My MSP project

[polaris]

This is my MSP adventure thread. I've been lurking on this forum for a little while trying to research and learn as much about my MSP as possible. I will say that this particular forum is great and I have found a lot of answers to questions concerning problems with my car (not all though). I decided to register so here I am. This thread is to document my journey on getting my MSP back to it's former glory. I'll post pics and details. Feel free to put in your 2 cents. I don't know everything about this car yet, so please also feel free to share wisdom.

About 7 weeks ago I bought a 2003.5 MSP. When I went to look at it initially, it wasn't hard to see the car needed work. The body had some dings and small dents, but was mostly intact. The motor didn't have the cover on it, and the strut brace was missing. You could definitely see someone has been in that engine. I'm guessing that the car previously had some mods done to it, but the stock stuff was put back on before they traded it in. The previous owner and/or owners drove it pretty hard. It had 140k miles.

When I test drove it, it clearly had a vacuum leak and idled pretty rough. The turbo spooled up just fine, but it clearly wasn't boosting as much as it should. It had a boost gauge (it was a brand called Nitrous from Harbor Freight I believe) but vacuum was only reading between 2-4 hg which is definitely not right. Tires were pretty bad and the finish was coming off the rims (looks like someone use brake cleaner or something and left it on for a while). It had no a/c and no stereo head unit, or the amp and sub in the back (the box was there though). The steering wheel had the normal dark stains and leather coming off on the left side. It was at a dealership that sells higher performance vehicles (off Ben White for those of you in ATX). In fact, there was another titanium gray MSP in pretty mint condition for about $9500. The guy said that the car I was looking at had more problems than he wanted to deal with, so he let it go for $3000, which really isn't bad considering the car's rarity. I knew she'd need some work, but I accepted the challenge and bought it.

About 1 month before this, my wife came home with a red 2002 Protege5. It had a check engine light and a few problems, so I got it tuned and tightened up. I got her some new clear tail lights and a cai (a cheap one from amazon) Little did I know that the experience working on her car would be valuable in my own quest for the perfect MSP later. However, as you all know, a MSP doesn't really come without problems. Especially the idle. The previous owner put in some upgraded motor mounts that are pretty damn stiff, so the rough idle can be felt extra in the car. It was obvious that this was the first thing I should give attention to (besides new tires) So the journey begins!!!

 

[323]

welcome! and nice username lol. it reminds me of the polaris cleaner in my friends pool

 

[KrayzieFox]

Awesome man, so glad to see a new member that actually did research prior to joining and is genuinely interested in bringing back an MSP from the dead. There aren't many of them left these days, and the few that do pop up for sale are in pretty damn rough condition.

I went through a very similar experience as you about 5 years ago.. I bought an 01 MP3 that had been severely neglected and I spent a solid year restoring everything from the body, wheels, engine, to the interior. It was a great experience and made me really love my car, hopefully you'll get the same satisfaction out of yours once you're done!

And you're definitely right about your car being modded in the past, even from the one picture you posted I can see that the front bumper has been on/off a bunch of times as the tab by the headlight is broken and the bumper lip is sticking out. You should look into getting a set of brackets from AAC to fix that, they're about $65 but well worth it.. NOTHING else fixes the bumper sag like his kit. The OEM headlight clips are about $8 a piece but they won't do the job, so just spend the money and do the job right

I'd also recommend redoing ALL the vacuum lines in the engine bay. I wouldn't even bother sourcing the leak, the car has 140K miles so the OEM lines are likely cracked and falling apart so just replace the whole system with nice quality silicone lines. You can get a kit for about $50.

Good luck, put up some more pictures and let us know your plans.. we'll do our best to guide you to the right products that will allow you to do the restoration right.

 

[323]

i plan on redoing all my vac lines too. it's on my long list of things to do. here's what i got down on my notes. hopefully it'll help you out

Vacuum lines:
- approx. 20' of 5/32" (4mm) majority of vacuum lines on intake manifold
- 10' of 3/16" (5mm) wastegate actuator and emissions lines
- 10' of 1/4" (6mm) PCV and crankcase ventilation

 

[mica.msp]

Glad to see another thread like this. Most MSP's in my area are in very rough shape (especially since I live in WI with all of the salt in the winter). I'm working toward the same goal as you are, but also transforming my 03 into an 03.5. Good luck!

