magnumP5's RX-7 Build Thread
- Thread starter magnumP5
- Start date
I'm not as familiar with the 12A but are you using the vent in the center iron or on the oil filler neck? Fuel line is a good idea.
My filler neck actually has 2 vent lines so I have 2 catch cans, I was just going to use a Tee and then dump into 1 can but just havent got to it yet.
mymmeryloss
Member
- :
- 13bT Mazda B2600i
This needs updated badly!
Haha, yes it does!
That's part of it! I'm pretty sure mymmeryloss has little ones of his own so he knows.
Truth is I was out of town 12/14 through 1/1; I can't do much to the RX-7 when I'm 10 hours away. Aside from taking some well-needed time off we made sure little Ian got to see as much extended family as possible. I did pick up a few things for the RX-7 over the holidays so there's work to be done.
mymmeryloss
Member
- :
- 13bT Mazda B2600i
Good to hear!
And yup i have kids. Thus the reason my project is taking forever...
And yup i have kids. Thus the reason my project is taking forever...
I wanted to get some work done this past Saturday before my sister came into town. Unfortunately I picked up some crazy one-day stomach bug Ian brought back from daycare and basically spent all afternoon-night on the couch. Hopefully I'll get some time this weekend to spend out in the garage. I also may have found a TII hood and OEM front lip 
Little update - got to play in the garage for a few hours yesterday. First thing's first, a Christmas present:
Swapped the ends for snap-ins for easier installation/removal:
Installing them turned out to be a little more difficult than I had intended. The 5th point was easy; just drill and tap a hole in the forward cross brace I previously made. The side anchor's were a different story. When I first mocked everything up using the stock side anchor points the belts were way too far back, pulling them into my stomach (bad!). I ended up drilling two new anchor locations forward of the rear seat mount. Yeah, I now it's highly now recommended to mount the anchors through sheet metal but I am using 2.5" diameter, 1/8" thickn washers on the underside of the car so the load should get distributed. This'll work for the time being until "racecar" when I cut out and weld in an entirely new floor, complete with harness anchors. New anchors:
Lastly, I took a quick picture with the seat and harness installed for the last time:
I actually have 95% of the interior back together now. I'll try to snap a picture tomorrow as it's finally starting to look like a finished car again.
In other news I broke down and purchased and oil catch can and some fuel line for my "PCV system." I also think I've got a good idea on the whole radiator ducting issue. The question now is how crazy I want to go with the new undertray/splitter. Also, I've discovered you really aren't suppose to do fiberglass work until ambient temps are >70 degrees so I won't be able to start any of that until late Spring. Considering that I'm now probably at a late Summer/Fall start up.
Swapped the ends for snap-ins for easier installation/removal:
Installing them turned out to be a little more difficult than I had intended. The 5th point was easy; just drill and tap a hole in the forward cross brace I previously made. The side anchor's were a different story. When I first mocked everything up using the stock side anchor points the belts were way too far back, pulling them into my stomach (bad!). I ended up drilling two new anchor locations forward of the rear seat mount. Yeah, I now it's highly now recommended to mount the anchors through sheet metal but I am using 2.5" diameter, 1/8" thickn washers on the underside of the car so the load should get distributed. This'll work for the time being until "racecar" when I cut out and weld in an entirely new floor, complete with harness anchors. New anchors:
Lastly, I took a quick picture with the seat and harness installed for the last time:
I actually have 95% of the interior back together now. I'll try to snap a picture tomorrow as it's finally starting to look like a finished car again.
In other news I broke down and purchased and oil catch can and some fuel line for my "PCV system." I also think I've got a good idea on the whole radiator ducting issue. The question now is how crazy I want to go with the new undertray/splitter. Also, I've discovered you really aren't suppose to do fiberglass work until ambient temps are >70 degrees so I won't be able to start any of that until late Spring. Considering that I'm now probably at a late Summer/Fall start up.
I saw that and it's tempting. I just haven't been able to come across any more pictures other that what they have on their site. What I'm mainly interested in is if it extends all the way to the bottom of the radiator.
mymmeryloss
Member
- :
- 13bT Mazda B2600i
Good progress!!!
Cleaned up the interior a bit more and snapped another picture. It looks a lot more complete with the center console back in.
Now to get a passenger's seat...
I started to pull apart the steering system as well. So far I've only broken all the bolts/nuts loose but with a 24 year-old car that's no small task especially considering I didn't break a thing! Unfortunately it's been too cold (<20 deg F) lately to spend too much time in the garage. In other news I'm told my exhaust manifold is *almost* done (it was almost done several months ago). I also think I'm going to bite the bullet on a ISC Racing splitter. Once that comes in I can finally start working on the front end ducting, which I think I finally have figured out.
Now to get a passenger's seat...
I started to pull apart the steering system as well. So far I've only broken all the bolts/nuts loose but with a 24 year-old car that's no small task especially considering I didn't break a thing! Unfortunately it's been too cold (<20 deg F) lately to spend too much time in the garage. In other news I'm told my exhaust manifold is *almost* done (it was almost done several months ago). I also think I'm going to bite the bullet on a ISC Racing splitter. Once that comes in I can finally start working on the front end ducting, which I think I finally have figured out.
Oil catch can came in last night. I paid entirely too much for this but it's a pretty neat piece. It's quite small at about 2" in diameter and 8" long and came with it's own mounting bracket:
It's actually a lot more complicated than it seems:
Closeup of the inlet with foam filter media:
I also took Marc's advice and went ahead and ordered the ISC Racing front splitter:
This should give me a little more inlet area for the radiator/oil cooler and the bottom is sealed back to the front wheels.
