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Let's triple the HP - Rotten BRG Euro 1.6 rebirth in 42 months by noob
Greetings everyone,
I should introduce myself a little bit first.
My name is Kalle, 30 years old, working in print/media and I live in the middle of Germany - Paderborn. When I'm not working, wrechning or driving I really like to ride MX and mountainbikes.
Maybe thats why this thing took forever.
It's going to be a pretty long one and i should have started it like 3 years ago, but never really had time to search pictures from different phones, get everything together, but here I am, COVID makes it possible.
Well, it all started when I bought my first miata in 2015 (1.6 90hp also) and me and my girl loved it the first minute we had it.
Sadly sold it in 2016 and bought a BMW 325ti as a "replacement" as I needed a car that can load a bike and tools. Girl was crying and I regret it till now.
Missing the feeling of driving a Miata even with 90bhp, I started to look around and found this beat up BRG 1995 200tkm 1.6 90hp one in January 2017 for 700€ with the hardtop on. In the background my old CRF250R, its now a 2017 SXF 350.
That's as it came. Sold the ugly all seasons for 150€, the hardtop for 400€ and the old seats for 50€, so this thing was basically "free".
As you can see, it took a "little" hit on the front left (no frame damage), had rusty wheel arches and rocker panels, the paint was in bad shape, the 1.6 overheated at idle (haven't driven it really) and the soft top also wasn't very nice.
The interieur was okay, the seats were worn, but that was the smallest problem.
We then put it on a trailer and brought it to my godfather 65km from my home. After inspection we found it to be way more work than we ever expected.
Not happy looking, haha.
We also found this on both sides. It was so rusty that we thought it would be a better idea to trash it and start with a different car, but we decided to go through it and make it nice again.
A few pics from the rust repair in no specific order.
BOTH sides were this bad. The welding was done by my godfather as I'm not good at welding and bodywork. I'm fine with how he did it, looks strong and i told him to make it quick and dirty. I have a good painter as a friend.
Still, it took a few months - we both worked full time and I had to drive one hour one way each time!
In March 2017 I decided to put more power in it for the future. Not that this thing was running, no no no, it was far from being on the street again. That was the time we had to fix rust and other stuff.
My search for more power quickly brought me here! Without question the best forum on earth.
I want to thank the whole community for taking the time and help all the noobs out there - including me.
I've learned so much the past years and spend so much time of studying build threads and megasquirt, tuning. The typical de-noobing way of MT.net.
After looking into making power naturally aspirated and figuring out that the power per € ratio didn't make sense to me, I went full retard in the eyes of my girlfriend, my family and friends and bought a Garrett GT2560R.
That was the stepping stone for going turbo and pwn some kiddos in their Golf GTI's.
Let's go on with the build. Sadly I don't have much pictures of the usual maintainance of a 200tkm miata, but we overhauled the front calipers, did new brake lines, ss brake hoses front and rear, bought new oem replacement rear calipers, new clutch slave, derust all wishbones and put in poly bushes everywhere, new koni yellows on some 20mm lowering springs (I see some good coilovers in this for the future, but it has to work for now, this is a street car), top hats, tie rods, balljoints, wheel alignment bolts, pretty much everything that moves.
The subframes need some love and paint, but that wasn't first priority at that time. I want to buy front and rear subframes some time in the future and powdercoat them black in the winter.
Besides all that stuff we pulled the engine - without the transmission - like real newbs.
My dad came over, he is a former BMW wrencher and helped me out pretty good with things I wasn't comfortable doing like pulling my fist engine.
Bye bye POS 1.6. I wanted to do it right the first time and bought an NA 1.8 engine for 150€ which was stored for 2 years.
Put it in my Golf 3 trunk (someone disregarded the right of way when I drove home from work in my BMW 325ti, it was done). The old Golf was a good transporting vehicle and all the money went into the miata and a new dirt bike.
Picked up these 195/50/15 Federal 595 RSR's after that for 20€ each. Put them on some stock NB 15" Enkei rims I found for 60€. Good deal to get it at least on some wheels again
More in the next one!
Last edited by der_vierte; 07-16-2020 at 09:50 AM.