 

[IllaNoizeTV]

welcome to the team bro. With rarity, comes great responsibility

I bought mine about 5 months back. I'm loving it so far. I plan to buy a nice s204 subaru lip and drop it. Heres mine so far.

 

[polaris]

Thanks for the responses! Like you said KrayzieFox, I knew that in order to isolate the vacuum leak, I needed to eliminate as many possibilities as I could at first. So I replaced all my vacuum lines. I was able to find the vacuum line sizes from a post in this forum that dates back a few years. Unfortunately, it didn't fix the problem. Also I'd like to add; just like anyone who wanted a little more breathability and power, I got rid of the stock air box and put in an Auto Zone el cheapo special air filter.

Keep in mind, at this time I didn't understand the full scope of the problem, or the engineering flaws that plague every MSP owner, so originally my idea was to keep the piping and everything stock. But as I crawled deeper into the rabbit hole, I realized some things would need to be changed around.

So after I got all the new vacuum lines in, I began to poke around the intercooler piping to see if my leak was coming from there. Upon closer inspection, I realized there was a plethora of small cracks, holes, and all the stuff that comes with any 11 year old turbocharged vehicle with plastic OEM pipes. The biggest problem being on my hot pipe. The pipe that connects the BPV to the hot pipe looks like it was broken before and someone used JB Weld to fix. Well you can probably imagine how that was working. I looked into getting an OEM replacement hot pipe, but it was over $300! So it was evident that the cheaper (and ideal) thing to do was replace all OEM pipes with hardpipes. In the meantime, I had some plumbing fixtures laying around, so I MacGyver'd a temporary fix for the leak. I used epoxy to seal it, and it did the job pretty well. But it still didn't fix the problem.

Also as a side note; like you said KrayzieFox, that bumper is sagging a bit. Upon further investigation, I'm pretty sure one of the previous owners had a FMIC in there at one time. But when they switched it back to OEM stuff, they ran some vacuum lines wrong, and of course it caused an issue that I would run into later.

 

[polaris]

So now that I knew I needed hardpipes, I needed to find some. As you all know, there really isn't much to choose from. All in all, I found 4 to choose from. Speed Circuit, Street Unit, Weapon R, and Turbohoses. I almost bought the Speed Circuit ones, but luckily, when I called, the guy told me they wouldn't work with the stock setup. Then there was Turbohoses. It looked like a great kit, but every kit was made to order, and honestly I didn't want to wait 3-4 weeks to get it. The Weapon R hardpipes were the cheapest of the 4, but it seemed like the cold pipe had a lot of bends in it...too many in fact. So Street Unit it was.

Lemme rewind for a sec. In the process of researching hardpipes and such, I was considering relocating my MAF. I looked into getting the Forge BPV, but the more I played with my car, the more I realized that the BPV was an engineering flaw that was more problems than it was worth. When working nominally, the BPV works fine, but having the MAF at the front of the intake system leaves a lot of margin for error. Of course this is subjective, and a lot of people would argue that the BPV is the best way to go. Sure its great to prevent compressor surge, but I feel it's an engineering flaw. Here's my theory...

The MAF reads the amount of air coming in, and subsequently adds gas to reach the proper A/F ratio. As we all know, a VTA BOV cant work with a MAF in front of it because gas will be put in for air that never reaches the TB. Air that goes into the intake has to travel quite a distance before it gets to the TB, and there is no way to meter how much air is going into the engine once it gets past the MAF. So when the BPV is activated, it temporarily creates an "air loop". Although this air doesn't leave the system once it gets past the MAF, it has a delayed entry into the TB. In Sound Engineering we call this "Input Latency" We all know that MSPs run rich by default. In my opinion, this is why.

So all that being said, I decided to relocate my MAF. I had Street Unit weld a Greddy flange onto the cold pipe. I decided on the Greddy FV. I know it's new technology, and there weren't a lot of reviews on the FV, but I know Greddy is a great company so I went ahead and ordered one. The Street Unit guys are champions and had my pipes and BOV to me in about a week. All together the pipes and BOV cost me about $750.

