Hey y'all,
I figure it's about time I start a build thread on my 82' project. A little bit about me: I'm 16 years old, and I have a huge passion for cars, especially RXs. I got my first rotary in 2016 in the form of a clean 91' FC Vert. Early in 2017 I started looking for a hardtop car for cheap to use as a track toy. My search led me to this 82' Base model in Sunbeam silver.

The car is a 1 owner car (before me) that was taken care of by a lovely older couple. Here's where the story gets crazy: I came to test drive the car after my dad and I went to DFW auto show, so that we could decide if it was worth putting an eBay bid in on the car. We met the owners and the car looked great. It was idling a little low, but nothing a carburetor tune couldn't fix (or so I thought). On the first hard pull during the test drive(about 3/4 throttle, certainly not abusing the car), the engine popped. I limped the car back to the owner's house with my dad and tried to explain what happened. Instead of being angry, like anybody with lesser self control would be, the owners were EMBARRASSED. They explained that they listed the car as having no issues when clearly, it did. Now, my original plan for the car was to rebuild the engine anyways, so in an attempt to salvage the situation ( I felt terrible about popping off the motor in such a spectacular way), I called them a few days later and made an offer of 2K (original asking price was 2500), and before I could even finish explaining my offer, the owner stopped me. He said that he was so impressed with my mechanical knowledge of the car that he would like to GIVE it to me. Keep in mind, I didn't know him from atom, and he was about to give me a car AFTER i popped his motor. Needless to say, I was paradoxically speechless and accepted the offer immediately. That weekend I traveled up with a U-Haul Trailer on the back of the family Tahoe and collected my new addition to the family, thanking the owner profusely before heading off.

This leads me to the reason this build got so crazy, so fast. I called a local mazda shop, Motorsport Enterprises Racing ( 9101 E U.S. Hwy 377, Cresson, TX 76035 )


I discussed with them what I should do with my new acquisition. The worker I was talking to told me they just had an RX-8 come in with a rear end collision that was being parted out. The 2006 engine in it was undamaged and had just been rebuilt and streetported by them 10K miles before the wreck. He suggested I take that motor and put it in my FB. I liked the idea so I went and pulled the engine with the workers help about a month later. To make a long story short, this led to me getting to know the owner of the shop, Darin, and I got an internship there In late 2016. I have learned so much from my work there and I always apply it to my FB project. Here is some of the work I have done so far, which consists mostly of removing things so far:




As you can see, I have removed the stock engine, installed a Mariah GTO whale tale wing, and bolted the renesis engine to the stock 82 transmission(I used a Racingbeat 215mm flywheel and RX8 Auto rear counterweight. Racingbeat gave me the greenlight on this transmission holding up as long as I don't pretend it's a honda transmission). I have also change out my front and rear suspension for GSL-SE components(work in progress), lowered the car on eibach lowering springs, installed an FC convertble steering wheel(to remind me of my roots), and swapped out the front shocks for Koni Reds (Koni yellows to come in the rear). What's left? I will get a 2004 RX8 PCM reprogrammed to delete the immobilizer, which takes care of any major wiring headaches. The stock RX8 cluster will be used in conjunction with a Garmin GPS Heads Up Display(really cool piece) for instrumentation. Motor mounts will be a tube mount style mounted to the frame(popular in hot rodding, works, cheap). I will adapt the stock A/C compressor so that I can have A/C in these HOT Texas Summers. I'll have a side dump exhaust valve for highway pulls and drag fun, and the stock muffler for everyday driving. I also have a set of stock 240sx wheels(that is two sets of nissan wheels that I have for my Mazda; See "Nismo Wheels on an FB thread") that I will be putting all terrain tires onto for winter driving and rallycross. My goal with this car is to have a jack of all trades, master of none RX-7 with the reliability of a modern engine(yes, you can make reneys reliable). I want to be able to go have fun rally, road, or drag racing on Saturday with the reasonable expectation that as long as I don't push too hard, any damage can be fixed by Monday(provided I have the parts). Wishful thinking, I know. I'm applying everything I learn at work to this car, so hopefully I'll have a really nice end product like the cars we build at MER. I hope to be finished by my birthday in July, but I'm not going to rush it.

