Project: P5 Rescue! making a clean Daily from two cars.

[Valk]

well today went pretty well dispite the monsoon conditions.. had some people around today to fish from the black p5 while a friend of mine and i got the silver shell ready for the motor/put the motor in. still have to put all the manifolds and stuff in place but i figure it will be easier to do that than wrestle with the rear motor mount with the intake installed.

either way, engine and trans bolted to the chassis and i have the long slow process of reassembly to look forward to. I seem to have lost one of the alternator adjustment blocks.. i tried to put one in but the bolt broke off in it. almost no hope of getting it out, so i have to find the other one, or go to the harware store and find something similar.. or make one... there is that too.


tommorrow ill connect the electrical branch to the alt/starter ect, possibly install the intake manifold, but it might be easier to leave the intake off until i find that damn alternator adjuster.

 

[Valk]

not a lot of progress. got the blue doors off and the black doors salvaged from the black car. was hoping to get the fender from the black one but one of the underside bolts was rusted in and i rounded the head.. i dont have an angle grinder, or any cutoffwheels left for my dremel so other than spending money, im screwed for that part.. wasnt a big deal anyway just a little dent on the silver one. ill live with it.

i found the alternator adjuster and reconnected that electrical branch and the coolant hoses. reinstalled the exhaust manifold with a fresh gasket. i started to work on the intake manifold, but the old gasket is caked on pretty good. will require more effort to prep. but while i had it on the bench, i took the opportunity to delete the VTCS butterflies.. ive heard people suggest using jbweld.. but i used a high temp silicon.. i figure if the s*** breaks loose, id rather it be soft silicon instead of hard jbweld.. but i have two manifolds if this doesn't work. worst that will happen is a little silicon gets into the cat and i end up with a vac leak heh.

also opened up the egr for a clean, though the plunger moved without incident, so this was prob a messy needless activity. the whole manifold is pretty carboned up.. if i was ambitious and decided to seperate the halves for a clean, could i just use silicon as a gasket for the halves?
whats involved in deleting the throttle body coolant? loop the one hose onto the other? which hose is the pressure/cold side? prob gonna delete the throttle body and use those coolant fittings for the turbo.

is the oil pressure sender on the filtered side? could i use it as a oil supply for the turbo? if so, it looks like the hardest task is just tapping the block for oil return, but ive seen these two peice metal groumet flanges you can use that slips into the hole from the inside and has a screw on fitting on the outside, so you dont have to tap the block, just drill a hole.

 

[Valk]

so last weekend was my kids 5th birthday. lots of prep involved for that and a big weekend for it.
now im back on track. this week has been about getting the body panels ready for install.







all bondo'd

all sealed







havent decided if i want to give a second coat of sealer on the good faces or not. i still have tons left but this is after just one coat.. some of the filler spots could prob use a little more love. otherwise, im hoping to shoot the 22v on saturday and have it all ready for install by... monday?

who knows. i still have to;
install front and rear brakes, install power steering pump, connect the shifter, plug in the axle stubs, fill tranny with fluid, install radiator/coolant, reassemble front suspension, install headlight ballasts... and prob other stuff. this weekend id like to get the car to start. in addition to finishing the paint work. also need to remember to peel the mouldings from the passenger side. entire car is gonna get polished after new painted stuff goes on so it should look pretty sharp when complete.

 

[Valk]

got to the paint work today. had to baby sit in the afternoon so didn't get started til like.. 5... but whateves 4.5 hours on it today and its finished short of polishing.

it took me 10 hours to prep the doors, repair the dents and any rust damage ect, seal them, wet sand and paint. I only wet sanded the primer to 400, to get rid of orange peel. did a quick wet scuff with 600 but was starting to hit black on some spots so switched to the grey scotch instead.
obviously with any kind of paint work, the more time you spend on it, the more people will be able to tell how much time you spent on it heh. if i was doing this with a rattle bomb, id prob have put more sealer on and wet sanded a full 600 grits. Rattle can just has a hell of a time getting enough material onto the peice and will rely a lot more on good prep.
i spray with professional equipment, though my booth isnt super ideal as its a wood shop. just impossible to keep clean.
my parts will need a polish to get dust nibs and random bugs out of the clear, but i can live with that.

