Two years ago, my father passed away unexpectedly. Before his passing, I would bug him that we should fix up his old FC, but he never thought it would be worth it. When he was gone I decided that I would fix it anyway in honor of him. Thus was the birth of Roxanne.

My dad, Ryan, had obtained the car when someone showed up in an FC asking about his truck (a Ford Ranger if I remember correctly). He wanted to buy it, and they made a deal to trade it for the RX-7. Or at least, that's what my grandpa had told me. Not too long after buying it, he blew out a brake line. I believe he also told me something in the engine was bad, but that is hopefully a faulty memory. The car sat for roughly 14 years before I started touching it.

First came replacing the fuel pump, trying to turn it over yielded no response from the fuel pump. While I waited for that to ship, I did my best to clean out the fuel tank which was full of gunk. After it had shipped and the gas tank was reinstalled, she fired right up. Success! But, she started to overheat so I shut it off and decided that might be a problem I should fix. Before that, though, I enlisted the help from one of my cousins (Luke) to do my brake lines as I didn't know how to. The mainline running from the master cylinder to the box where it splits off to each side has busted, but we replaced all the rear lines right away. I would later have to redo the front lines too (I did those myself) because the brake hoses had rusted to he calipers and were unable to be removed and I snapped the hard lines. I also bought pads for all the calipers, rotors, braided steel brake lines from Racing Beat, and decided I would do Aaroncake's 4-piston conversion in the front. The original front calipers I ordered got lost in transit and were never recovered. I got a full refund from eBay and ordered another set, which shipped in no time. I spray painted them blue (which I also plan on doing to the rear calipers when I clean off all the rust). During this time I also rattle canned the chipping paint on the wheels. Don't mind the overspray onto the inner lip of the tyre, it'll be gone when I replace them again. I got the spacers for the brake conversion cut by a local machine shop, but they cut them too big and had to get another set. Back to the cooling, I started by replacing both of the radiator hoses with silicone ones from Racing Beat, then I took off all the pulleys and replaced the water pump. The radiator cap's release mechanism was broken, so I replaced it with a unit from Corksport. It has an increased pressure so it might blow a seal somewhere and I'll have to repair something again, oh well. On the interior, I got some cheap seat covers and got the LRB speed cupholder. The little controller for the electric mirrors actually didn't fit in the hole provided, so I just sanded down one of the sides and everything was great. I also bought some aluminum defroster vents, but I haven't installed them yet. It was about then when prom started to roll around, which I was hoping to take the FC. Tragically, the slave and master cylinder for the clutch decided to give out. Looks like I'll have to try to take it this year instead.
Jump forward to today. Recently an electrical issue arose after changing out my battery and terminals, causing just about nothing to work on the car. I went through the check fuses and found that I had put my battery terminals on backward, and therefore also the battery. I also found that 3 fuses were blown but those will be ordered soon. Next comes rear brake discs, pads, and caliper cleaning. I also plan on doing a compression test on the engine in the near future, I'm worried about a rotaries condition after sitting for 14 years in the Midwest.


Here was the original resting place of Roxanne

Here's the first interior picture

Then she got moved to a shed. Picture taken last summer after a good wash.




The calipers, post painting


New vs Original caliper

Here's how the brakes sat for a couple months

The paint on the wheels was chipping off, I'd say the repaint was pretty good for rattle cans


Pics of the old clutch cylinders


No storage bins or anything back there.

Cheap seat covers and an LRB speed cup holder! I'm considering plasti-dipping it to look like carbon fibre but my girlfriend likes the raw aluminum look, so I'll probably leave it as-is.

Painted my pulleys white while replacing the water pump because why not.

 

Very sorry to hear of your father's passing. Im glad you have the car as it's one more memory of him you can hold on to.

That's a really great car to restore in your father's memory! Appears to be an 87 Sport model. Personally I would restore it as close to original as possible with a few reliability upgrades and enjoy the car. I still have my very first car, a fully restored (now, not when I got it in 1998) 1963 Ford Falcon, a gift from my grandfather before his passing.

Odd to not see any storage bins as they were standard equipment. The only exception to this was a rear seat which was optional. I wonder what's under that carpet.

Before going any further with the cooling system, I recommend performing a coolant system pressure test to see if the system will hold cap pressure. If not you may be looking at an external leak, which should be pretty simple to find, or if the system is losing pressure, you may be looking at a faulty coolant seal or corroded housing in the area where the coolant seal resides. If the latter is the case the engine will require a full rebuild. Look forward to seeing where this project goes!

