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In summary: I own a well-cared-for-before-I-owned-it 1997 Montego Blue with an MKTurbo/MS3X setup. It has been serving daily driver duty on and off for about two months. Other than the turbo kit, a Momo wheel, and a QMAX reroute, its bone stock, down to hard as glass all-seasons and blown stock shocks. I originally bought the car to try my hand at the cheaper easier side of forced induction in advance of a much-longer-term turbo LS 280z project.
A week ago, I made another in a series of great life decisions by buying the former star of "Tim's Turbo" (https://www.miataturbo.net/build-thr...part-ii-94737/) with little forethought other than it was a pretty wild deal for all the parts I was getting.
Between the two cars I've got:
1997 1.8 w/ MKTurbo/MS3x
1992 1.6 w/ MKTurbo/MS3ProPNP (but no Lars manifold, an ebay cast one for some reason)
Some Riceland Ultimos
Some 15x7 wheels w/ 205 Falken Azenis
A HardDog Sport Double Diagonal
A very rough but intact Snugtop
An eBay aluminum radiator
A mishimoto radiator w/ their fan shroud/fans
A Sparco Sprint & 4-point harness
A 4.1 torsen/axles/d-shaft
A 4.3 torsen/axles/d-shaft
The current next-step for my '97 is to swap in the coilovers (which, while markedly less fancy than anything I've ever run on any of my cars, have to be better than blown stock shocks right?) and wheels off of '92.
The current next-step for the '92 is to put on a new not-broken turbo-to-downpipe v-band and attempt to drive and tune it. So far I've fixed the TPS, wideband, change some wild settings in the tune, and discovered some rather important missing fasteners.
Yep, there is indeed another door. The Z is currently taking up the spot. It's not anywhere close to watertight, and the forecast is rain every day for the next 10 days, so its been a bit of a pain logistically to start moving parts from one Miata to the other.
It sure is. So far I've fixed the floors, pulled some huge dents/creases out of the passenger side, and started pulling the L28. Thankfully all the damage on the car is on the doors or front fenders. I have slowly been gathering parts to go LS, just missing the engine/trans.
The Z will be (temporarily) getting that Sparco seat out of the '92 Miata, and those Raydyot mirrors, which actually look pretty appropriate on it.
Moved the Riceland ULTIMOZE (yea, I know what you're thinking, I lucked out MAJORLY, these things sell for a whopping $20 more than the much-less-swag-specly-named Classics), wheels, and Falken Azenis from the '92 to the '97. Drove it around for a bit, and I see what people are saying about cheap coilovers...
The '92 appears to have Flyin Miata sway bars on it, but NA6 sway bars are said to be dimensionally different than the NA8 bars, so I left mine alone.
Got the 1992 running. Drove it around for a bit, the 6 puck clutch is definitely not as smooth as the Supermiata clutch in my '97. Too many small little issues for it to be worth selling as a whole or keeping, so started parting it out. A good friend of mine is taking the shell for some unknown project.
In other news, I put the hardtop on my car, not sure if I like not being able to put the top down.
I have a bit of a dilemma: the '92 has a depowered rack and a PS pump bypass pulley. My '97 has working power steering. I ran a depowered rack on my FC with sticky 255 tires and liked it, so I am thinking of swapping the manual steering onto my car.
Which brings up another point: the '92 has a pretty nice intercooler setup with a much simpler hotside routing versus Lars's setup since there is no PS pump to navigate around. The hotside piping is also 2". The intercooler is an eBay bar-and-plate unit, but is of the wide and short form factor, the kind that fills most of the "mouth" of the car, versus the more "buck-teeth" looking tall and narrow intercooler from the MKTurbo kit. I remember reading that the latter is preferred for airflow to the radiator, so I am wondering if I should stick with what I have, switch entirely to the setup from the '92, or just use the hot side piping from the '92 and keep my cold side and intercooler.
In other news, got rid of the boat anchor that was in the Z's engine bay.
Picked up an engine for the Z. L33, 5.3L aluminum block. Appropriately, the guy I bought it from says he was going to put it in a Miata but never started the project.
The "Tim.6" NA as I call it is now in my hands. I am beginning the process of saving its life tomorrow. Much thanks to DrKarrot.....YOU BETTER FINISH THAT DAMN Z.
Working on it. I fixed some completely stripped out spark plug threads in one of the heads on the 5.3. Main obstacle to finishing it soon is the transmission, I'm planning on grabbing a T56 magnum, contingent on the IRS giving me back some money in "12-14 weeks". Other things still on the list is an intake, engine harness, EMS, exhaust, and driveshaft. The last two are obviously transmission dependent. I also need to finish welding in some seat rails.
The newest obstacle to finishing it is this, I bought a Mercedes turbo diesel for my '86 Toyota pickup. Hoping for a quick turnaround on swapping it in.
Working on it. I fixed some completely stripped out spark plug threads in one of the heads on the 5.3. Main obstacle to finishing it soon is the transmission, I'm planning on grabbing a T56 magnum, contingent on the IRS giving me back some money in "12-14 weeks". Other things still on the list is an intake, engine harness, EMS, exhaust, and driveshaft. The last two are obviously transmission dependent. I also need to finish welding in some seat rails.
The newest obstacle to finishing it is this, I bought a Mercedes turbo diesel for my '86 Toyota pickup. Hoping for a quick turnaround on swapping it in.
12-14 weeks.
If it was an amended 1040 you can bet you are gonna wait the full 16 weeks +. Cool swap though. I was in Honduras for 10 days a few years back. I was amazed at how many small-sized pick-ups had diesels. I wasn't aware it was the norm over seas!
Last edited by mreakus; 06-18-2018 at 01:04 PM.
Reason: added somewhat proper grammar
Well, I subtracted the four weeks since I sent it, but added a two week buffer not to get my hopes up. Looking at late August/early September. A bit of a pain since all the driveshaft/exhaust work can't happen until its bolted in with the trans. Maybe I'll just sell the Miata and finish the Z real quick like...
05-29-2018, 01:21 PM
One Man, One Very Small Two-Car Garage
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