it cost me $200 to buy enough sealer, base coat and clear, activator,reducer. If you are fortunate enough to have access to spray equipment, i cant say enough good about the valspar automotive products... the sealer laid out beautifully. like spraying a single stage top coat. minimal orange peel, no runs, nice and heavy. the base went on without incident, even coverage in 3 coats with a 1.2 devilbiss. used a pint of sealer and a sprayable quart of 22v. used about a pint of of valspar ac2100 clear. two coats for a glass smooth finish.

if your using rattle, definitely look at the valspar stuff and try to get the 2k primer/surfacer and 2k clear.


wet sanding vigorously to 400. still some orange peel around the edges but i can live with it. it isnt a showcar and its not like the oem paint didn't have orange peel heh.





three coats of 22v, 2 coats of clear







in 72 hours ill hit them with 3m perfect it polishing system. prob wont polish doorhandles an mirror cover. they usually dont get polished from factory.

another thing for would be diy painters.. get an assortment of scotch pads when you buy your prep stuff. esp if your painting over good oem paint. the scotch will rough up the surface very well without actually scratching it like sandpaper will. I prob could have cut out the sealer stage entirely and just scuffed the oem black and painted it silver heh. took the full three coats to cover the black rub-throughs though.

 

[Valk]

got to work at like 10 am this morning doing as much of the small parts assembly as i could. everything is on except the front calipers i had off to mess with on the wifes es. this will get my msp front brakes and some new oem rear brakes to finish.

so after like 7 hours of bolting little things on, the entire underside is buttoned up aside from the brakes, i could drop it down and it rolls. engine runs, power gets to the wheels.. alls well. this is actually the first time ive seen the trans move and im pleased that the trans feels better than my msp with 70k fewer kms. ill get some shifter bushings for it, POSSBILY a twm. if i could get an msp shifter that would be better, or just use mine and put a twm in the msp. who knows. trans good, wheel bearings good, im happy. once the body has hardened ill give it a quick polish and put it back together. I should be able to roll this car around by the end of the week.
then the real "Modding" begins.

i must say though.. ive never had another FSDE that reved so nicely. with the fidanza and vtcs delete it is quite happy to sing for me. comical too compare the stock downpipe to what its going to get in the not to distant future though

 

[Valk]

trying to do a little bit every day, even if its only an hour.

today, i got the fenders bolted up, the hid wiring installed through the crash bar, the front bumper on, hood on and the fender mud covers.

all thats left is to putthe doors on, reassemble the inner door panels, mirror, trims ect. find a battery, stick an intake in it and put some front brakes on. car should be driving around by thursday at this rate.

i havent polished the new paint yet. will prob do that next week after a FULL cure has been acheived. minimum of 72 hours but ill just wait a week.

it was night time, but color match was pretty good. this car didnt fade all that much in 13 years. all it took to match was a valspar alternate deck. didnt even need a photo scan.



looks like a car again.. not some "in over my head wtf did i try to do project"



i have the black cars bumper and hood at the shop. ill start paintwork on those shortly, which will give me the mint front end. ill also paint up my msp lip and stick it on as ill have this car for a few years before coming back to msp land.

 

[JDM323J48]

Good job.

 

[Valk]

cut the doors out and put them on with a friends help just door trims, mouldings and handles left for that. trying to finish by thursday night to get it down on the ground. then i get to help put a clutch in a supra on friday.