 

I'll make sure to run a pressure test then, thanks. Any other things you would recommend doing? It's actually an 86, and I'm not sure which model it is as it has features from a bunch of different trims.

 

10/20/19 Update
My cousin came around again to bleed out my clutch, and the rear of the car was lifted as well so we could bleed out the brakes. I had new pads and rotors for the rears as well, so I decided to replace those right away. But as it does, something went wrong. All four bolts holding the caliper bracket to the hub snapped off.

The only way I can think to fit a tap back there is to take off the entire hub assembly. So it looks like I'll be pulling it all apart. I may as well replace the bushings back there too and I'll have to service the wheel bearing too. The parking brake on the caliper had also rusted up and seized, so it looks like I'll be investing in new calipers as well.

I'm hoping I can get the car in a drivable condition by May when prom comes around. If not, I might just decide to pull it all apart and completely rebuild it, who knows. I'm also hoping that it can soon be trailered to a proper garage to work in, working on woodchips really sucks.

 

Where in Wisconsin are you located? If you are local i can come and help you out sometime, i a do the coolant pressure test if needed.

 

I'm out near Fond du Lac, so that might be a bit of a hike from Kenosha area. But with the prospect of totally pulling the car apart becoming more appealing to me, I would more than likely rebuild the engine anyway. Recently my attention has shifted to stopping the rust and reinforcing the frame rails and pinch welds, whcih I've been reading about. Of couse I'll never turn down help, so if you'd like to I'll buy you dinner or something haha.

 

10/30/19 Update
This actually just took place last night. Figuring I couldn't get the hubs off without getting the brake rotors off first, I had to make away with the brackets.
And so I prescribed a healthy dose of Sawzall. And for a set of Milwaukee blades I found in a 10-year abandoned factory, they chopped through very well. To my great surprise, 3 out of 4 of the brake rotor bolts came out without breaking.

 

I'm gonna frame these
School certainly has a special way of getting in the way of all my plans, but I finally have gotten these forsaken bolts out after hours of drilling, cutting, and pounding. In the mean time I've also picked up a set of Energy Suspension chassis bushings, have brake caliper clips for the rear on order, and might have a set of used coilovers lined up for purchase
Pretty needless to say iI'm stoked. I also have a bunch of replacement interior parts from LRB speed I'm going to install, and I'll probably get around to throwing in a radio soon. Fingers crossed this gal starts and doesn't overheat next time!

 

This weekend I finally got around to putting the brakes together and bled out and pulled of some nasty heatshields that were ratting (that took way too long). I had plans to start it yesterday, but somehow I cross-threaded one of the leading sparkplugs.
I'm going to order a backtap and try to fix it, and if that doesn't work then I guess I'm replacing a rotor housing.
One step forward, two steps back.

 

The thread gods have shined upon me, and using a backtap was successful. With spark plugs once again, it was time to start the car. One of my friends, Tony, came over and turned the key while I banged the starter. And she cranked! But she wouldn't fire up. We first tried testing for spark, pulled a plug and flicked the key while it laid against one of the shock bolts. No spark on either the leading or trailing plugs. I have new spark plugs and wires, so I suspect it's the coils, but I have no way to test them. Unless, somehow, my plugs fouled just sitting in my engine (which I don't think is flooded). On top of this, I don't think I'm getting any gas, I left the hole open as I don't have spare plugs (probably not my best idea), and no gas came out of the hole, just a whoosh of air. I ran out and picked up a new EGI COMP fuse as it looked a little corroded inside the fuse, but I'm not sure if that fixed the problem. I can hear the fuel pump whirring. Any ideas would be appreciated

 

A new fuel pump and starter later it’s still not starting. Checked the FPR and it looks like gas is reaching it, and testing my spark with a timing light also shows I’m not getting anything. I put a test light to the wires that come to the coils and it lights up, so it’s not a wiring issue. Rip all 3 of my ignition coils, I wouldn’t doubt if they fried when I put my terminals on backwards a while ago. So it looks like I’ve got a lot of money to spend

 

I believe that I have a bunch of ignition coils. I can check tomorrow. I'd sell them for a good price

 

Aw for real man? That would be great, new ones are super expensive. Let me know what you find

 

Do you have the service manual, if not you can download it and lots of other good stuff here:
Foxed.ca - Mazda RX-7 Manuals

 

New ignition coils from rotor head izzy came in today. This weekend I’m aiming to get out there and slap them on, let’s hope this works.

