I chased a similar tach problem on mine. Had spark on the trailing side but no tach. Read everything i could, finally discovered its fairly common as these things age for the tach to act up when cold. Sure enough, after letting mine warm up good (and turning the heater on) mine would start moving. Started slow, would jump up to about 1000 and sit there, then move a bit more, then finally start acting normal. Took 10 minutes or so for it to start working correctly. Ended up switching the tach with another tach i had and it seems to work fine. While i had the 2 tachs out, i could manually move the needle, my old one would "stick" when moved and the other would move back to zero smoothly. I am thinking if you could get some sort of lube into the mechanism it might solve the issue, but since my "new" one works I just left well enough alone. Dash cluster is fairly easy to pull if you wanted to try....good luck!

Thanks Barron. That helps. I started pulling the cluster already so all that is left is to disconnect and remove. I'll try to lube it since I don't have another tach right now.

When you get the cluster out and the lense off, take your finger and gently swing the tach needle. See if it "sweeps" smoothly back or stops. The one I had that was acting up would stop 95% of the time at about 1k on the face, other times it would slow down but return to 0. Do this outside on a cool/cold day, as i think air temp is the cause for the sticking. Remember, my tach still worked once warm, so i dont thing there is anything wrong per se with the tach, except seemingly its pivot needed lubing. Since I had the other tach that moved freely, I simply swapped mine and will mess with lubing the other one later... When you get into the tach you will see what I mean. Hope this helps. Keep us posted....

FINALLY was able to take the car for a ride today...it proved to be just as depressing as it was inspirational :(...my metering pump is completely inop (knew I should have used a blockoff plate and premix) My driveshaft yoke shield is rubbing something and my mechanical fan must be unbalanced in some way because it causes the water pump bearing to howl at anything over 4000rpm.

I am a bit concerned about running the car without the metering pump working correctly, but it was just a short drive. I hope I didn't damage anything to badly.

Its amazing how nice it drove otherwise considering that all is shot suspension wise on the car. Just gotta take a step back and make things right one repair at a time. :dammit:

just premix until you fix it...

I got a block off plate from RE Speed and will be eliminating the oil metering pump completely and just running pre-mix. I'm sure the ratio is gonna be off a bit since my gas gauge is also inop...but I hear this is a very common problem on these cars and a new sender is probably the fix I need.

Its been a while since I have updated this thread and have been using the "today" thread as a update center, but figure it is time to get this going again
http://img26.imageshack.us/img26/107...2051500284.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-05-15

Put the car in the garage to pull down my noisy water pump, leaky oil pan, and siezed brakes...also took the opportunity to pull down the front suspension for strut carteidge, spring and control arm bushing replacement, as well as new front ball joints (more on this in a minute)

My parts delivery...
http://img194.imageshack.us/img194/1...2050200239.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-05-02
http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/722...2050200240.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-05-02

while the car was up realized my master was leaking

http://img18.imageshack.us/img18/587...2051500286.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-05-15

forgot what a great "paint remover" brake fluid is. Gonna need to address this. For a quick and dirty build, this car is starting to become a major project.

Took the front suspension to work over the weekend to get things stared.

http://img443.imageshack.us/img443/4...2051300278.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-05-13

front suspension almost there... Racing Beat spings and tokico blue's installed...really need some strut tops, but would love some re speed camber plates instead...

as for my front ball joint replacement, this was a first...it was MURDER to remove these suckers...8lb sledge took care of business to get them out. After removal the new ones just didn't seat properly and wanted to drop out. Mazda says they are not replaceable and you must buy the entire control arm with the ball joint installed, but at 169 dollars a pop...I had a better idea

http://img811.imageshack.us/img811/2...2051300274.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-05-15

yes...I welded the ball joint to the control arm...lol :lol: I have talked to a couple of people about this and it is a fairly common way of dealing with distorted ball joint bores...been doing front end work for years and yet this was my first encounter with this type of problem. (please excuse my welds...I'd like to think they are getting better, but I am aware this is not the case) A tack probably would have got the job done, but I need the practice.

I have the ReSpeed bushing kit and all that is left to replace up front is the strut rod bushings.