 

[Valk]

well, she is on the road. after dinner i went out and put the msp front brakes on it, tires the msp was running on, battery, intake ect and got it to move out the carport under its own power for the first time in a month. took it for a good long drive on a fresh tank of gas and im quite happy with the results. vtcs delete, lightweight flywheel, stage 1 clutch, SRI with 3" vibrant filter. snappy throttle response, solid clutch engagement, snappy gear changes and sticky on the corners dispite 8 year old oem mazda 5 rubber. its more comfortable than my msp, quieter and smoother in every area. I suppose that is not a surprise considering the differences in the cars but this just feels like a nicer car.

of course im gonna wreck all that by boosting it, putting low profile tires on, lowering it 2"...


i still have to finish assembling the driver side rear door, peel the mouldings from the passenger side, peel the tape from the bumper where the trunk protector used to be, assemble the trunk. but she is daily drivable otherwise.



next project is to paint a passenger side mirror cap, cause the driver side one i did looks SO MUCH BETTER thant he passenger... gonna paint the black cars hood and front bumper and my msp lip. stick those on. ill swap a few more msp parts over like the exhaust, and start taking the msp turbo setup apart for this car. should be boosted by june, depending how lazy im feeling.

 

[Valk]

a little bit of a tribute for my msp.. she isnt going anywhere, but getting a good long rest while i figure out what to do with her. i miss my racing hart rims.. sure hope someone is enjoying them at least after they were stolen =\
she needs a trans rebuild and some engine work. might as well plan to forge her and build her right for around 300 hp. but i dont have the money for that atm. apparently there will be a new racetrack built on the island in a few years, so maybe then ill be motivated to build the msp.

in any event, at her best.









my first car, 2002 protege 5 auto. she was absolutely mint condition..

 

[Valk]

had the car on the road since thursday night. no problems so far, but she seems to hesitate sometimes at low rpm accelleration. not sure why or if it has to do with vtcs delete. no lights on in the dash.

very smooth in all aspects. sometimes i get a clunk that might be a axle but im not too worried about it atm.

Washed and waxed for the first time since it got an engine in it. hope it stays clean for a bit.

I also took off the passenger side mouldings. ill have to hit the doors with a 2000wet followed by a polish to get rid of all the remaining residue. looks better though. whole passenger side looks kinda bad, but better than the black one did i guess. just chips and scratches from 14 years of life. im spoiled by a brand new driver side probably lol.



im kind of liking these mazda 5 wheels. I was thinking of picking up a set of MX5's local for the msp, but running them on this for now. and some gram lights for my wifes black es. but these 16's look pretty good. im imagining them with a lower profile tire "they have 55s on them atm" maybe a 205/45/16. that with my eibach sportlines and some spacers would look pretty nice and still be discreet.

i dont want this car to draw a HUGE amount of attention. I guess mx5's are kind of understated but they would prob look better on the msp.

 

[Jackie chan]

Looks good man, I really like those 5 wheels.

 

[Valk]

think im just gonna put new rubber on them. i can do that for like $650.. otherwise i need to spend $4-$500 on used 17s and then another $650+ on tires. gonna buy a friends rays for wifes car though. i had planned to get her two new tires but the rays would look pretty badass on her esgt. after i finish up the body panels on this p5 "front bumper/front splitter, hood" ill start fixing the parts i wanna stick on hers.

 

[Valk]

the other day i swapped my msp front struts/springs over. i am running eibach sportlines on stock struts atm. front went down nice and low. will be even lower with the front splitter and the low profile 16's. rear.. well. i tried to swap the rear eibachs to my p5 struts but i guess i actually did buy msp eibachs when i thought i was buying ES/p5 ones. springs are way too short for the p5 struts. i could prob guide them into place when installing in the car ect but i just put the msp strut back together and stuck it in the p5. tommorrow ill have to get the other one, but i wont waste an hour dicking around with taking the struts apart ect. just a direct swap.

weather or not this lowers the rear or not is a good question. msp had a little bit of a rake. I also dont have swaybars atm as i had to delete all the endlinks forcibly. i just dropped the rear bar out of the car, and zap strapped the front one until i can get some replacment links. i was going to make custom ones, but it didnt work out. my custom ones were pretty worn out from 5 years in service anyway, so ill prob just buy some this time.

so, assuming weather is ok for a couple hours tommorrow, gonna get the other strut swapped, rebuild the one i took apart and put both rear struts back in the msp, pull the exhaust off the msp and front splitter, get it able to roll again as its on blocks atm.

