Impressed as hell, as always!

What rack and pinion is that? Re-speed?

 

I'm glad somebody is. I wasn't too impressed with myself when I found that my fiddling had thrown off all of my oh so careful measurements.

It's a Flaming River 15:1 power rack for a fox body Mustang. Re-Speed also uses the fox body Mustang steering rack. So, yes and no?

 

Let me guess. You cut it twice and it was still too short?? I hate when that happens.

 

Actually more so, "I need to move this just a little bit this way and this just a little more thataway" and Voila, start over.

 

After years of trailering it all over the country and getting settled into a new place. I dug her back out and hopefully can get something done this time. I finally made it to DGRR this year and other folks cars lit a fire under my behind to get after it again now that I can. Cheryl's 81 GS is inspirational along with the other 1st gens, The yellow REPU just put a silly smile on my face and Nick's RX3 is breathtaking. Let alone all the oh so pretty FDs and super cool RX8s.

... as they say ... Never give up, never surrender.

 

Holy 10 year thread revival

It was great to finally meet you at Deals Gap Kevin! Looking forward to seeing your progress on this first gen, or maybe even that MG!!

 

Ditto. I've been looking forward to running into you at one of these things for a while now. I loved your FD it's so clean and well done.

Yikes! I guess it has been 10 years hasn't it? Sometimes life really can suck you down a rabbit hole. I had to make up my mind which to get back to first. The SA won out as it was my first love affair with building one of these cars that go hmmmm. So now I'm researching RX8 parts. Yes I know, I'm a parts who*e.

 

congratulations! and ... congratulations! i can totally relate.

 

Thanks it's good to see you're still kicking around these parts. It's been a far longer hiatus than I planned on.

 

Looks like you've got some type-c on there. Did you convert to the fc hubs and whatnots?

 

I got the tires and wheels from Socks on here when he was upgrading his FD. Even used the wheels were worth more than what I paid for the car initially.
I swapped over to the front hubs, brakes and rotors from an SN95 Mustang Cobra in my quest for better brakes and stronger parts. I love the look of the Type C SSRs on the silver first gen. I may do something different in the future, don't know yet. I need more front track width. I set the front track width at the stock 56 inches, but the SSRs pull it in an extra 2 - 3 inches or so (+42). Back is Ok, maybe still a touch far out, but workable. I'm thinking RX8 parts may be in order.

 

Glad to see you are getting back to it! I missed DGRR again this year, but hopfully next year! Will be keeping an eye on your progress

 

You need DGRR. Motivational event. I bought some RX8 stuffs.

 

It's funny, I've been down there multiple times, both in my FB and my Fiesta ST, but never for an event. I love the area and would actually like to move there, but alas...

Hopefully I'll get to DGRR next year.

 

Hanging out with the rest of the "not quite right between the ears" bunch is the best part of the event.

Still trying to get the wiring done in the garage (once again). I'm getting real tired of having to put wiring in garages before I can use them. Moved the car into the garage. Picked up some parts from Las Vegas and had a new engine and transmission delivered for round 2. I need to start a new build thread as the old one really no longer applies (RX7 1/2?). Most of what I did worked out in the end, but I was less than satisfied with my front suspension (It seemed like a good idea at the time and it was highly entertaining). Now that I can get back to it, I'll try a different route. I see others have done variations of this, so at least I've got a little heads up before I do more stupid stuff.

 

I'll be watching your other thread - I am in the middle of doing NB miata subframes on my 83. Will be interesting to see how you fit the Rx8 parts in there. Also, I have a 4 port renesis swapped into one of my other ones - any questions let me know

 

Too cool, looking forward to seeing the swap!

 

I love this... I am trying to do a similar FC 13b swap into my JDM 78 RX7 SA. Similar to you, I want to use the FC ignition setup and as much of the FC as possible (harness. Cruis, etc...). Most swaps say to change the front cover (12a or 85' 13b) , will the ignition setup still fit? What about the OMP?

I won't be doing a suspension swap because I do not fabricate and my wife has me on a budget. Lol.

Any guidance/info will be appreciated.

 

I will say that S5 convertible looks way too nice to be a parts car. There may be some stuff you will need to do differently as you are dealing with a RHD car as opposed to my LHD car. If you decide to do this, you will need to learn to do at least some fabrication or know someone that can.

