tenthe

iTrader: (1)

Very glad I put the rack on the trunk instead of a wing. It's functional! One wheel in the trunk, one on top of it and 2 in the passenger seat.

I read that 949 was discontinuing silver 6UL's so I had to ****** up a set before it was too late. I wasn't planning on buying another car part so soon but the silver finish is by far my favorite.

Absolutely stunning in person. Can't wait to get them mounted tomorrow.

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

It's been awhile. I still have my car, but haven't done much to it in the past year and a half or so since the FM Fox and bushing install. As far as that goes, I'm still super pleased with them.

I just finished doing my PhD and now I finally have time and energy to throw at this stupid car again. I decided to commit to boosting it. I've come too far not no. Purchased an MS3 and ID 725s from a forum member. It's happening.

In other news, I wasn't planning on doing the clutch just yet, but last Saturday afternoon I started hearing a grinding sound whenever I pushed the clutch in. It wasn't horrible, but not something I felt comfortable ignoring. So over the long weekend I started reading about potential causes and everything pointed to the throwout bearing. So, after much struggling, mostly with the exhaust nuts, I managed to pull the transmission:



Swivel impact sockets are my new favorite thing. Worth every penny.

The throwout bearing actually looked okay, I think:



But the clutch was ready to be changed. I bought this car before I knew how to drive manual, so at the beginning I was very unkind to it. It is OEM style and my car has 128k miles, so I'm guessing it's the second.





While the transmission is out, I'm going to finally deal with the slow leak I've had in my cooling system. I don't have any overheating issues, but having to top of the coolant now and then has been driving me nuts. I determined it was coming from the back of the head, but just kept putting off dealing with it because it's such a pain in the *** to work back there. I pulled off the m-tuned rear housing. Gasket was a mess, I don't think I did a great job installing it. I also saw that the surface of the head where the rear assembly attaches to was scored. After cleaning off the gasket remnants, I picked up some JB weld to fill in the hole, let it cure then sanded with 220 grit. Ordered a new OEM gasket from priority mazda. I'm not sure if I should use RTV in addition to the gasket or attach it dry. Really want to do this right. I'll probably sand the back of the rear housing some more as well:


I cleaned off the transmission. It's still not pretty, but it's clean enough that I'll be able to know if I have a leak and that's what matters:



I dropped my flywheel off at a local machine stop. Very cool place and the owner was friendly. Unfortunately he's retiring soon so I'll have to find a new shop next time I need something. Decided to keep the stock flywheel for better driveability during commuting.

I also dropped my starter off at an alternator repair shop I've used in the past to have it rebuilt. It was such a pain in the *** to remove it that I figured I'd have it done now while it's out just in case. Maybe a waste of money, but the peace of mind from knowing I won't have to kick myself for not doing it if it fails is worth it.

Now I just have to wait for parts to come in. I've ordered the following:
FM Stage 1 Clutch
Extended stainless steel clutch line
Slave cylinder
Master cylinder
Throwout bearing
Pilot bearing
Tranmission cover gasket
Front transmission seal
Rear transmission seal
Silicone heater hoses (even though they were new I had to cut my rubber ones to remove them. And I don't want them to melt once I add the turbo)
Wrap for heater hoses
Rear housing gasket

It's good to be back.

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

tenthe

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I was away on vacation last week, but I'm back and now the work continues. The car's been up on jack stands for 3 weeks now. This is longer than it took me to do the suspension/bushing swap.

I finally found out why I was leaking coolant from the back of the head. When I installed the reroute, I gouged the mating surface with a screwdriver while I was scraping the old gasket off. The visibility was very poor and I didn't have an inspection mirror, so I never noticed. I filled in the gouge with some JB weld, then sanded it smooth with 220 and then 1000 grit.




After finishing, I went to put the reroute housing back on with a new OEM composite gasket and found out that the threads for the bottom bolt hole were damaged. I used the wrong bolt there when I installed the reroute. The kit comes with one longer bolt thats meant to go in that bottom hole and apparently I put it elsewhere. Since I used a short bolt, only the first few threads were engaged. My theory is that the bolt worked itself loose, then vibrated around and trashed the first few threads. This would be the second reason for the leak. I gave up for the night and ordered a longer 35 mm bolt, a set of metric thread chasers (plan A) and a helicoil (plan B).

Plan A did not work -- the threads were too far gone. Before I could bring myself to drill into the head to install the helicoil, I thought I'd just try to run a tap through just in case. At this point I had nothing to lose, the threads were already trashed. To my surprise, it worked. I put the housing back on, and used blue loctite on the new lower bolt.