 

Been a while, but I have made lots of progress! The ignition coils didn't fix the problem, but I was at least getting the correct voltages/resistances. After being stumped for a while, I figured the coils must not be getting an actual signal to spark. After a new ECU, huzzah! She started, but died almost immediately. I could keep it alive if I held it above 2,000. After looking around the forum for a while, I figured looking for a vacuum leak would be pretty easy as I have access to Smoke Pro from my workplace. This revealed a huge vacuum leak from underneath the intake manifold, coming from the 4 way connector. I replaced all the hoses (and deleted my FPD while I was under there) then threw the manifold back on, and finally she ran again! But of course nothing is perfect, my water temperature gauge doesn't budge. I already know my sender is going to be so overly seized into the hole that pulling it out will be a vain effort. Not to mention an aftermarket gauge would look pretty sick

So now I'm looking into tapping a hole for the sending unit. Looking around I see the general consensus is the back of the water pump housing. I did really like another setup I found though (pictured) from jackhild59. Would this be a good accurate system? Otherwise, where would a good spot be on the back to drill into?

 

the one for water and on the for the ECU are different. the one for the gauge is on the rear iron underneath the oil filter. its that tiny sensor. you shouldn't need to drill and tap it as its a close enough fit for a standard thread sensor. thats what ive done. works fine.

 

600 miles into driving the RX7 around, an issue has begun to rise. It's an odd intermittent stutter that tends to happen after driving the car around for decent lengths. It feels like a combination of the 3800 rpm stutter and something of a bigger issue, To describe it more accurately, the entire car bogs down and loses power when I press the pedal down more than a hair, almost like its flooding or leaning out. The problem is remedied by shutting the engine off and starting it again. However, when the car isn't going into epileptic shock it runs super solid. Pulled off my upper intake manifold for the 3rd time and got to work fixing it. Injectors were all pulled to be sent in for cleaning/flow testing at a local tuning shop, new spark plugs, cleaning up the ground connection under the manifold, and giving the engine a power foam treatment are the main focuses. After I have everything reassembled and run it a little bit longer I'll finally perform a proper compression test. On a side note, I also got around to installing a radio and got rid of my non-functioning
cruise control and cold start assist.

 

Unplug your BAC valve and see if this keeps happening. It happened to me sometimes at random, never did figure out what was causing it other than that the BAC valve was part of the issue. Cleaning / testing / swapping the BAC did not help. It's worth a try to see if you have the same issue, but mine was exactly as you described.

 

Hmm, I'll have to check that out then. Thanks for the idea

 

I remember we had talked a few months back on Reddit, I'm really impressed with the progress of this build keep it up kiddo you're very bright!

 

I've been spotted! Thank you, I've come a long way since then!

This weekend was a busy one, but I budgeted time for the car. Now that my injectors have been cleaned up I was able to reassemble the upper intake manifold and made sure to clean up the main ECU ground. After that my girlfriend and I sprayed the engine up with a whole can of AMSOIL power foam and let it sit overnight (which smoked me out of the garage for a solid 5 minutes this morning).

And I got around to finishing my gauge install

 

Last night I got a compression test done after putting about another 200 miles on the car. The first rotor tested out at an even 90 psi, which by Racing Beat's 75 psi minimum and Banzai Racing's suggested 85, it's good enough. Then we moved onto the rear rotor and after a brief scare of 60 psi (my friend didn't hold the valve in all the way), tested about 90 again. By some miracle, my engine is in pretty decent shape (I'm sure the power foam treatment helped out).

I also unplugged my BAC valve for the miles I was putting on the car, and sure as hell the stutter hasn't returned. On the other hand, I had to sacrifice a good idle (idles at about 2000 cold, then wavers between 1000-2000 until it fully warms and sits at 1000. For now I'm not too worried about it as it doesn't affect me while I'm driving, but any ideas are appreciated.

 

It's been a long time since I've owned an FC but I'd suggest testing yours to see if it operates in line with FSM spec and replacing it if it does not.

 

Glad it helped As far as a proper repair, I got as far as testing the Throttle Position Sensor, the BAC, trying a different ECU, the Air Flow Meter, and I never figured it out. Everything worked perfectly and matched the FSM. What I did not get to is checking the resistance of the wires from the ECU pins to the connectors, but I know I cleaned the connectors and it didn't help.

One thing I will say is that the idle is supposed to drop when BAC is removed IIRC. Usually it goes from like 750 to 700 in my case, but I bumped it to 900 just to make it less likely to bog when I turn on accessories. It's weird that yours is 1000rpm when warm.

I think it's reasonable to assume it's somewhere in the system that regulates the idle and the BAC is just the mechanism by which the malfunction makes itself noticeable, but I never could figure out where. Hopefully you can find out