I also got the opportunity to begin my oil pan replacement so I disconnected the header, steering linkage and motor mounts and jacked up the drivetrain to remove the oil pan...had a nasty crack and this...

http://img403.imageshack.us/img403/7...2051500285.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-05-15

looks like a pick up tube will need to be swapped out as well...:)

Back at it...for today at least
 

Time to move this along...I was able to FINALLY get my oil pan in and the engine sitting back down on its mounts. Time has been really scarce lately to work on anything but shuttle busses at work and customer cars after work as well as getting boxes packed for moving, meeting with teachers for end of the school year (I have a special needs daughter) and dealing with dear old mom...lol:lol: but here are some pics from the few moments of sanity I was able to capture today.

oil pan in.

http://img837.imageshack.us/img837/2...2060600313.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-06-06

http://img339.imageshack.us/img339/9...2060600314.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-06-06

I was feeling productive so I thought I would start re-installing some of my front suspension. I was able to score some castor/camber plates to replace my worn out strut mounts, but soon came upon a problem.

http://img204.imageshack.us/img204/7...2060600311.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-06-06

http://img225.imageshack.us/img225/7...2060600312.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-06-06

it appears that the part that replaces the strut mount does not fit over the shaft of the tokico blue struts that I installed. It clears the threaded section fine, but the part after that is a dead stop. I should mention that these are "Seven's Only Racing" castor/camber plates, so if anyone has any insight into what I need to do to get these to work, let me know. Here are some pics to show the problem I am having...

tokico strut shaft with mount removed.
http://img525.imageshack.us/img525/3...2060600316.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-06-06

trying to install
http://img560.imageshack.us/img560/9...2060600315.jpg
By cfamilyfix at 2012-06-06

any ideas??? I know there might be a difference in "coil over" strut inserts vs stock strut inserts, but I was under the impression that in Pro7 you had to run a stock configuration...which I am

It looks like the strut shaft will need to be turned down a bit in order for me to run these parts...Re-Speed says to turn down the strut shaft .625", but these are 7's only parts...so I emailed them and am waiting for a response. I have a friend with a milling machine (old school) so the turn down shouldn't be a big deal.

Yup I still have this...
 

over the last couple of weeks I got some things done...

Front suspension and new brakes done...

http://imageshack.us/a/img689/1531/img2012120100001.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img90/4900/img2012120100002.jpg


http://imageshack.us/a/img17/7986/img2012120100003.jpg

replaced my radiator,also replaced the water pump and re-installed my mech fanhttp://imageshack.us/a/img18/7470/img2012120100008.jpg

Glad to see you're still at it. Making some good progress there!

awesome progress!

Thanks...I'm building a motor this winter that I think will go in this car...a nice street port...in fact I got the ported plates from 82transam...thanks again. soon it will be time to turn the car around in the garage and get all the rear brakes and suspension done...then rust repair and then....well it never ends. I work 2 jobs now and with the a serious lack of time and energy its tuff to stay inspired. I like this car for some odd reason...lord knows there are cleaner ones out there, but I feel like THIS one needs to be saved. I feel like it will be a great opportunity to try things out on, like direct fire ignition, and a cool weber set up I have. As a result, this car might spend more time on jack stands than driving, but I have other cars for that.

No problem, glad you're getting some use out of them!

I know what you mean about feeling the need to save a specific one. The one I'm restoring right now is/was a rustbucket. Would be easier to find a different shell, but something keeps me from scrapping it.

BTW I still have those other irons if you want them ;)

Very nice, got a 80' that I am building right now. So far carb and seals still seem to be good but I'm sure they're all hard and about to fall apart any moment.

Didn't even get near my car this weekend...so frustrating...decided I'm not even gonna run heat to this this thing...bought a bunch of caps to eliminate the heating system to this car.

a tiny bit of more progress...got the car out of the garage finally and managed to get the rear suspension upgrade started...pics

http://imageshack.us/a/img90/1214/img2013030500069.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img826/424/img2013030500068.jpg

hopefully the endlinks and the remainder of the bushing kit make it in this weekend...no promises though...two jobs, two kids and one on the way, an over bearing mother in law who lives with us and my intense mom who does not all conspire to ruin my progress on any given moment...lol.

Wow!
 

Looks great! Keep up the good work. Yours looks as rusty as mine does underneath. I plan to take the suspension parts out and de-rust them and seal them up with POR-15. I'll replace the bushings of course too.

Love those tokico's.

Editing for my stupidity. Tokico's all around. Forgot that yours was 81.

Rear end links are in

http://img826.imageshack.us/img826/1...3041400002.jpg

Uploaded with ImageShack.us

and it is up for sale...$2000 OBO

ended up trading this for a 90 Miata...

http://imageshack.us/a/img841/6185/img2013051900025.jpg

no idea what to do with it...lol

drop a rotary in it! :)

lol...never out of the question for me....

I thought it was a forgone conclusion.

Wait Wait, you mean people actually buy a Miata without the intention to Rotary swap it? Blasphemy!

The little four banger in this thing is trying to win me over!!! I will prob throw some plates on it and a hard top and drive it till it blows up....then the build begins...