Great project. Living in the UK I'm all too familiar with cars that look like this. It's fantastic to see someone giving it a new lease of life!

 

Looking good as always, Nate! Your attention to detail is next-level

 

Thanks for the support guys!

Not a lot has happened, had to spend some time on the miata (and another trackday), then was out of town for work.. but this weekend I got a few more hours in and tidied up the engine bay. Fuse/relay box mounted (and the mount painted of course), and inspected/re-wrapped the engine harnesses. The bay is almost ready to receive the 13b again!

 

Zip ties AND velcro for relay mounting, huh? On my NA rebuild those older snap in relay mounts are giving me issues with breaking off as well. I'll probably do the same.

 

Hahaha, yeah, the theme of this build is "good enough!". You should see what people pay to restore these things to actual OEM level. In a way I'm kinda grateful this ones a bit clapped, I can pretty much do anything I want with it. Makes me feel better about things like ditching the sequential turbo system, stripping emissions equipment, pre-mixing, and the other hood rat **** I've got going on!

 

Lots of little **** done, got the engine bay finished up and moved onto running the fuel lines. The factory lines rotted where they went up and over the rear subframe, so I cut the lines there and went to soft lines to the filter/tank.



And god the subframe back in, which feels good.

 

Looking good, man! My favorite part of these projects is when they begin to look like a car again.

 

I was going to recommend you drill the end of the cracks on the heat shield, but a closer look shows you already have. Nice work!

 

Yes! I'm pretty amped to have the chassis coming back together.. and to soon be working on dressing the motor for install. Super psyched on the link ECU, @redursidae already has built me a base map and link ECU software looks sooo sexy.


Haha, good eye! Yes, I did terminate the cracks with the ole hole-drill trick.

 

Photo dump, text updates inc.

 

LOL at the fingerprints all over the spray cans. Bet the wife had a thing or two to say about your hands after that, and probably rightfully so

Thing's looking so good man.

 

Bwahaha, thank you.

So quick recap to go with the pics above. I got the suspension fully buttoned up, sway bars back in (fresh poly bushings), shocks in, new tie rods and steering rack boot, etc. Once I get the brakes back on it will be a "roller" again. Feels good.

Then I got the heat shields cleaned up and back in, finished tidying up the fuel lines (plastic covers cleaned and re-installed), etc.

Next I want to get the fenders back on, but wanted to pump the frame rails full of FluidFilm before proceeding there. So I proceeded to use my fiber optic camera through every single access hole on the chassis, and these FluidFilm cans with the 24" wand/fogger extension to pump the frame rails, rockers, and every single body cavity FULL of film. This stuff has a really nice black color to it, so it's easy to see where coverage is and isn't. I ended up putting 6 MORE cans into the front end (this is after the original 6 cans I pumped into the rear frame/rails/quarters/etc.). I'm feeling really good about this. Also in the picture from the inside of the trunk you can see how this stuff "creeps" even upwards against gravity. It creeped through the frame rail past those plugs (that I never removed) and coated all of that. It also creeps into all the seam welds, you can see it coming out a lot of the various pinch weld cavities, etc. It gives me some really good peace of mind to know the inside of every cavity has been fully fogged with rust inhibitor and inspected. No major rust in there really, just lots of little surface stuff starting on the corners of the seams etc. that I could see with the fiber camera.

And lastly a pic of the wing I picked up, or rather traded to a local friend for some tuning on his MS2 powered turbo miata. Pretty cool trade, since those things are like $500 and It's the series 7 (99+) OEM wing for the car. Well that ones a replica, and needs some finishing, but yeah.

Next I'll get the fenders back on, get the brakes cleaned up and on/bled, then I'll be working on engine dressing, de-sequentialing the turbos, etc. as well as wiring (CAN expander for the link, o2 inputs, etc.). So generally.. onto the fun parts.

 

Hell yeah's all around dude! The car is looking real good, and Bear was ready to get you out of the garage haha. That trade for the wing is awesome ha!

 

She'd only be saying good things.

I'm going to assume you haven't used it before since there's no need when you live in California, but Fluid Film is Lanolin based - it's oil pulled from sheep's wool.

It's probably not the same with spray cans, but I've fluid filmed a few cars back when I lived in Michigan using a compressor and paint gun that basically fogs the whole area. It's the only time I've ever worked on the underside of a car and had my hair and skin feel better after I cleaned up than I did before I worked on the car. My mane was soft enough to make a Pantene hair model envious.

 

You would be correct lol. That's a trip! I never would have guessed.

 

Bwahahahah. Yeah honestly that stuff is pretty awesome, definitely does soften your hands (though I did mostly wear gloves), and the garage smells like sweet lanolin (not even kidding).

The fogging is awesome, It's super satisfying to fog the **** out of the cavities you can't reach. I mean where I live now I suspect any rust in there would slow to a crawl, but this just assures that it can't get moisture or oxygen and stops it in its tracks.

I needa do it to the cars that I actually drive in the snow..

 

Yeah the only problem with Fluid Film or anything else like it is that it makes any other job after it a dirty affair, especially if you go off road or even just a gravel road. That's why I haven't done it to my clean XJ yet - I don't expect to drive it in salted roads, so why suffer until I have to?

It's better than snapping bolts for sure, but when you've filmed to an already rusty winter beater and then have to constantly work on other items... bleh. Best time to apply it is before the car starts rusting.

 

Totally, I've seen people spraying the entire undercarriage with it. Seems like a good idea if the salt is that bad where you live and you DD the car in the winter, the mess is worth it, etc.

In the case of the FD it's all inside the frame rails, which then get plugged up (back with the factory plugs) so a liberal coating should have mostly no downsides. I'm definitely in the camp of treating any rust you can actually get to the right way, and then using a product like this to fog internal/unreachable cavities.

The other car I plan on doing a similar thing to is my 1988 323gtx. The thing is super clean, but was a Tulsa car and has a bit of rust here and there. It would be nice to take a similar approach with that car at some point and fog the frame rails and rockers.

 

the whole time I'm reading this thread I just keep thinking

#remembertheppf

 

PPF, power plant frame? It's rusty as **** and I haven't touched it yet. Who would have thought they'd make them steel in the FD and alum on the miata's.