I didn't have the new silicone heater hoses yet, but I wanted to pressure test the cooling system. I ended up rigging up a heater core bypass hose by cutting the damaged ends off my two old rubber heater hoses and joining them together with a socket. It held pressure up to 15 PSI just fine until one of the hoses popped off the socket and sprayed water everywhere. Awesome. I reattached it, tightened up the hose clamps and tried again. It held 15 PSI steady for around 30 mins. I left it overnight and it went down to 10 PSI. No evidence of any fluid leaks that I could see, and definitely none at the back of the head. I decided it was safe to finish the clutch job and bolt the transmission back up.

Changed the rear main with the FM tool because I'm incompetent.



I put the flywheel back on, added loctite to the bolts and torqued to spec. Next I went to put the clutch and pressure plate on and got an unpleasant surprise: the dowel pins to locate the pressure plate never made it back from the machine shop. So I was stuck for a few days until I could get back over to the shop. I pulled the flywheel off again.

Thankfully the machinist found the dowel pins. I brought the flywheel back to him so we could test fit and make sure they were correct. He installed them for me. I walked a mile home with that damn thing for the second time and reinstalled it. Next, I put on the FM stage 1 clutch.



At this point I saw the light at the end of the tunnel. I changed the transmission seal and gasket, put the new throwout bearing on and then tried to bolt it back up to the engine. It went horribly. Wrestled with it for a few hours, then got frustrated and called it. Came inside and got cleaned up and spent some time with these two.



Started fresh the next day with a plan. Before, I had the PPF tied up and supposedly out of the way using a rope through the shifter hole. I think it was catching on the end of the transmission and jamming everything up. So I ended up detaching the wiring harness from the PPF to avoid putting stress on it, removed the inner rear PPF bolt and loosened the outer rear bolt. My god those fasteners were stuck on there. They laughed at my impact gun. I had to use a breaker bar with a 5 foot cheater pipe and all the strength I had. Thankfully I didn't have to do this from underneath the car. Removing/loosening those fasteners let the PPF droop much lower than it could go before, so I stuck it down and to the side.

Then I went back to wrestling with the tranmission. The harbor freight transmission jack that I have is too tall to roll under the car with the transmission on when the car is on the regular non-SUV harbor freight jackstands. So I had to drag the transmission under the car, then roll the jack under, and lift the trans onto the jack while on my side under the car. That was probably the hardest part. It's not so much that it's heavy, but the leverage is terrible and it's hard to find the right positions to lift from. I finally got it up on the jack and balanced. I didn't end up using a strap to support the rear of the transmission because I was able to balance it well enough on the jack. Mating it up was still a huge PITA, but it went much better this time. I wasn't as tired so I could actually think about what was going on and look for reasons why it would get stuck and fix them instead of just swearing at it and jamming it forward. The little rubber drain hose on the passenger side would catch, as would the stupid ear thing protruding from the trans. Once I got it in position, I would just push it slowly into the engine to see if it would mate, then back it up and adjust the height on the trans jack slightly and try again. Repeat. Repeat. Then, finally:



Put a bolt in at the bottom, then ran to the top and put in another. Here's my set up:


Floor jack with a block of wood pushing up on the oil pan, then the trans jack positioned at the trans center of gravity. I don't think I could've done it alone without that thing, no idea how others manage to pull it off.

Then it was just a matter of buttoning everything up. Putting the starter in was fiddly, as expected. Installing the stainless steel clutch line was fiddly, which I was not expecting. The bracket under the hood where it meets the hardline was a huge pain in the ***. I had to take a hammer to it. I put the slave cylinder pushrod in backwards, but realized eventually. Installing the master cylinder wasn't too bad. Did a quick bleed, then adjusted the clutch pedal using FM's instructions. Not totally confident I did it correctly but we'll see. Moving the slave cylinder piston back into the bore took a lot of force and it didn't go back in very far.

Put in the new silicone heater hoses, with insulated wrap:


I'll have to work out a shielding solution for the brakes and clutch reservoir, but that's getting ahead of things. Need a turbo first.

Now today I just need to put the coilpack and wires back in, reinstall the exhaust, add fluids and hopefully I'll be back on the road. Half expecting that I messed something critical up and I'll have to pull the trans again. We'll see.

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

It works! Had a slight issue with an exhaust leak at the exhaust manifold / downpipe flange. I bought some copper clad locking exhaust nuts on amazon to replace the old nuts that I manhandled during removal. Turned out they were garbage -- I couldn't torque them to spec because the cladding fell off and they began to round. Replaced with stainless from the parts store and the exhaust stopped leaking. Other than that, no issues so far.