Hoping to get the steering rack pulled this weekend and I'm looking to pickup a '87 TII (no engine/trans) for parts.
It's actually a lot more complicated than it seems:
Closeup of the inlet with foam filter media:
I also took Marc's advice and went ahead and ordered the ISC Racing front splitter:
This should give me a little more inlet area for the radiator/oil cooler and the bottom is sealed back to the front wheels.
Hoping to get the steering rack pulled this weekend and I'm looking to pickup a '87 TII (no engine/trans) for parts.
Started the steering rack de-powering process this weekend. There's not a whole lot to show but the overall process has been pretty easy so far. The hardest part was braking the outer tie rod lock nuts loose! Got most of the rack apart before I had to stop for dinner and baby-time.
Before:
After:
While watching the Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona I was playing around with some other ideas for the RX-7. I'm strongly debating doing some more body work while the rebuild is ongoing since it looks like it's going to late Summer/early Fall before it fires up at the earliest. Plans include vented, fiberglass hood (shown previously) and wider, fiberglass fenders (front, maybe rear as well). The fenders would be to support a wider wheel/tire combo. Debating between 17x9 +22 RPF1's w/ 255/40R17 rubber or 17x9.5 +18 RPF1's w/ 275/40R17 rubber. More grip is always better but I'm worried the heavier/larger combination will have more negative effects.
Before:
After:
While watching the Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona I was playing around with some other ideas for the RX-7. I'm strongly debating doing some more body work while the rebuild is ongoing since it looks like it's going to late Summer/early Fall before it fires up at the earliest. Plans include vented, fiberglass hood (shown previously) and wider, fiberglass fenders (front, maybe rear as well). The fenders would be to support a wider wheel/tire combo. Debating between 17x9 +22 RPF1's w/ 255/40R17 rubber or 17x9.5 +18 RPF1's w/ 275/40R17 rubber. More grip is always better but I'm worried the heavier/larger combination will have more negative effects.
Not much going on in here lately...
Found an hour to work on the steering rack and pinion last night. Got everything completely disassembled:
There are a bunch of seals I was after: one on the rack (skinnier thing about 1/3 from the left), one inside the rack support (left of first seal), one or two inside the rack housing, and a bunch on the pinion itself. Seals removed:
The seal on the rack was easy; two cuts on opposite sides, whack with hammer, and off it goes. I actually left the seal inside the rack support but I removed it's retention spring so it should exert less force on the rack. There's still one (or two?) seals inside the housing I need to get to once I figure out how to remove them. I think once I clean the housing tonight (should be 60* here) they'll come right out. The pinion was a little more difficult as I had to remove the rear bearing to get to a small, annoying snap ring, which was holding all the seals in place. Pinion less seals and bearing:
The bearing will go back on when I'm done with the pinion. In order to completely remove the "slop" from the steering I need to weld the discontinuous ring in the center of the pinion to the pinion itself. Supposedly this eliminates 5* of slop from the steering.
Regarding wheels/tires I think I'm going to stick with 255/40R17 and 17x9 +22 mm and front wide fenders (+20 mm). While wider is better I'm worried the larger diameter and heavier weight of the 275/40R17's and 17x9.5 + 18's would be a detriment. That and I would likely need even larger front fenders (+30 mm) and installed rear wide fenders looks to be a major PITA (despite looking awesome). Anyone have a fender roller I could borrow?
Found an hour to work on the steering rack and pinion last night. Got everything completely disassembled:
There are a bunch of seals I was after: one on the rack (skinnier thing about 1/3 from the left), one inside the rack support (left of first seal), one or two inside the rack housing, and a bunch on the pinion itself. Seals removed:
The seal on the rack was easy; two cuts on opposite sides, whack with hammer, and off it goes. I actually left the seal inside the rack support but I removed it's retention spring so it should exert less force on the rack. There's still one (or two?) seals inside the housing I need to get to once I figure out how to remove them. I think once I clean the housing tonight (should be 60* here) they'll come right out. The pinion was a little more difficult as I had to remove the rear bearing to get to a small, annoying snap ring, which was holding all the seals in place. Pinion less seals and bearing:
The bearing will go back on when I'm done with the pinion. In order to completely remove the "slop" from the steering I need to weld the discontinuous ring in the center of the pinion to the pinion itself. Supposedly this eliminates 5* of slop from the steering.
Regarding wheels/tires I think I'm going to stick with 255/40R17 and 17x9 +22 mm and front wide fenders (+20 mm). While wider is better I'm worried the larger diameter and heavier weight of the 275/40R17's and 17x9.5 + 18's would be a detriment. That and I would likely need even larger front fenders (+30 mm) and installed rear wide fenders looks to be a major PITA (despite looking awesome). Anyone have a fender roller I could borrow?
mymmeryloss
Member
- :
- 13bT Mazda B2600i
Ah hells ya! That splitter is legit!
I may ask to borrow this in the near future if everything plays out.
Came in Wednesday too!
It'ss a pretty legit fiberglass racing spliiter. It's not perfect, but then again it doesn't have to be. I'm probably going to have to raise the ride height a bit with this or it won't last a day! The trick now is to figure out how to mount it. There is a "mounting kit" but it's currently unavailable. I want to setup something with Dzus fasteners so I can quickly and easily remove it. I need to figure out how to install those things first...
The de-powering exercize is basically over. I really just have to weld the pinion and I can put everything back together. I'm debating if I should try to clean up the rack a little more and paint it though. I'm not sure how I'm going to do that in a non-heated garage in 30* weather though...