 

[Valk]

drag and drop drop from the msp. will prob settle a littleb it more. will be more gap with the lower profile tires to but not bad.



also the difference from msp to p5 struts.



unfortunate but msp struts seem to work as well as the p5 ones.

 

[Valk]

pretty good weekend of pilaging. msp is officially retired until the rebuild now with its suspension and exhaust pilaged. also pulled the front splitter, scratching the bumper unfortunately cause i used some REALLY GOOD double sided tape app.
its fine, will be good practice for the color match to fix blemishes on it. i figure both sides of the msp will get a repaint and ill try to find a trunk lid with no rust mine has typical sedan rust around the lip and stuff. rolling chassis is still good though. just needs some spot treatments to stop the spread. nothing painted has this problem, just underside bits as the car was never undercoated.
it will get a full undercoating/dynamat treatment as in a few years. no worries. gonna replace most of the suspension links and braces and paint them before assembling. should be pretty good.

debating if the s pipe from the exhaust is going to be much of an improvment over stock.. i think there might be a .25" difference but i pulled it anyway. i didnt really want to disturb the mates to the midpipe, which as you can see is catless. ill prob get a generic auto parts store exhaust tip and bolt it to the pipe. since the p5 bumper isnt cut for this tip its prob best.

the front splitter and black p5 front bumper will get painted this week possibly. I was gonna clearcoat the headlights so ill prob put the msp headlights in temp to accomplish that.

turns out tax season will finally net me a refund this year so im gonna jump and get a corksport 80mm exhaust before they disappear forever. possibly a corksport radiator, the tires i need for the 16's and before the summer, 1991cc's grams. this is more work than ive ever done to the msp in the 7 years ive owned it lol. hard to imagine i saved this car from the wrecker for $300.







i never did take a snap of the engine after putting it in the p5, so there it is. 315km, still runs fantastic.


I have a clunk to investigate in the front end when weight transfers to the front. im pretty sure its just the front swaybar clunking on things, but gonna lift it and check it out today. sadly the car has lost the light feeling of the stock suspension, but holds corners better and isnt that much worse of a ride. somehow the same suspension on the msp just felt worse heh. of course all the rollbar bushings were extremely worn and loose. i might investigate making new brackets that are ballraced instead.

 

[mica.msp]

I think you might have missed the Corksport exhaust...I heard that they still had it on the website but were backordered and were not making any more. Pope will be doing an exhaust setup though. Might want to check that out. Or just have a custom one bent up.

 

[Valk]

i sent them a msg about it.
pope is pretty far away to be shipping me an exhaust though. he wanted more than the cs was too. ill have to see when i get closer to the msp being back together i think. where i live there arent really any reputable shops that will fab me a stainless exhaust. im certainly not gonna pay up to $1000 for mild steel.

 

[Valk]

Next project underway.

 

[Valk]

spent about 2 hours sanding the filler off and shaping the parts. sprayed the first coat of sealer. ill need to pick up some more sealer for sure though. front splitter fared pretty well and ill just sand it it shape and put the final sealer on later this week. bumper however was so pitted and damaged ill have to go back and do a bunch more spot fills. im not woried about recovering the shape of the ground line as it will be covered by the msp lip. I might drop the lip on and sharpie around just to see where i need to focus my attention. though, t would be nice to be able to take the lip off if i sell the car and not have it look ass. of course.. i could take the msp lip and... intentionally park on a curb prior to selling lol.

this project not a rush like the other ones, but id like to get the parts out of the shop sooner than later.





i guess it all has to do with context.. silver hides blemishes VERY well. the chips are huge to me, but im looking at them like a foot away/two feet max while sanding. ill prob do two more coats of sealer to get the best surface i can without spending 50 hours on it.