The Eppic Offroadster
 

**Since Photobucket did it's thing you might not be able to see many of the pictures. If that's the case, try this. Worked for me. https://chrome.google.com/webstore/d...giikdkpmcpkaon
I'm using Imgur now**

Well, I needed a winter car. There's a whole pile of Miatas around here so I figured it would be easy to slap one together quickly. Well that's quickly turned into a "build a brand new car" build. Everything is getting stripped and refinished.
The plans for this are not just another cool Miata. No no. This will be another Eppic Miata. We say top secret but really, we get too excited and just want to share our creativity with people. Hopefully another week or so of hard work and this new project will be rolling.
Onto the pictures:

Sorting out what parts to use.
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Rebuilt steering rack
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Subframes out and getting ready for prep
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Stripping things right down to the are bones
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Had to move the shell out to sand blast the engine bay. Fastest way to get work done is just do it yourself.
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Parts go in the oven to be baked and gassed out before sandblasting and then powder coated.
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Subframe all cleaned up and ready for coating
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Interior is fully stripped.
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And the list continually grows larger and larger.
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Golf clubs! RHD!

What's the actual goal for the car?

Blood orange, gold, and high gloss black
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Metallic Merlot
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That was a messy job. Fully sandblasted engine bay.

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Sandblasted and rustproofed the floor.

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Parts take up all 2 levels of the shop.
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Bed liner installed...
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Grounding might be tricky

This is looking pretty good.

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Looking good all installed.

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slowly figuring things out and getting things in order. Biggest problem now is that I can't decided what I want to dip and what I want to powder coat.
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test fitting a dinky little 1.6L
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parts came in. Got them front wheels on loosely so I could roll her out of the shop. Have to work on some customers vehicles every now and again

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Front Calipers rebuilt and powder coated.
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Lots and lots of sandblasting.
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And more and more powder coating.
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looks pretty good mostly assembled.
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onto the rear. burn out the old bushings.
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more sand blasting and rust coating.
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Bed liner installed on the rear sub-frame and wiper cowel
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and the reassembly begins as I wait for the heavy cast parts to heat up enough to flow the powder.
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I had to throw the towel in on the sand blasting late afternoon before I was done cause it started snowing. Figured I'd go start planning where to build and igloo and keep my dog sled...

Crazy how that took 2 hours. That's just the top half. Haven't even got to the bottom half where the really gross stuff is. Tomorrow is going to be another long day of blasting. But then the hard stuff is over.

before
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after
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before
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after
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​​​​​​​Rust coating applied. Hopefully tomorrow i can get the bed liner in there and start putting things back together soon.

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I live a couple miles down a gravel road and have had slammed miata's for years. This time we are going the other direction. ;)

Why no roll bar?

Why 1.6L?

Why?

Slowly but surely things are getting coated and slowly coming back together.
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And bed liner is finally covering everything now.
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had to make it juuuuuuust right.
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well, It's been a while since I got anything productive done on this guy. I've been very sick the last week. Before that I spent a week converting part of my shop into a paint booth for winter, and had a whole lot of yard work and clean up to get done before winter is here, that's life eh. But alas today I finally got back at er a bit even though I'm still super sick.
Paint is starting to get applied to the parts that will be hydrodipped. I guess I'll let the secret out...

Camera's and fluorescent don't like each other so these pictures don't do justice. This stuff is BRIGHT!
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interesting thing happens with the camera when you turn the lights off.

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started getting the rear assembled. (temp shocks just to roll it around)
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apparently snow is due for next week wednesday. I better get a hustle on. Ol Spitty probably wont do to well in the snow. Turbo loves the snow though. Maybe I'll have to quickly build a dog sled and get him to pull me around in the mean time.
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Much goggles
very 1.6L
many colors
So confuse
wow

roll bar and turbo are waiting to be installed. One thing at a time.

Why go higher instead of lower? Cause I can. Low doesn't work in winter when you have 8" of snow on the road. And living down gravel it does get a bit tedeous driving 25mph for a couple miles every time I leave my place. It's going to be a trophy truck Miata sort of look. Just with some Eppic flare to it. Matt at paco motorsports has done the dirty work I was planning and made a long arm kit for miata's. Go big or Go home. :bigtu:

Why did you not cut the parcel shelf before coating it if you plan to roll bar?

What. Miata truck with a 1.6L?

is this a build thread or a paint thread?

I keep thinking of scraped knuckles whenever I see truck bed liner used in places on a car that requires work

It's coming. Gotta lay down a good base before you can get to the finished product. Seems nobody understands this till they see the finished product.

Because winter is so close, I've had to make some sacrifices on how things get built. Don't have the time to do everything before the snow falls up here in Canadia. Roll bar I have is a bolt in. and turbo kit I have is for a 1.6L. Right now the plan is to just get it driving so next week I'm still able to go buy groceries. Sounds like 7-8" of snow is coming next week wednesday.

Ok, as much as I rag on the 1.6L (I used to have one too) I understand the imperative of getting something running for use (assuming you have no other daily vehicle that can handle conditions).

Still a lot of time and prep merely to get something snow worthy. You could easily just replace the motor right now while you're at it.

You're still probably going to be cutting that freshly coated package tray to get the roll bar in. But you already knew that.

One of my parts cars has a freshly rebuilt 1.6L in it and picking up another parts car this weekend with a turbo. Figured I'd mash them together.

yes been there done that.
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I'm intrigued by your color choices. You don't look Filipino.

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Good luck with the project. Cool dog, by the way.