Rising from the Ashes... (Pics be warned!)
 

Last March, I had an unfortunate accident in my RX7, due to my own stupity I ended up putting the poor car on the edge of the graveyard. The car sat around as I tried to figure out how to get the money and the parts to try and repair her. I eventually collected enough money and thanks to some members on this fourm I got myself a 1985 GSL-SE Shell and a S4 13B.

See for more information on accident:
https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...light=its+dead

The cars sat around for a long time, until today when I finally had the time and the trailer to go move the wrecked Seven to the shell to begin the transplant. Today I got a lot more done than I thought I would, I ended up pulling out the entire engine and transmission out of the wrecked car and got a decent start on being able to remove the axles and suspension.

I will eventually pick up work on my other side projects, so keep an eye out for updates on those as well.

And for your viewing pleasure, pictures!

The beginning of the day:
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...bothcars-3.jpg


This is going to be my new RX7 :)
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...wn67/Shell.jpg


This engine is going to make getting the suspension bits annoying... so out it comes!
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...7/EngineIn.jpg
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e.../EngineOut.jpg


At the end of the day, scratch one engine and tranny, tomorrow its the suspension!
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...ndoftheday.jpg

Thats hard to do on grass. Good job

Yeah, I actually have the jacks resting on 2ftx2ft slabs of 12mm plywood so they don't sink in rain.

Also when I was pulling the engine, I misjudged the soil and got the crane stuck, so to actually get the engine out of the bay I rolled the car back. :lol:

Looks good! You picked a nice week to work on your car! All sunny I hear with very nice warm temps. Cali/Bay Area love right here lol

hey call me tmw i'll come by

Well I didn't get as much done today as I would have liked, got a little lazy and ran into a few problems...

I finally got the front suspension off along with the sway bar and I must say I was shocked by how straight everything was! I mean when you see the frame of my wrecked car you're thinking the left suspension is toast, but everything is all good!

I was going to start installing the RE-Speed Polyurathene Kit when I ran into a few snags. First, I don't have the socket to remove the strut bars; I'll just assemble the front end and put the bushings in at a later time. The second and rather disturbing problem was that I didn't have any sway bar bushings... which I was sure came with the kit when I purchased it. I PMed Billy to see if I am just looking in the wrong box or something.

The amazingly straight front suspension!
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...Suspension.jpg


The box of poly-urethane filled goodies!
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...lyBushings.jpg

Oh also, after removing the sway bar and looking how rusted/chipped it looked I decided to remove it to just sand it down and repaint it black or something. I also have the old sway bar off the shell which looks aftermarket also, though its really rust covered.

Now here's something that bugs me... I was looking at the shell and saw it had a power steering box on it and was going to swap out that box for my manual one from my old RX7 when I realized that the steering columns look completely different! Do the boxes interchange easily? or do I have to pull both columns and boxes to make it work properly?

My sway bar and the front suspension again
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...ontSwaybar.jpg

The old sway bar in all its rusted glory
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...Oldswaybar.jpg

If any one wants that old sway bar please PM me, otherwise its getting scrapped along with all the other left overs.

ooh ooh i can hardly wait! i wanna see how well my POS can be beaten by yours haha

No one have an answer for my steering question?

i think i read somewhere that you can use it with the PS rack and everything and block off the lines for the null ps pump something like this. and it is supposed to give you a quicker ratio?

+1. It will work in your car.

looks like you're on the right track!! keep us posted with your progress!! are you using the S4 wiring harness and ecu or are you thinking something in the line of a megasquirt?

s4 ecu

Currently going to just use the S4 ECU an injectors, though while I am rebuilding the engine I will most likely consider upgrading the injectors and such...

Oh btw the way, if anyone thinks they want any of the left over parts let me know, the 12A is still running strong and all that jazz. Otherwise the stuff is going to get scrapped at the end of the swap

Is there supplier for ENTIRE tie rods for our cars? (Both ends and sleeves) I keep looking for them but all I find are just the ends.

black dragon has everything the tie rod ends have... inner outer middle adjusting thing..

Yeah, I can find teh ends and such, but does no one sell them as a whole assembly?

Our steering system is a paralelogram so there are two ball jointed tire rod ends and a sleeve and with $30+ per end and 40 for the sleeve that's expensive to make two whole tie rods. :scratch:

yeah well thats about how much it costs. our cars arent getting any cheaper. thats why most people only replace things when they go bad.

looks like fun. i would turn your smashed fb into a drag car.

Good pics.

I still think that sucks that its going to be about $150+ tie rod end...

In any case, was able to remove the Rear Axle, was surprised that all my shocks were still in very good condition. Though seeing the condition of my rear sway bar end links has me thinking of buying one more set of Poly ones for it.

I also dropped the gas tank and all the hard lines underneath the car to transplant over to the gas tank I got from RX7Doctor and the shell.

I also will be reusing the old exhuast system for now, if I end up getting enough money/materials i may just fab up my own 2-3" system.

as I said before, anything you guys might want that is left over from this swap let me know, otherwise its going to get trashed along with the shell at the end of this. So that nikki carb or the whole damned 12A is all up for grab I guess?

Anyways, pictures!

This is the rear axle, after much hard work and tugging it came off! Thanks for a little help from a friend also, damn thing is heavy as fuck.
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...7/RearAxle.jpg


The exhaust system in all its restrictive glory
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...austsystem.jpg


This is what the 12A fuel tank looks like
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...12Agastank.jpg


And this is the nice 13B ready fuel injected fuel tank! :)
http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/e...13Bgastank.jpg


I think I'm going to dig around in my garage and see if I can find some larger sockets and junk and try and install my bushings tomorrow.