Burped the cooling system. It felt like the fans were coming on much less frequently and for a shorter duration.

New clutch is fantastic. It engages about 2 inches off the floor, whereas my old one would bite maybe an inch or so from the top. Huge difference. The pedal feels just as light as stock, Also, the engagement is so much smoother. Since this is my first manual transmission car, I always thought I was just a mediocre driver because I couldn't get consistently smooth shifts, especially from 1 to 2. Now it's smooth. I guess part of it was because I was using a clutch disc with no friction material.

Now time to drive for a bit and keep the car on its wheels instead of jack stands.

WigglingWaffles

I feel your pain on reinstalling a trans alone.
When I replaced my clutch, I ended up using a regular jack on the front of the trans and the spare tire jack near the middle and manipulating it forward with the car jack, holding the trans up with my leg when the tire jack needed to be moved.

this is an excellent, clean build and I cant wait to see where it goes, especially when you start applying more power. 5 stars.

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

Thanks! I'm excited for adding power as well.

Just did some easy stuff today. It's nice to be able to work on the car while it's on the ground and not get filthy.

Swapped the steering wheel. Mine was pretty beat and the leather would flake off if my hands started sweating. I got a stock wheel off a 15k mile NB from the Parts Group a while back.



I want to find a Mazda sticker to cover the Nardi badge on the horn. I'll have to check ebay or revlimiter.

Replaced the soft top latch striker plates. Mine were very worn down.



Got new bolts as well. Couldn't find a torque spec so I just got them good-and-tight. I also used loctite blue on them because I had one of my old ones rattle loose.


And here's whats going to be keeping me busy for the immediate future. Planning to install this in a couple weeks after I do more reading:



MSLabs MS3 basic with CAN wideband interface. Purchased from a forum member along with ID 725 injectors. It's happening.

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

I'm going to install the wideband first, then the MS3 second. Currently planning out the details of the wideband install. I think it would be easiest to the controller in the engine bay, near the clutch master cylinder. I can cut a hole in the grommet that the main wiring harness comes through, and slip the serial output cable through there to plug into the CAN module. Innovate sells a 4 ft serial cable extension that should work:
https://www.innovatemotorsports.com/...roductid=16339

I still need to figure out how to power the controller. I know the MS3 has +12V to power a wideband, but I want to be able to power the wideband independently of the MS3. Partially because I want to get it installed and running first, but mostly in case I need to remove the MS3 for some unforseen reason (car won't start and I need to put the stock ecu back in to go somewhere before I can remove the wideband sensor, etc). So I have to find switched 12V somewhere in the engine bay that's relatively easy to access without making a mess. I previously installed an auxiliary fuse panel, so I can easily get power from there but it's always hot. In order to power the LC-2 and any future mods that require switched 12V, I'm going to set up another smaller fuse panel attached to a relay and powered off the always hot panel.

Doing some research now but I haven't found anything too promising. Here's what I've got so far.
Option 1: Use an add-a-circuit on one of the fuses in the cabin, then run the wire through the firewall grommet and up to the relay
Option 2: Splice into a wire, likely the wiper motor power. Not sure what the least sloppy way to do this would be. Cut and crimp?

Leuz

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

Thanks! I did do the rear main, it was the last rubber oil seal on this engine that I hadn't touched. Telescopic mirror is a good idea, I'll have to pick one up. I didn't know they existed when I was doing the coolant reroute or I would've definitely bought one. If you're thinking about doing a coolant reroute/revisiting the leak at the back of the engine, its 100x easier with the transmission out.

Oil change today. Rotella T6 and Mobil 1 long life filter.

I changed my mind about the windeband install -- I'm just going to get an add-a-circuit fuse tap and put in on the CIGAR fuse, wire up the LC-2 and mount it behind the airbag switch, then run the sensor cable through the shift boot. Simplest way to do it.

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

Drove the car to work this week. I've traded my bus pass for a parking spot so it's on commuter duty from now on. It's been great so far. Had a slight issue with some stuttering and a weird idle droop. I thought it might be the coilpack going out, but when I popped the hood I noticed that the ignition wire for cylinder 1 wasn't pushed in all the way. I put it back in place and that seems to have fixed it. We'll see.

It was hot out today. Over 100. No cooling issues whatsoever, thankfully. The duty cycle on my fan is way down after fixing that leak. Now that the system can actually hold pressure it appears to be more efficient.

