I decided to revive a salvage title 7.

The RX7 has come back from the frame machine and I'm ready to beat her up.

Here's how she was after I took off the paint to see what kind of work was done, the rear quarter is toast.


Mocking up parts:



Those stock wheels look silly, I went ahead and put my friends wheels on with a better offset and are bit wider. They aren't as wide as I'm going but it at least gives me an idea.



The fun began with cutting out the fender to fit the wider wheels

 

I borrowed my boss's 110v welder and welded the inner well to the fender. I spent more time trying to fix the welder than any actual welding. The trigger kept getting stuck causing me to burn holes in my sheet metal more times than I wanted to, there was no burnback adjustment, and the wire kept getting snagged causing the wire to bunch up near the spool. AARGGHH!!







oh god, my first attempt at fiberglass. It is kind of an abortion.
Here are the beginnings of the extended inner well, I was just going to use the fiber to seal the metal, but I decided to extend it. There are a few bubbles and some thick spots, and some wavy areas, I'll have to grind and fix them. But it isn't a bad first start.... i think.




To glue on the overfenders I found the 3m Automix linup of bonding adhesives. Good for steel, aluminum, SMC, and FRP. Awesome.


I drilled holes and lined up the overfender with rivets to position everything.


Here is where I was grinding off all of the surface to be glued. I also covered any metal not to be glued with Rustbullet (por-15 ++).

 

Here I placed the overfender in place, glued, and riveted. Any contacting surfaces were scuffed with 40 grit.





Here is the other side on

Damn, i need to get some RIMMMZZZ




I put a used (new for me) door in, the old one had been worked over fairly well and didn't align right. I'll be able to shape my edges now.



Smooth, the black stuff that you can see through the fiberglass is the panel glue



Got the old window out and I've installed it in the new door.




Here's my guide layer of primer so I can find the rest of the imperfections. I got a new gun and I had a tough time with it, seems to have shot a bit dry and i got a few runs.





my boss had some metallic basecoat lying around that was exactly what i was looking for, i test shot it with some clear coat tonight to see how it would look on my car, too bad I have to sand it back off. I'll have to get it color matched. Here it is drying:





Wheel fitment again.

My friend brought over some Gram Lights. 18x10 +12 for the rear to check out. I think this is damn near what I'm going to get.






and then here I'm almost done frenching in the rear blinkers.




Thats all for now

 

Very impresive job. Keep up the pictures show of your progress. I'd love to see the finished car.

Albert

 

Is the overfender, a cut out rear quarter panel piece from another FD?

 

hey is that a chargespeed rear quarter? looks like a nice project...

 

What kit is it altogether?? nice work

 

Looks good so-far!

 

The overfenders are Chargespeed. The fronts and sideskirts are the Burnout replicas from Shine Auto.

 

why not shave the rear lights and antenna? i did it to mine...

 

looking good!

 

lookin good

 

you have skills that's for sure. looking good

 

I should have I know. But somehow I decided to keep em.

 

Ok im still trying to figure out what can tuck up in here. Its hard to figure this out without a tire on the rim. They aren't my rims. Does ANYONE know what offset and width a Chargespeed widebody takes in the rear and what a Burnout takes in the front?

 

Base Coat Sprayed





Clear coat

 

hello. this is what i got from chargepeed when i asked for rim size and offset:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hi Joachim,

Following is data of wheel size of rims that the car in movie of top of our website.

1. Front 19 x 8.5 +35 offset with 20mm spacer (adapter)
2. Rear 19 x 9.5 +35 offset with 30mm spacer (adapter)

Please note for the rear wheel, when put 30mm spacer and if the car lowed, the car can
not be driven because the wheel will hit the side skirts. So you need some modification at your car when you lower your car and use wide body kit.

regards,

liyun
Chargespeed
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Looking nice so far!
Joachim

 

practice makes perfrct. but the Fenders look nice. & that red is going to look hot!
Im going the same route but to save some money, time & effort im going to buy the stuff from chargespeed. then mold the fenders with the car

 

dang they are running skinny wheels. At least that data gives me an idea with those numbers, thanks.

 

If I remember correctly the chargespeed fenders are the same as the M-Sport fenders with 20mm/50mm front/rear. I have 18x10 +38 and 18x12+26 wheels off the deep dish chart of the WORK wheel chart. These will fit with stock brakes but if you want to go with a BBK you will need to either add a 8mm spacer on the front or get a offset that will work with a BBK. Tires are 265/35/18 and 335/30/18.

 

A good friend who owns a body shop and painted both my 7s told me that he didn't recommend having that done because eventually over time you'll be able to see a slight depression in the areas that were shaved/filled in. That's why I chose to leave my antenna as-is.

Aeka, the project looks great, it's awesome to see an FD get revived what with all of them getting crashed and ruined. Definitely keep us updated

 

that happens if you don't weld in metal in place of the holes... i welded cut pieces of metal flat across so that my bondo won't sag or cave in....

 

ok fellaz, because I don't know what i was doing, my clear coat fish eyed like a golf ball. I kept spraying because I didn't know there was a problem. Water was getting through the gun and misted the clear coat. Bad filter I suppose.

Here she is, I was told by many "experts" that the clear has to be stripped and the base coat re-sprayed.



I refused to listen, and decided to try and knock em down with 400 grit. Well holy **** it is working.

dry




semi-wet




I'm walking on thin ice by doing this, but if I pull it off, I should be able to hit it real quick with 800 grit and then shoot some more clear with a couple of new filters and a new hose.

 

nice

 

i also welded in new pieces of sheet metal in place of rear blinkers/antenna.. and i have had it like that for almost a yr and it looks just the same as the day it got sprayed with paint.