Nice wheels...they'll be beautiful once you refinish them.

 

Thanks. I've got one of the four 95% polished, it looks great. The centers are all cleaned. Three of the centers had overspray on them from a rattle can paint job. That was no fun cleaning out the paint from the insides of the mesh.

 

Power steering is no more. Swapped in a manual unit from a donor '85. They are not easy to remove with the motor and A/C in place. Sheesh!

Drained and replaced the gear oil in the manual unit, and replaced all the steering column wiring. Super happy!

Worked a bit more on the wiring tuck - pulling the main harness back into the cabin and out along the fender.

 

That's looking good!

 

Dave how are you routing the wires through from the cabin into the fender? Curious where you're cutting into.

~Geoff

 

^ditto,

Nice build btw... I love me some wide body first gens!

 

Cut a hold up high in the drivers side footwell above the dead pedal. Used a hole saw for a nice round cut. I'll put some spare door molding around the sheet metal to protect the wires. It will need some type of waterproofing eventually.

 

Very nice.

Are you pulling a fresh harness? Extending the factory?

I've been thinkin of replacing a lot of my factory harness, noticing lots of shoddy, rusted through connections in my harness.

 

Just extending the stock harness where necessary. The wiring for the headlights, turn signals and marker lights is pretty close to required length anyway. Because the battery is in my driver's side rear bin, I'll be extending a few +12V wires back there and will also relocate the engine bay fusible link block with a Mazda fuse block instead. Most of my wiring is in good condition, the alternator wiring (BW and WB on connector A-02) is frail, mostly because of repeated heating of the insulation. Those wires will be replaced and tucked.

 

Replaced the old "Wolf v550" decal on my ECU with a more proper version today.

 

If your going with the wide body, would you be interested in selling the Mariah side skirts and rear lower skirt?

 

Much as I like the super wide-body look, I don't like it at all some times, and like it a lot other times. For the moment, the Mode 4 kit is staying on the car, so I'm not going to part with it. I still have to figure out what is best with the 11.5" wide wheels in the back. Thanks for asking though!

 

Dave,

I 100% hear you on the wide-bodies. Personally, if anything, I'm going for the fender flare look. For whatever reason the Aussie Group-C look just totally does it for me.

As far as widebodies tho....

 

Yep, seen the RES wide body - looks awesome, but I've never seen that Mariah Mode 1 before. That's very nice. I even have the same targa band and whale tail. HMmmmm.

 

A clear but cold day was finally here for some good outdoor wiring work on the RX7. I had recently received the upgraded Wolf v550 ECU and flying lead, and rough wired-in the harness for the engine. The engine harness only needs wires for TPS, CAS, Water Temp, Air Temp, BAC valve and injectors. I also pulled through wires for the alternator, rather than using the old factory wires. The ignition coil wires will go through the drivers side fender wall. The ignitors themselves will be mounted under the dash.

I bought a Weatherpack connector kit. A company "Vehicle Harness connections" on ebay - their username is "avilaelecinc" has nice kits and crimpers. About the best price/value, but you can also get them from diyautotune.com. Makes everything "factory new" for all wiring. You won't ever go back to anything but these once you've used them.
Basically all the wiring is tucked underneath the upper intake manifold as best as I can get it. Results are pictured below.

 

Looking real good Dave, can't wait to see it in person!

 

Build's coming along nicely Dave.

 

Been picking away at the wiring over the last two months. Wiring is not my strong suit, so I'm taking my time and doing it right.

Got far enough with wiring to hook up the battery and check on Wolf v550 statistics. TPos is reversed, but AirT and WaterT are spot on. Boost controller seemed to be operating continuously, so going to have to figure that out. Generally, super happy that I can power up the car and troubleshoot any wiring issues much more easily.

Did some fit-up on my 3-row Champion radiator. Unfortunately, it's just so big that it can't fit with the sway bar, and it's too close to the motor mount, and as such, the lower radiator hose won't fit. I can't get the fan in without shredding up the radiator fins, so it may have to sit in it's box until some other project. I was hoping to get better cooling than stock, but maybe there's something out there that's better than stock but still stock size.

Drove a stock GSL-SE - very stock! this weekend, and it reminds me how much power my TII motor really has when running well.

Feeling happy.

 

And...................................... it runs.

Super happy that the beast is awake once more. Video? Sure!

 

awesome dave!

 

exciting! sounds nice, what RPM was that idling at?

 

Niiiiiiiice! That sounds like a solid 900rpm idle?

And he's right - that Gilmer isn't that loud at ALL. Did you notch the teeth?

 

About a 1000 rpm idle, maybe a bit less. I drilled holes in the center of the grooves on the pulleys. Still need to do the alternator pulley, but it made a big difference.

Had some nice revs, but currently have an ignition issue to figure out.

 

That should keep that intake temp down.

 

Yup.

So where did you get that radiator? I am 0 for 2 on the eBay specials. The last one I ordered was the same design as yours only rattle canned in mexichrome, which was flaking off before I even touched it