Waiting on the LC-2 wideband and a DW100 fuel pump to arrive. Hopefully those will keep me busy next weekend.

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

Idle droop and hesitation have been have still been happening off and on so I replaced the coil pack today. I went with a cheaper aftermarket one since It just needs to last until I convert to COP. I'll need to drive it for a few days to see if the issue is solved.

I dealt with my battery today. I have an AGM battery from O'Reilly's that's supposed to be Miata-specific, but the stock tie down is too high to prevent it from moving. I also stripped the threads for the bolt that secures the tie down when I first bought the car, so that didn't help much. The battery would slide back and forth and jump up a bit when I went over bumps.

Ordered a steel battery plate from advanced autosports to replace my cracked plastic one. There are actually 2 holes in the floor of the NB battery compartment, so once I popped out the factory grommets the plate bolted right in:


I looped 2 tie-down straps underneath the bracket before tightening the bolts, then cranked them down on the battery.



Not the cleanest solution, but it holds this battery down much better than the stock setup did.

Robbins tan cloth top with zipperless glass window. I always wanted a tan top instead of the black one that came with my car. I was undecided on what color NB I wanted to buy and was leaning towards British racing green until I saw an ad for a black and tan. Someone else ended up buying that one, and I tried to hold out but I got impatient.



I noticed that it's a little quieter inside on the freeway with the canvas top. Every little bit helps.

LC-2 arrived but I didn't get to it today.

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

LC-2 wideband installed.


I hate thinking about where to source power when adding things to the car. Decided to put in the second fuse panel under the dash.

Got a bunch of wiring supplies and a 5-pack of 30 amp relays for this project and a few others.




Poked through this firewall grommet near the clutch master cylinder. Ran 12 gauge +12V starting from a fuse panel I put in earlier that's fed from the battery with 0 gauge wire, through the grommet, to a new smaller panel under the dash. I also ran vacuum tubing for the MS3 install while I was in there.






Since the +12V wire I ran was always hot, I put one of the relays up under the dash and used an add-a-circuit to trigger it off the radio fuse. Now I have switched power for any future additions. Thinking about an inverter to plug a laptop into and an auto-dimming rear view.


Pulled the downpipe off and brought it to a muffler shop to have a bung welded in. I could've used the factory location, but I wanted to be able to run the stock ECU without a check engine light while leaving the wideband in. Also the main reason I went through all this pain-in-the-*** wiring instead of just powering the wideband from the MS3 -- if I ever need to go back to running the stock ECU on short notice, I don't have to swap any sensors or worry about the wideband getting damaged because its left in the exhaust without power.





I don't know if I did a poor job marking it, or they didn't drill where I marked but when I installed the sensor I had maybe 5mm of clearance between it and the transmission. That was almost a day-ruiner. Ran the sensor wiring up through the shift boot as suggested on many threads here. Worked great. I put the LC-2 controller behind the little pop-out piece of the dash in the driver side foot-well. This way I can take a quick look at the status light for troubleshooting, or leave it covered if everything is working.

MS3 install should be pretty straightforward now that this is sorted out.

I also swapped my accessory belts. I had done this a couple years ago when I first got the car, but I used parts store belts. My alternator has a noticeable whine which is quite annoying and I wanted to rule out the belt. Here's a difference between the Dayco alternator belt I had on (left), and a new OEM one (right):



Tightened it up to 110 lbs using a kricket belt tension tester tool. It's much quieter now. Unfortunately I've noticed that I'm getting voltage drops. The battery light hasn't been coming on, but occasionally when coasting to a stop the battery voltage reported through OBD2 will go from the normal 13.6 to 12 or even 11 for a few seconds, then back to 13ish. I guess I'll try to tighten it more, but it felt really tight.

Not sure which project to do next weekend. I'd like to get my FM spal fans off the stock harness and power them through relays. It might help with the voltage issue so I'm leaning towards that. But I also have the MS3 to put in, and a set of FM frame rails that I FOMO'd into a couple weeks ago when I read about the pending price increase. And the DW100 from Trackspeed came in.

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

tenthe

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Wideband controller install:






Installed relays for both spal fans instead of running them through the factory wiring. Glad I decided to go through with this. Installing the fans was one of the first car mods I did that involved wiring and I did an awful job. Ground wire for the driver's side fan popped right out of the crimp connector when I lifted it.



The passenger side fan was just as bad. There were maybe 2 strands of copper making the ground connection and the wire insulation as well as the electrical tape I wrapped everything with was melted/burned.