You don't need to do suspension mods for a naturally aspirated S4/S5 swap. I only did it because I was bored and a glutton for punishment. (almost hitting a deer because of small tires and laughable brakes may have had something to do with that as well)

You do need the front cover for the mounting from the GSL-SE 13B or the 12A. Racing Beat has the front crossbar mount to go from the 12A to the 13B if you don't have one from a GSL-SE. The 12A and 13B mounting plates are different because the 13B is slightly longer. I'm pretty sure that I used the 86/87 S4 OMP on the cover as it is still mechanical. I can't remember if there was a difference from the 12A OMP or not. I don't know, but I suspect, you could use the 88-91 electric OMP with the proper parts car harness. Pre-mixing is always an option if necessary.

The GSL-SE oil pan is also recommended. The S4 pan will hit unless you want to do some fabrication to make it fit. I don't recommend that unless you have access to an excellent fabricator who can do it for you. Dealing with leaks after the fact is no fun.

I used the entire wiring harness and control boxes plus the necessary S4 switches from my wrecked donor car (I connected the appropriate harness wires to the retained SA ignition/turn signals, hazard, defrost, and light switches, radio stuff, and head/taillights, etc.). I wanted to retain the factory stock ignition, EFI, cruise, et al. It gets involved, but completely doable to combine the two harnesses. The wiring diagrams are available (and a godsend) on foxed.com. I did use the FC instrument cluster which was not difficult to modify for the SA opening. I actually should have tried to incorporate the SA cluster instead as IMO it looks better as well as likely easier to deal with the wiring than modifying the cluster.

I used the S4 five speed as my 4 speed sucked with no OD. The problem is that you need to modify the opening for the shifter because the S4 shifter is further back. It would have been a lot easier and looked a lot cleaner to just find a five speed from a later first gen or GSL-SE. You will need the TII transmission only if you go with a turbo.

You will have to do some fabrication to relocate coils, air intake, etc. I used the FC radiator (modified the opening) mainly because I had it and I knew it worked with the 13B EFI engine. I'm sure a heavy-duty aftermarket radiator designed for the SA/FB radiator opening would likely work just fine. The 13B is going to need more cooling than the 12A. Extra power = extra heat.

I also swapped in the FC fuel tank/pump to run the EFI as close to factory stock as I could. This did necessitate cutting out the spare tire well, sealing the rear deck back up with the FC floor so I would have maintenance access holes, and mounting the tank underneath the floor. Not difficult, but necessary for the EFI pump. The downside is trying to get the fuel filler to match up since the FC filler door and the SA filler door are on opposite sides. I just installed it in the center behind my license plate because ... SA. You may be able to install an EFI tray (Tanks Inc. has them) in the original tank (dunno) or just get a new tank from Tanks Inc. and have it modified for the proper filler opening and adding the appropriate parts to make it work. They have a cool electronic box to adjust your sensor outputs that I'm dying to tryout when I get to it.

My thinking with trying to stay close to factory stock was that it would be easier to find parts when I broke it. The S4 engine is not a powerhouse, but it does have almost half again as much power as the 12A. The EFI is utterly smooth and trouble free. Cruise was a nice addition but mount the cruise control switch somewhere besides the center console. I had problems with the passenger constantly hitting it with their knee engaging the cruise at an inopportune time. Keeping the SA heater controls, and the rest of the interior parts is a plus compared to the 86-87 LogiCon and unreliable electronics from the FCs (some stuff you can't avoid using, just make sure it's accessible if you have to get at it later). Overall, I probably could have done some things easier/better, but it turned out well and was dead reliable and lots of fun. IMO the naturally aspirated S4/S5 FCs are the most reliable rotary out there. In the light SA chassis, it will light up the 13s quite easily if you're not careful. Others have build threads with how they did this type of swap with some very good ideas. Most just put a carburetor on it and avoid all the silliness though. I hope that helps.

 

mechanical OMP from an FC will fit on the GSL-SE front cover but not a 12A.
Electronic OMP has a different bolt pattern so some modification would be needed for either cover.

 

Thank you both for the info.

In addition to the GSLSE Oil Pan, do I need a different pickup tube or can I just buy the oil pan?

The AC And Dash info is interesting. I would like to leave the stock cluster and hvac controls. I will look at the wiring as you suggested. And read that portion of your build to see if it has the details.

 

Always get the matching pickup for the specific oil pan if possible. Fabricating a pickup gets very involved with lots of cutting, fitting, and checking with clay to establish distance to bottom of pan. You don't want to go down that route unless there is no other choice. I modified my pan and wished I hadn't. Go over to Sgt Fox's site (HTTP:/RX7.FOXED.CA) and get the wiring diagrams. The diagrams are downloadable and free. It is polite to leave a donation if you find this useful. My advice is to use as much of the SA stuff as you can. Some stuff, like the door opening switches, and pedal switches don't matter so much, but anything visible is better off left stock and modify the wiring to work with it. You are going to become an expert on S1 thru S5 wiring very shortly.