 

Welcome! That's an awesome story. I have to also congratulate you for choosing to use a forum to document your build unlike so many other kids these days. Soak up as much knowledge as you can while you are working at that shop. Good luck, and be sure to ask for help here when you need it, there's alot of knowledge on here

 

Great starting point, looking forward to seeing the build progress.

 

Didn't get too much done today. Sanded, rust converted, and painted my Eibach front lowering springs (thanks to Sean/82TransAm). Painted Red to match the rear units I purchased from Ground Control.
Before
Rust Proofed and Primed
After
I also got my FC's right headlight motor fixed, which I didn't take pictures of. No more blinky.
In other news, I got to drive a really badass RX-8 with a Chevy LFX V6. These LFX swaps are kinda our shop's specialty.
More to come. I think tomorrow I'm going to begin working on the GSL-SE Spindles I acquired.

 

Call it the RX7.5

 

Any reason why you didn't just use the RX-8 trans? Granted you would probably need a new drive shaft and I have to admit I have no clue if shifter position would work. You may want to look into getting MazdaEdit, Versa Tune or a Cob accessport to try to take advantage of the port. Though based on what I have read on rx8club.com, porting the renny isn't worth a whole lot.

My personal opinion is the renny can be reliable. I put 146K on my first (a 2005 I bought new) before I sold it and currently have 102K on my 2009 R3, both year round daily drivers. I have yet to replace/rebuild a renny. Definitely need to keep up with the fluid changes, etc. and I would recommend the BHR ignition coil kit as the coils on the renny are a weak spot. I have also premixed.

 

LS coils will be coming as soon as the stockers burn out. The RX8 tranny is nice, but the shifter location is WAY off, and they are very heavy. The FB unit is pretty strong as long as you don't abuse it (this will be a daily for me), and eventually I will probably change to a Turbo II unit. Keep in mind that torque kills transmissions more so than horsepower, and the renny doesn't put out much more torque. Using the stock transmission gives me mounts, stock driveshaft, and no tranny tunnel modification. I'm still debating wether to premix or not. The Engine came with a rotary aviation OMP kit that gives me a seperate tank to put premix in, see below:

It's some expensive kit, I feel like I need to use it lol.

 

Definitely use the OMP kit. Premixing is a hassle for daily driving.

 

That's the way I'm leaning. Eventually when I start road racing my FC I'll probably premix, but for this car I'd rather not.

 

Definitely agree with using the OMP kit since you already have it. I think the parts in your picture that go between the OMP and the engine are not for the renny. You'll probably need to get the renny specific one.

 

Oh, that picture isn't my kit. The kit is already on the engine, I was just using that photo to show people what part I'm talking about.

 

Did some more work on the suspension today. I also got my rear lowering springs from ground control.
Before(light surface rust)
After (with newly painted eibach front spring and new Koni Red Shock absorber)
Really like this paint. Very easy to work with, thick and durable, beautiful finish.
New springs YAY


I'm really enjoying this light duty restoration. Nice to see some really tangible change. Luckily the car itself is rust free thanks to Texas winters, but all this suspension is from St. Louis. I think the next order of buisness will be installing the rear axle, new rear shocks, new 4 link bushings, and a Panhard Bar from Techno Toy tuning. Can't decide wether or not to stick with the Watts link. I have poly bushings for the factory link, but I've heard bad things about poly bushings on the Watts link. Any input is appreciated.

 

So in the few months since my last post, a lot has changed. I got tired of looking at that drab silver paint on the car and decided to have a go at doing a home repaint job. After a few weeks of bickering with myself, I decided on a color; Lamborghini Arancio Borealis Metallic.


That's right. I'm wild.
Some of you (maybe most of you) will probably hate my choice, but I think it is a great color, and it's really going to bring the car to a new level. Pictures don't do the color justice, you have to see it in person to get the full effect.
I went about prepping the car.


About Halfway through sanding, excuse the mess around the car.


Etching primer on some problem areas where I burned through the factory primer.


