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Boy I never thought I'd be making an RX7 build thread, but here we are! And what better way to start a build thread than with a background intro. Hopefully I can keep a steady trickle of updates for this car and do my part of keeping a forum alive.
Basically born into the curse of car enthusiasm with a heavy focus on antique BMW's thanks to my dad. Still have my first car, a '73 tii, as well as an E30 that I got a few years after that when both of those vehicles were incredibly cheap. (If only I could say the same about getting an FD). Helping out on all the projects in the driveway since before I can remember, not even sure when I first changed the oil in one of the cars. Waking up early on Sundays for F1 with the sound system cranked for the starts, then playing Virtua Racing or the Senna F1 game on Sega immediately after, then moving into Gran Turismo a few years later which is where I was first exposed to the beauty that is an FD RX7.
But like many people, I never thought I'd own one because of all of the hurr durr apex seals go boom rumors and stories that still plague these cars. It wasn't until about a month ago that I seriously started looking into an FD as something to fill the void of selling my S2000, and realized that they're as reliable as you make them. Keep up with maintenance, maintain the full cooling system, and don't do stupid aggressive tunes. Basically don't be a 00's hotboi . Seeing plenty of the builds on this forum going strong for years on end really drove that point home, so thanks to y'all I actually bought one!
I ended up finding the car below, totally stock aside from a Racing Beat catback. 109k miles, original owner had it until the start of 2022. Drove it 4.5 hours home and it didn't miss a beat. Took me an hour to organize all of the maintenance receipts starting in 1996. It has a few small scratches and dents, but nothing horrible after 30 years of life. Interior is basically mint, aside from an intermittent instrument cluster and head unit. It's leaking from the oil filter stand, so some OEM o-rings should arrive tomorrow for install this weekend. Other preemptive things on the way in:
-Koyorad Dual Flow radiator and OEM hoses
-Cooler thermostat
-Aftermarket AST
-185°F fan switch
-Shifter bushings and parts
-Boost gauge
The OMP, waterpump, clutch, plugs and wires, IM gaskets, were replaced within the last 10k miles. Rotary compression test showed 90/87/87.
Pics are from the ad, haven't had a chance to do decent ones on my own yet haha
I actually drove my FD FOR WORK as in doing service calls in it back in the day, that lasted about a year or so until I bought. daily driver. Zero problems.
Thanks guys! Super excited about it. My S2000 was picked up this past weekend by the new owner who drove down from Michigan to get it. Definitely shed a tear watching it drive away, until I turned around and saw the FD sitting there.
@ZE Power MX6 yep original motor, and unbelievably clean for sure, almost kind of stressful haha.
Over the past few weeks, drove it a few more times and still can't help but get that stupid grin as it rolls into boost and just keeps pulling. I got a basic mechanical boost gauge to verify what it was actually doing, and sure enough did the 10-8-10 and sometimes down to 8 as it pulled more. However, the cluster not being fully functional was driving me insane so I pulled it a couple weeks ago to see what was up. UNFORTUNATELY, once the cluster was out and I started removing the cluster from the gauge hood, I found evidence that I was definitely not the first person to have done this on the car... unless Mazda had some Tesla-esque shortcuts to get things through production. Pics below show what I'm talking about. Also saw some very mildly tweaked screw heads on the tach mounting screws, so seemed like someone tried to remedy the tach/speedo/odo issue in the past. I sent it out to RX Cluster Worx last week and should have it back this Saturday to see what it's like to actually have functioning gauges in this thing.
Also needs at least one of the rear sphericals replaced, which thankfully six were included with the car. I have a Harbor Freight press at my disposal, so hopefully I can find the time this weekend to get it done and see how it feels.
The car appears to be in very good shape for the mileage, good find!
Someone definitely serviced that cluster before and you can expect the plastic screw lands to break when going in for work. Unfortunately at this point age has gotten the best of them, there are some good replacement options using a variety of plastic repair methods.
The pillow ball bushings seem like a daunting task to take on but with patience it's actually very easy.
@Molotovman thanks, appreciate it! And yeah, I'll need to go back through the repair work done on the gauge hood.
Whelp, ended up helping a friend with some maintenance on his car this weekend so no bushing replacement. However! The gauge cluster made it back from repair, and man is it nice to actually see my revs and speed. Turns out the car has been idling at 1500rpm, which explains the lack of idle brap and why it would sometimes hunt at idle. The AAS was a few turns out, so I turned that all the way in and backed out 1/4 turn. The idle settled down to about 900rpm, so there's still some air getting in somehow. Throttle and cruise cables have a bit of slack in them, so a smoke or starting fluid test is up next (which should've been first, but got impatient ) before moving to TPS and fast idle control issues. But at least for the time being, it runs and feels amazing.
Also forgot to put this in a previous post, did the shifter rebuild a few weeks ago being that there was no record of it. As expected, everything was disintegrating. Now it has that sweet, sweet bolt action feel. Not quite as great as my old S2000 shifter, but still incredible.
Also also, much like the FD, I picked up a head unit that is continuing to rise in price so figured I should go for it before they get too wild. I always wanted to get one for my E30 or tii, but figured the FD is more deserving of it. The face plate is actually glass, and the controls are true potentiometers.
The OEM head unit display is totally bled out, and only the center speaker works sometimes. I assume the speaker amps circuit boards all have issues at this point, so this install will probably stay on the backburner until I pick up an amp.
Definitely not cheap for a basic single DIN, there are plenty on eBay that are multiple times more expensive than this one was. Always seems like the ones out of Japan try to command a premium. The double DIN's I was looking at before deciding to go screenless were around the same price as this was so it all worked out!
02-02-23, 08:49 PM
. Seeing plenty of the builds on this forum going strong for years on end really drove that point home, so thanks to y'all I actually bought one!