I bought an engine stand and teared the engine down myself in my cellar.
Bearings and crank looked good, bores aswell. The head was a bit crusty inside and I accidentally found a new BP05 head for 190€ near by me, had to buy it. My dad (he is toolmaker for plastic castings) measured the block and everything was good to go.
Brought the block to a machine shop near work and they honed and cleaned it for me. They also resurfaced the 1.8 flywheel, that came with the engine, not the one in the background.
Cleaned the HLA's as they are known to tick on older engines and put my old cams in the new head.
Finished the engine up with some forged H-beam rods, stock 8.8 pistons (94 engine), new piston rings, stock head gasket and new BP4W oil pump.
Put it in the car (could not start, no MS or hotside/coldside parts) and brought the car to the painter. Sadly he didn't have time for it over the winter (he is self-employed and bigger things needed to be done) so it stayed there a few months till March 2018 i think.
Brought it back to Paderborn for the first time in my ownership!
More in the next one
Last edited by der_vierte; 07-16-2020 at 09:51 AM.
Pulled the trigger on this stuff. Big milestone in the build. Kraken first gen manifold and 3" exhaust with HJS cat and SPS Motorsport (more later) resonator and muffler.
Mr. Kraken did a few FMIC setups and I'm happy to say, that I got a kit. Intercooler is a toyo sports. Its 2,25" hot side and 2,5" cold side piping, iirc. Came with a GM IAT sensor.
Put all that stuff in the car and bought some VAG cops and made a pretty shitty - but working - wiring loom for them. Bought a first batch PNP Speeduino for 200€ and an MTXL plus wideband.
I thought that a reroute isn't a bad idea and put in a skidnation kit and a new stock replacement radiator.
I know, I know, that threaded rod intercooler mount and wiring was pretty ghetto and I shortened them, but it was at least good enough to start the car.
After some troubleshooting with the speeduino and my TPS and IACV wiring (I have an NB TB), it actually fired up! No rattling, no coolant leaks, no ticking, but surely ran rough due to no tune on it.
In the hot summer i decided to buy a BMW Z4 3.0i for the upcoming holiday on Corsica, the most beautiful island I know. Here are some impressions. It's also sports car wonderland!
It all got a bit slow after that and my godfather got cancer, really bad cancer actually.
On christmas 2018 I brought the Miata to my painter friend and got it back just a week later, they were awesome!
Got it back home and put everything loosely together. Also put a new beige soft top on it, just like it came from factory.
This is February 2019.
I got the car to run better and moved it under it's own power a few hundred meters and brought it to another garage (I switched them 3 times) where I cleaned up some stuff, but progress was very slow, had to work >200 hours per month.
End of May 2019 my godfather sadly passed away (RIP bro) and I couldn't find motivation to work on it for the rest of the year all that much.
That brings us to this year! I got motivation back again real hard, made it ready to drive safely and drove the car back to where it all began (65km from home, where we did so much stuff!) to finish it up!
I moved it with 5-day number plates under its own power, boosting 7psi with a rough road tune, but it was SO MUCH FUN, I was laughing the whole way.
Right when I got there:
Forgot to mention that I put a TR Lane rollbar in it before putting on the new roof.
Little videos of the first real drive. One is a bit boosting around and the other is a 4. gear pull 80-120kmh:
We put in on the lift just to see it leaking oil from the transmission wheep hole. Pulled the engine and trans and put new gaskets in it and resealed the oil pan, valve cover, cas o ring.
I went ALLOFIT with RTV
Was so paranoid and didn't want to pull all this stuff out again. Put the CC Clutch Stage 4 with the engine and trans back in and fired it up! Did a quick test drive and it was dry! Now it's leaking just a tiny bit out of the wheep hole, but maybe 1-2 drops a week, I think it's the rear main seal, but that is going to be fixed when I destroy my 5 speed and put a 6 speed and my 3.6 Torsen II in it. But first, TÜV!
TÜV inspection was set July 2020. All this was possible with the help of two friends, who now live where my godfather used to live (the sons of his girlfriend).
