided to put the vented Seibon hood back on. This one is their "KnightSports-like " design, but the vents are little smaller and the ridges a little sharper. I've had it for a while in my storage, but wasn't happy with the fit. I messed with it and enlarged some holes and now it's not bad—but the larger gaps would show if it were painted silver.