Put in a 40 amp relay for each fan. Fed both with 12 awg power and ground.



Got some nice high temp rated wire as well as braided heat-resistant loom. I got +12 V for both from my auxillary fuse panel next to the factory one on the passenger side near the firewall. For the driver's side fan I just ran back to the firewall, then across behind the head. 30 amp fuse for each fan. I'm not sure if this is the appropriate size - I may go down to 20.

Fabricated, in the loosest sense of the word, a bracket to hold my relays on the passenger side.


Re-purposed clutch hardline bracket with some home depot perforated duct strap. Rattle can'd it black.



Makes removing the fan relay and the HID relay much easier. Wiring is a rat's nest because I'm troubleshooting my HID setup. One of my headlights occasionally won't turn on, so I've been swapping components from side to side one at a time to find the problem. Left everything everywhere for easier swaps.

Similar bracket for the driver's side.



Turned it on and the fans worked. The tone at startup actually sounds different. Before, when turning on the a/c, it sounded as if they were almost ramping up -- the pitch would change a bit over the first second. Now they seem to get up to speed almost immediately.

Tightened up the alternator belt. Either the belt had stretched, or I didn't crank down enough on the pivot bolt because it was much looser than when I installed it. Went for a drive and unfortunately I'm still getting voltage drops. They seem to occur when I'm letting off the gas and the fans kick on. I'll see 11-12 V for a second or so, then it will go back up to 13.6. The battery light on the dash never comes on. I think it's just taking the ECU time to compensate for the increased load. It seems to have started when I changed the main relay, the belts, and added the wideband. The belt tension is good, so I don't see what could've triggered it. But it really doesn't seem to be an issue for now, as the battery is charging just fine so I'm going to leave it alone.


Next week will be either the FM rails for the DW100.

ddwelch

Thanks for the in depth details on all the work you are doing. I picked up an NB1 about 2 months ago, and it is nice to see what others do or headaches they run into while working on their car.

What was your deciding factors to determine the purchase of the Fox set up vs the Xidas? Sorry if I missed it.

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

Congrats on your NB1 and welcome to the club!

I was really torn between the Fox and Xidas. I almost pulled the trigger on the Xidas a few times. Aside from just drinking the MT.net koolaide, based on Emilio's multiple posts about them here and on m.net it sounded like he put a ton of time and effort developing and refining them and was proud of how they came out. Obviously, he sells them so he's going to paint them in a positive light but if you go through a few posts you'll see what I mean. A whole lot of effort went into making them, they're very well received on here and therefore most likely worth buying. I did more research and ultimately decided that although the Xidas were a great product, they just weren't right for my application. I needed a taller ride height that would put me outside of the ideal operating range of the Xidas.

In order to get to my garage I have to go down one of the worst alleys in LA. Here are a few photos. These are just the closest potholes to my place, there are many more that are way worse. It's about a 1/4 mile gauntlet of bumps from the entry to exit:






After that, I have a pretty steep ramp to get into the garage. On my blown stock suspension at factory ride height, I needed to use a set of plywood ramps to avoid scraping when pulling in. The rear of the car would dip after the nose cleared the ramp, causing my rear brace to scrape.

Anyway, the point is that I just couldn't go low and daily this car without a bunch of headaches. At the time, the Xidas XL weren't available. So the Fox from FM which offered quality on par with the Xidas but more travel and the ability to run a taller ride height was a much better fit for me. I haven't posted much about the Fox since I bought them, but I absolutely love them. I haven't done any track/autocross with them yet, but they're amazing for a DD. I'd like to post a full review once I get the chance, since there aren't that many out there. I can go down the alley-from-hell at a good clip and not touch the bumpstomps. I did a trip up to northern CA with the gf and they were plenty comfortable on the freeway for 5 hours. You can tell that the car has stiff springs, but they're exceptionally well behaved. In my opinion these are a really solid option for a street car. They fit my needs perfectly - a performance suspension that wouldn't compromising ride quality, or cause headaches when navigating everyday terrain like potholes, speedbumps etc.

I haven't been in a car with Xidas to compare (maybe at MLS), but for what it's worth I would fully recommend the Fox.

ddwelch

Thanks for the info.

emilio700

iTrader: (3)

You do realize we also offer Xida XL, which are the same length as OEM right?

We would agree, that the shorter Xida Race would not be appropriate for your application.

tenthe

iTrader: (1)

I picked up my coilovers back in 2016 before the Xida XL were available. It would've been a much tougher call for me had they been around when I was buying. It's great that you guys saw there was a market for longer shock bodies though.