So naturally, I was going to need a CAI. The only 2 that really peaked my interest were the Injen CAI, and the Weapon R. I considered getting one from Turbohoses, but it was pretty expensive. And I was beginning to rack up a lot of unforeseen expenses. But little did I know, this was only the beginning. So anyways, I decided on the Injen. I also decided to run it as a SRI instead of a CAI. Theres a lot of rain in Texas and I didn't want to take the chance of sucking water into my intake. Plus SRI's = quicker spool up. As you all know, Injen products are damn expensive, and this one set me back about $300.

Of course with all the new piping and stuff, I was going to need a proper boost gauge, so I got a trusty autometer for about $60.

 

[polaris]

Since I was relocating my MAF, I was going to have to do some custom fab on my hardpipes. I feel like the BOV flange was welded a bit to high up on the cold pipe. In retrospect, I should have requested it was welded lower. But I still had enough room for the MAF (barely) so I moved ahead. I dry fitted everything and put tape on the pipes to mark where to cut. I couldn't find anyplace that did affordable bead rolling, so again I went the MacGyver route using a crimper. Taking my time, it came out well and everything went together without a hitch.

 

[polaris]

So I get it all together and take a deep breath...moment of truth...and start the car. It fires right up. Usually the car doesn't idle rough at first, so the real test was yet to come. I take it out of the parking lot onto the road and open it up. The turbo was definitely generating sufficient boost. In fact, the acceleration was amazing! But right about 4500 rpms, I started getting fuel cut. My boost gauge was reading right about 6, so I couldn't understand why it was getting fuel cut.　わからない！！！Although I didn't realize it at the time, my vacuum wasn't reading more than 5 hg, and it should be closer to 20. I still had a vacuum leak...but where?! I then began researching the tallest accessible building in Austin so I could throw myself off of it. But I chickened out and decided to take another look at my vacuum system. My hoses and hardpipes were good. No cracks in my intercooler. I worked my way down the vacuum line until I got to the BOV. Little did I realize at the time, but the vacuum line T'd again and went down to my wastegate actuator (as you know, that's not good...WGA diaphragms are only intended for boost, not vacuum) I pulled the line off the T and gave it a blow. Blowing into a WGA should be like blowing into a brick wall. But this was more like blowing through a straw. So I finally found the vacuum leak. ヤッタ！Unfortunately my WGA was toast. The vacuum leak gave me false boost and vacuum readings, and worst of all, my wastegate wasn't opening. So the fuel cut was from overboosting. Luckily I didn't blow up my engine.

So I ordered the Turbosmart 7+ WGA for around $170. I also got a MBC (cheap $35 one from amazon, but it would work for now) A few days later, I get all my tools and such together and get to it. Of course, the first thing that has to come off (after the pipes) is the exhaust manifold heat shield. I pull that bad johnny off to reveal yet another problem. My mani has 2 cracks in it. One wasn't too bad, but the other was huge. In fact, my mani was pretty much cracked in half. Although I felt like someone just stomped on my cubes, I felt a small (very very small) sense of accomplishment for getting one step closer to my resolve. This, of course, is only until I begin researching and trying to find a replacement mani. As you know, these days, if you want a quality stock replacement, your only choice is the OEM mani. Although it is destined to crack eventually, you could easily get 100k miles out of it if you have proper motor mounts and exhaust bracing. Only problem is the price; well over $1000.

On the back end of my search, I found a mani on Ebay for $200. It looked like it would fit, but I couldn't find any reviews on it, or even anyone mentioning it anywhere. And the thing that worried me more than anything, was the brand name was ilovetacotaco. I called the place and talked to a girl at customer service. I asked her if it was a stock replacement, or a turbo kit mani. Her answer was just read from the product description that I just happened to be looking at while talking to her. This was discouraging to say the least. But I was in desperation mode, so I took a chance and ordered the mani. When it came in, I held it up to the OEM mani and it looked like it would fit. Since then, I posted something about it in the Pope mani thread, and found out its a Chinese mani, and it will work (for a while).

 

[polaris]

In the meantime, I took the vacuum line off the WGA (which should have never been there) and plugged both ends. So now my boost gauge is reading proper vacuum and I can see accurate monitoring of boost, but I'm essentially driving without a wastegate. Needless to say, I don't boost it at all and drive it like an old lady until I can get the new mani and WGA installed. I'm heading outta town for a week, but plan to do the swap as soon as I get back. I plan to raise the boost 1 psi for a total of 7psi. I should be able to do this safely without new injectors and/or internals.