Built a "booth" out of a wedding tent.


Sealed with duct tape, LED lights (explosion proof) from lowes, and fans with filters(not pictured)


Pano shot.


Primer! I used Finish 1 2K high build filler primer. Sorry I don't have a better picture, I was too excited to think about it. Funny how the primer has more gloss than the paint that was on it did.


ORANGE!!! This is before clear, you can kinda see the pink fleck in the paint. I used AutomotiveTouchup.com urethane paint.


!!!ORANGE!!! This picture doesn't do it justice, the car GLOWS under good lighting. Arancio Borealis is semi-pearlescent as well, it looks orange when it's dark, but gold when it's bright.

There's also a beautiful pink metallic fleck that I'll try to capture in some future photos. I am so happy with how the paint came out. Sure, it's not perfect, but I did it myself in a hangar and I'm proud of my results. I even did the jams so that you can't tell it was repainted unless you really go digging. I'm sure there are a million ways I could've done a better job, but it's all part of the process to learn. I hope you guys like the color choice, I'm so happy with it!

Aside from the main painting of the chassis, I will be painting my Mariah whale tail wing, the lower half of both bumpers, and all black trim in a gloss high fleck black. I am hoping to get the car reassembled by the end of this month and I'll post more pictures when it's all back together. I can't wait to see this paint contrasted with those chrome Nismo wheels!

Onto the Mechanical side of things, I am having an issue with building my front coilovers(I ended up ditching the lowering springs in favor of the T3 Coilover kit.) For some reason, my Koni Special D shock absorbers don't fit in my GSL-SE Spindles.


See Here
If any of you have any idea what the problem is, I'd love to hear it. Not only do they appear too long, but the shock is extremely tight fitting in the spindle. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

I'm down with that color, looks great. So are you saying you did the whole car with spray cans? Holy ****.

 

GSL-SE struts are slightly shorter and narrower than non-GSL-SE legs.

 

What an awesome story and awesome build. Puts me to shame when i was 16 or even now for that matter lol. I wasnt even allowed to work on cars while i lived with my parents.
I think you should call it Braptholemew Buuzzingthwaite (edit, not really).
Very keen to see how this goes. Its almost the perfect build.

 

Great job on the paint! I love the use of box fans and a wedding tent.

 

No no no lol. I should've made that more clear, I used an HVLP gun with a really crappy compressor that wasn't really up to the task. I managed to make it work, it just took a while. I'm glad you like the color, you should see it in person!
I appreciate it man, I love this car and the story behind it. I'm just trying to do everything the right way. Luckily I work at a race shop and I'm surrounded by people who have a better idea of what they're doing than I do. I'm glad you like it!
Thank you, I wish my photography was better so that I could get better pictures of the paint. It came out really well, although it's not perfect.
I'm glad everybody is enjoying the color choice (so far). I know that a factory color might be more "appropriate" for a classic vehicle like this, but I like to be different.

 

What's weird is RacingBeat has the shocks I ordered listed for ALL 1981-1985 cars. The difference is far from slight as well. I'd say that the shocks I have are several centimeters too long. Perhaps they sent RX-3 shocks?

 

I can't comment on racing beat's catalogue but I suspect they have sent you the struts for the 4x110 PCD front legs, which were produced between 1978-85. You want the struts for GSL-SE (and Series 3) 4x114.3 PCD cars made between 1983-85. It's a totally different shock, shorter and thinner.

 

Having painted my car i my garage last year, I can appreciate the work that went into your setup and your accomplishment - very well done! Love the color too.

 

Some more pictures

 

Cool car, great work!

 

Haven't gotten much work done, mostly because money has been tight. Mocked up the wheels against the car though, I'm very excited to see this done!


Needs camber.... And more low. Soon to be brought to you by T3 Coilovers

Really frustrated with the shock absorber situation for these GSL-SE spindles. I'm finding so much conflicting information about what fits and what doesn't. Anybody with some expert advice would be appreciated. As of right now, I can't order anything because I have no idea what will/won't fit.

 

Just get the bolt on T3 setup, then you don't have to worry about which shocks fit.