We did a lot of other stuff, fabricated a new intercooler mount, put in both seatbelts, made a new exhaust heat shield, put the cat in for the first time, recirculated the BOV and VC breather before turbo, build a battery holder, fixed all the little stuff and put interieur back in, put the inner fenders in, just cleaned things up.
We also swapped the windshield for a new one, that thing was really shitty and no fun replacing (should have done that at the paint shop).
WAY better!
Engine bay before TÜV. Not the prettiest, but I'm okay with it. Need room for improvement
More in the next/last one!
Last edited by der_vierte; 08-19-2020 at 11:38 AM.
Awesome build! I have a lot of family in Germany and they were quite mind blown when they saw the extensive mods to my NA(which are very similar to yours). Will the TUV certify the turbo kit and everything for legal road use in Germany? My family said that they could never imagine it would be possible! but maybe they meant that it would be very expensive.
Keep the updates coming! It's great to see a beat up car become so beautiful again!
Made a VD pull in 3. gear before I trailered it to @Guido@SPS at SPS Motorsport, THE MX5/Miata tuner in Germany for final inspection, all the paper work and TÜV to get this thing finally on the road again!
This was 14-15psi on my road tune. Fueling needs a bit of tuning. This is 16° timing on 100 ROZ octane. There is a little hump in the road and it is slightly downhill, which explains the "high" numbers, but it's a hoot to drive!
Right now it's sitting at SPS Motorsport and everything was done to my full expectations and above. IT HAS TÜV!
They were really easy to deal with and it's a pleasure to work with them, so if you're in central Europe, they can help you out.
I will pick it up tomorrow and I'm so excited to finally drive it home and enjoy all the hard work everyone has put in it. Will update from now on and hope someone enjoyed reading all this stuff
A last picture from the inside, it's nothing special, but I want it to look as stockish as possible, only want to put some nice wider wheels on it with some wider semi slicks, that's it.
Awesome build! I have a lot of family in Germany and they were quite mind blown when they saw the extensive mods to my NA(which are very similar to yours). Will the TUV certify the turbo kit and everything for legal road use in Germany? My family said that they could never imagine it would be possible! but maybe they meant that it would be very expensive.
Keep the updates coming! It's great to see a beat up car become so beautiful again!
Thank you very much. They certified the turbo kit, exhaust, steering wheel, all the good stuff really. Not at 300hp, but i have learned how a simple switch works
It's not cheap by any means, but I personally had really good deals and did all the work myself and with friends/family.
I think if you let someone do the all the work for you with new or rebuild parts, its going to be a five-digit figure, but it is so much fun and worth every cent
I forgot to mention some things we did. I bet there is other stuff, but my brain feels like a marshmallow right now
I also installed an EBC solenoid (Pierburg 7.01024.02.0, it's awesome and cheap!) and put a switch in the cabin, so I can choose between wastegate pressure and whatever EBC is set at.
Upgraded the fuel pump to a DW200, fixed leaky diff seals, put in some harder comp engine mounts and the engine has KING XP bearings inside.
For the COP wiring loom, I used a gutted igniter and soldered right to the pins to make it removable/pnp.
Hope everything goes well tomorrow, it's about 150 miles for the first "big" trip, but I'm confident that it brings us home
After some struggles... My Speeduino PNP decided to **** the bed right before my arrival. Probably lost a spark driver.
Was running on two cylinders and everything we tried (stock coils, additional pull ups in the cop harness) didn't fix it, so Jan from SPS gave me a new MS3 mini (i love it so far!) and after flipping some jumpers and loading a nice base map, it actually ran on all 4 and started right up, yay! They helped me out big time here (again) and I would have been absolutely lost without all the help. Glad they were there.
So, what happened till now? I drove it home, made some little adjustments to the VE table and pulled 2° of timing because i could only find 95roz fuel on my way home and it was really running well.
Did some autotuning on the Autobahn and came home 10pm.
I want to put it on a lift this afternoon and check everything underneath the car. There is some vibration under deceleration (some heat shielding i believe) right around 2500 rpm and a minor rattling from the rear left, but I'll find out.
Also need to wire in the EBC-Solenoid on the MS3, because I soldered it right to the board on the speeduino, had to cut it and drive on wastegate. Will use the purge solenoid connector this time.