But in hooking everything back up, I have a question for you guys. When I connect my WGA, it needs to be to a boost only source. I don't think the T25 has a pressure nipple on it. So what do I connect it to? Can I leave it connected to the crankcase vacuum/boost line if I add a check valve?

 

[hornsfan10609]

Damn you are doing a lot of work on this thing, I wish we had met before you starting buying parts the SU kit is way overpriced. You should be able to get a lot more than hardpipes, a BOV, and an intake for $1k if you only spent $3k on the whole car.

 

[hornsfan10609]

In the meantime, I took the vacuum line off the WGA (which should have never been there) and plugged both ends. So now my boost gauge is reading proper vacuum and I can see accurate monitoring of boost, but I'm essentially driving without a wastegate. Needless to say, I don't boost it at all and drive it like an old lady until I can get the new mani and WGA installed. I'm heading outta town for a week, but plan to do the swap as soon as I get back. I plan to raise the boost 1 psi for a total of 7psi. I should be able to do this safely without new injectors and/or internals.

But in hooking everything back up, I have a question for you guys. When I connect my WGA, it needs to be to a boost only source. I don't think the T25 has a pressure nipple on it. So what do I connect it to? Can I leave it connected to the crankcase vacuum/boost line if I add a check valve?

Just hook it up like stock with a T or get a vacuum block, no need for a check valve

 

[paniaguae640]

i would of just gotten ebay universal hardpipes and cut as needed that would of been cheaper and they are still good since they are just hardpipes, as far as a good exhaust manifold have you tried popeperformance? Last that I heard of, he was making one.

 

[KrayzieFox]

I like what I see so far OP, you're willing to open up your wallet and spend the cash where it's needed without cutting corners.. kudos to you sir! However, as the previous two posts indicate, you probably could've gotten a bit more out of your money. But, no use in crying over spilt milk, what's done is done, and it's definitely not a waste as all of it has allowed you to fix the problems you inherited with the purchase.

As far as the WGA line goes, it's fine if you have it hooked up the stock way. Most of us have vacuum blocks on the brake booster line and run all our vacuum lines off it (WGA, BOV, MBC, AFC, gauge, etc.), but that's just for convenience. If you decide to go this route, make sure to cut the booster line before the check valve, you don't want the brake booster seeing boost just the same way you don't want the WGA seeing vacuum. It's fine if it does tho, it's how most of us run it, but a proper check valve shouldn't hurt if you want to run it properly.

And before you get in there and replace the manifold and WGA, take off that intake and check the turbo for shaft play.. I imagine it could be on its last leg as well with all those miles on the car, so maybe you could try sourcing a replacement while you're in there. There's one in the FS section with only 60K something miles for around $200, so it'd be worth while snagging that if you end up needing it. That way you can assemble the manifold, turbo, and WGA off the car and just drop it in and hook it up to the down pipe and oil/water lines. New gaskets go without saying of course, but be warned, finding a replacement manifold to turbo gasket at local auto parts stores is often impossible, so look into picking one up from a vendor or maybe even eBay.

And lastly one of the BEST sources for OEM parts is onlinemazdaparts.com

 

[paniaguae640]

I agree with the above poster, the gaskets you could get from atpturbo.com I have personally used them before and they are always on point. I agree to getting every single piece of gasket new, do not reuse or you will regret it later by getting a lot of leaks. As for the turbo do it and do it right once, my personal opinion I would just rebuild the turbo so it's like new instead of buying a used one or if you want to upgrade get a GT2860RS but run at low boost. My 2 cents.

 

[hornsfan10609]

Apparently Onlinemazdaparts is no longer in business? I haven't confirmed this but that's what scratchnsniff claims. As far as the turbo goes it's a lottery, my original turbo with 156k still boosts 12psi easy and doesn't smoke or spray oil in the piping.

 

[KrayzieFox]

Apparently Onlinemazdaparts is no longer in business? I haven't confirmed this but that's what scratchnsniff claims.

That would be a tragedy!! I'll try putting in an order and get back to you guys, I really hope that's not true..

 

[323]

I have an active order with them. I'll prolly call them in the morning because they're taking longer than usual

 

[323]

update: called yesterday at 330pm. called this morning at 9am and again at 1130am. no one ever picked up