Ouch...

Was looking through some autoparts stores to replace both tie rods. All four (two from my car and two that we left over on the shell) are toast, both ends on each one the boots are torn and leaking.

But to put together a new one its going to cost me $200, roughly $160 for four tie rod ends and then another $40 for two adjusting sleeves.

Anyone know if I can just get these bad boys as one unit and maybe a little cheaper than $200?

Also, if someone could verify that post saying that recirculating the Power Steering Box actually gives you a slightly tighter steering ratio; I would be very appreciative, as it will probably be the deciding factor whether or not I am going to rip it out and replace it with my manual box.

Thanks for the input guys, helps me get this girl fixed up faster.

hey guys isn't the s4 engine a 6 port as well? i'm just wondering for clarification

I remember the sleeve cost less than $20 for both side...

The PS box is 15:1 and manual box is 17:1

oh really the manual is 17? dayum i thot it'd be more like 20

is your "new" gsl-se hit in the back by the tail lights? if it is, then i used to own it.

its fairly rare, its the shaded glass painted mirrors version, build date is 4/1/85 and it was sold new at either oak tree or almaden mazda, so its a local car.

at rockauto tie rods are 20 per end and adjusting sleeves under 10, what's the problem? :scratch:

There is a bondo repair on the back and the left tail light is missing...
The bondo job is horrible, they didn't pull the metal out enough and used a non-urethene bondo because its cracked all the way to the base metal.

If it is your car, then I assume its your name on the title? If so I need to talk to you later about that. :lol:

Ah, cool! I was looking at the rock auto stuff, but I wasn't sure that the quality was good since I never really heard of their brand.

I was looking at some Moog stuff from Partsamerica.com

How much you want for the 12a? Can you ship to Kansas?

PM Sent :)

By the way, what is a good way to remove the bushings? I can't press them out, and i really am not leaning to the burning them out idea.

Do you think drilling out the rubber and prying them out would work?

What are you pressing them with?

which bushings? i doubt that drilling them out will work very well

I am not pressing them out, I have a crowbar, a hammer, and wrenches and junk... I can use small diameter drills to drill out some of teh rubber and sort of squeeze them out.

But I'm not sure how to approach it.

BTW if you're wondering $221 for x4 Moog Tie Rod Ends and x2 Adjusting Sleeves from Moog, Expensive, but at least they're quality parts.

ah well it all depends on teh rubber.. how bad it is i guess

You can't really drill through the bushing material. It just twists up around the drill bit instead of drilling out. I tried this when I was doing the suspension on my 83 GS. The easiest way by FAR is to burn them out with a torch. Just make sure that you have a bucket to catch them in. When you burn them out they leave a black tar substance behind. DON"T GET IT ON ANYTHING THAT YOU DON"T WANT TO BE PERMANENTLY RUINED! That's why the bucket comes in so handy.

rockauto stocks moog. that's actually the parts used in my reply. you can get other parts from them for like 15. I recommend moog though.

the car got hit twice... its been around, but the guy who fixed it up, had it painted silver, then right after it got hit, so he had it fixed (the bondo job). he sold the car, then it got hit agian!

i bought it after that, and it sat, then the guy i bought it from needed a car and bought it back.

sent you a PM about the title

Sweet! I own a bumper car no one really wants! :)

Wow... it had been around.

Anyone know what size bolt the Tension/torsion/Strut bar is? My 24mm won't fit it, and I'm just going to go buy a socket for it so I can replace the bushings.

Oh, sorry for not posting any updates either, between My mother getting horribly sick, work calling me in for an extra day and normal work hours, I haven't been able to work on the poor bastard child.

This is great your at least salvaging the good parts of the wrecked 7 and your still in the 7 game! I just flipped mine over and it's totaled. :( But this threads giving me some hope to get another and REVIVE it. Thanks! Can't wait till I can do the same. :)

Drilling out bushings works fine, Use a 1/8" drill bit. Drill a hole at the boundry layer between the rubber and the steel, The bit will grab the steel and walk all the way around the inside of the arm. The fun part is cleaning up what's left. I used a drill with a wire wheel followed by a sanding drum.

As for your 2 fuel tanks. While the older one is a 12A, the S3 tanks are nearly identical, except for the pickup assembly and the sump.

just burn them out. i cleaned the charred rubber out with a flathead screwdriver. Slowly I got enough out to start pushing on the bushing. The steel was hot by this point, but not red hot, so the rubber melted and the bushings popped out pretty easily. burn out the residue, and use bolts, washers, and a socket to press in the new bushings.

I'm glad that I was able to inspire someone to try and recover their own wrecked seven, that makes me feel like I've actually accomplished something by making this thread.

Didn't do much today except transfer over the hardlines to the shell...

I kept looking at the steering box and I've decided that I don't like it and its coming out!

LoL, tommorrow I will either be doing the steering swap or just transfering over interior pieces... Haven't decided yet.

i guess i'll head over today

it lived in SF... the p.o. has a trailer and people hit that too...

Hey guys, just updating you on what's happening.

Started classes this week so I haven't been working on the car much, and its going to be raining for the rest of the week.

But I managed to nab the front suspension and some other bits, so I've been snadblasting them and will paint them and take pictures when I am done.

I also started dissasembly on the S4 Engine I have and will take pictures of that next week after the intake and exhaust comes off so we can see the inside condition of it.


Sorry for the lack of pictures, between feeling like shit, school, and work i haven't done much I thought was picture worthy.