I try to keep this updated, there is always stuff to do, right?
I have driven it around 500miles and nothing exploded or caught fire, which is a good thing
Hooked up the EBC to the new ECU and tuned open loop boost control a bit, which works really nice on MS3.
Next task is to turn on CL boost control.
Sadly my 5 Speed transmission seems to hate me a bit more every weekend and it is whining pretty good in second and third gear, not so much in fourth and fifth. I build up boost (15psi target) "slowly" to hopefully keep the gears alive.
I also try to make all my pulls for tuning purposes in 4th gear (1:1) in hopes to get a few weeks more out of it.
I'm actually pretty afraid of breaking it. Is it going to lock the rear wheels? What if it happens at higher speeds? Can anyone share their experience with this? I desperetaly need a 6 speed or BMW transmission as fast as I can.
Winter has owned Germany pretty good with 2ft of snow in just two days and temps are as low as 1° Fahrenheit, so no real driving the last weeks/months other than two quick blasts over the autobahn to prevent standing damage.
BTW: 5 speed is still alive, but I only managed to put 600 miles on it since it's on the road. What a shame...
BUT! I gathered some "go-even-faster"-bits here and there.
A damaged compressor wheel GTX2860R Gen 2 turbo with 0.64 housing and internal gate. Need to port the wastegate to prevent boost creep, although my 2560R only creeps 1-2psi, but it's completely disassembled anyway, so...
Where there's a problem, there's also a solution:
Turbo Rebuild UK it is. They can provide all billet wheels you can think of. In OE-geometry and other variants. Shipped 3 days after ordering, pretty quick and amazing quality. See yourself:
Will just slap that sucker on and hope it doesn't grenade itself Turbo was super cheap, not too worried about it. MAYBE I'm going to get the CHRA balanced as a whole, but I haven't decided yet.
Then a new drive line - 6 speed gearbox with supposedly 88k miles from Prestige Spares UK.
As people experienced before me, they were a bit slow, communication was "poor", but after 2 or 3 weeks it arrived very securely packed in good old Germany. If you're in no hurry, buy from them!
I also have this 3.63 torsen II laying around since over a year I believe...
Can anyone of the gearbox gurus tell me what 6 speed I have? Is it an NB1 or NB2 unit? I want to rebuild it and have no idea what car it came from Would be very happy to identify this thing.
I'm going to put all this stuff in next month, when the streets are dry again. Shooting for 320-330whp and ~300tq in hopes to keep the gearbox alive
Can anyone of the gearbox gurus tell me what 6 speed I have? Is it an NB1 or NB2 unit?
maybe not a guru but I believe it's the later type...
theres an extra 'indent-plunger' in the selector-rod in front of the gearshift housing (sticking out of the casing on the top) that the earlier 6 speed gearboxes didn't have
here is a picture of that part on my DEFINITELY early 6 speed with the same size shift ball as the 5 speed. Not sure if you can tell by the hump he is referencing, but here is at least something to compare
I was looking after a short shift kit and I think I'm going to take the shifter assembly out and measure the connection tip out.
IRP say this: "... make sure to choose the right version of connection tip diameter ~19mm (up to VIN214807) or ~22mm (after VIN214807)."
I have a BOFI Racing dual friction Clutch coming in on monday, VERY VERY happy to have this option in Europe, as Supermiata doesn't ship (THEY ACTUALLY DO, I'm stupid) outside of the states (iirc) and flyin miata is just too expensive with taxes and everything.
People are very happy with these in terms of drivability and pedal feel and my CC Stage 4 is killing me. Six pucks in a race/drag car are win, not so much in stop and go traffic. Will be interesting, if I get it to slip with the new setup.
Will keep you updated and post some detailed pics of the clutch
Last edited by der_vierte; 02-12-2021 at 04:35 PM.
07-16-2020, 07:13 AM
Let's triple the HP - Rotten BRG Euro 1.6 rebirth in 42 months by noob
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was pretty ghetto and I shortened them, but it was at least good enough to start the car.
Turbo was super cheap, not too worried about it. MAYBE I'm going to get the CHRA balanced as a whole, but I haven't decided yet.
Would be very happy to identify this thing.
