FC RX7 5.0 race car thread

[Teeson1111]

Been doing nothing but listening to old music on repeat so lol nothing really to add there

scrapped the collectors, unfortunately a lost of time lost but thats all part of the fun



I use a laser whenever I can, I just like laser beams. Made it easier to get the cut and fit really tight. Im not the one welding these so I want to make it as easy as possible and that means tight fit ups.







rinse repeat.



much better fitting near the steering column







This kinda made for an awkward manifold that had really long runners and hard to get the bolts and get in and out of the car. My OCD wasn’t happy



sooooo minor change



tack them in a symmetrical way



to make fitting them easier, as tape holds it it place pretty well but you can adjust it once its taped, I cut some thin aluminum tube to make like spring holding thing



worked really well actually







got the runners fit up nicely. Funny thing I learned is that equal length manifolds really mean equal volume. So all my runners are really close, not sure what acceptable tolerance is but they are within 5%







Fits in the car well, I can get the manifold on and off without having to lift the engine or anything silly. I dont know about with the turbo on yet but should fit fine. I can use one stud but no more, Mazda only used 2 studs so I’ll try bolts and one stud and we’ll see how that seals.





finished the welding blocks, got the hardware sorted and dropped them off with my buddy Travis to weld them. Tapped a 1/4” barb for back purge, he later told me to add a diffuser to make the gas flow straight



Got the real deal adapter plate back from cutting and machining. Made a few small changes besides the hole size on the M12 bolts to the block



I gave up trying to find a countersunk allen head in M12x1.25.
M12x1.75 is much more common and easy to get. One side on the engine block isn’t even threaded, and the other side is threaded but theres nothing behind it.



drill it out and put a nut on the back



whole thing bolts up perfectly





also got some less then common hardware M10x1.0 for the flywheel adapter.



Its actually a reasonably common thread for flywheels but not in allen head and in the length required for the adapter



flywheel bolted up

So for the first time I have the engine and transmission bolted together with the clutch lined up and it all fit



starter engagement is good, I locked the spur gear all the way out to check



pilot bearing is right on the end of the input shaft, like full engagement though. Prefer this because the adapter sandwiches the pilot bearing between the crank and it self.



turns out T2 and NA rx7 trans use different slave cylinders. Well barely



Thankfully the T2 ones are cheap and available

The whole thing fits, I’m blown away. Big thanks again to Neil at SCG for all the help. Arguably the biggest piece in making this build functional. Also thanks to Hose for his help machining all things I can’t lol.



another small thing I didn’t want to get held up by later, I used the adapter from the filter block already on the fuel filter because it didn’t come with one. So I had to make one and while I really don’t like the idea of welding this but it will have to work for now

used a bolt to get it good and aligned



practiced my tig skills. round objects are hard



reamed out the inside



and threw it in there

went back to finishing the trans mount since the trans was out of the car again





tig’d with no filer and really like how that looks. I’m sure using filler is proper or whatever



however since I fitted it back in the car, between the engine mounts and now the trans mount it doesn’t quite fit perfectly so I’ll need to cut and tweak that a bit



a kind of issue has been the fuel rails. So I had found these Honda J30 V6 rails had the same injector spacing, but as far as mounting goes it was going to be a challenge and also ugly. I was ok with that somewhat because it was going to be hidden under the intake manifold. But they didn’t exactly fit the injectors I had, so my options were to get new injectors ($$), modify those rails to suit and **** the end result or just buy rail stock and make something I’d be happy with.



Mopac had a FAST 24” rail in stock, wasn’t far off the cost of ordering rail stock from the states





double checked all the measurements on the stock rails and laid out and drilled the new ones after cutting them in half



I measured and ordered tooling to replicate the ID adapters as close as possible, including the 10mm step to locate the injectors



did a test run on some bar stock just to make sure it all works. After some measuring it looked like I was going to have to max out what space I had and drill the rail as deep as I could and the manifold as deep as it could be



So after much setup and struggle to get it aligned using the tool I made





and then drill the rails





Mockup with the injectors in place to be able to measure for mounts



the tricky part here was going to be joining the 2 rails. I was thinking banjo bolts and a machined block until I fit it in the car and realized how little space I had. Then the banjo bolts that fit the bore have a head size thats too big, so now I’m working on an idea with a 180* fitting…









then I spent an entire evening making mounts for the fuel rail just to find that I made a measuring error. The rails sit on a 30* angle relative to the flange and where I measured the offset distance was much closer then where the rails actually sit. But now I know what they are supposed to be lol

[Teeson1111]

Happy quarantine everyone! just kidding, here in Canada we never went to a full lockdown just heavy restrictions. Work never stopped because building condos is essential or something I guess. So all its really done is made it harder to get parts and material and cleared up my social calendar lol. Still having FOMO because my buddies are out cruising around but at least theres no drift events yet. I’m still quite a ways off from a running driving drifting car, as usual everything takes longer and costs more then you thought.
I also keep deciding to do things cooler and costlier ways, but I’ll be happy with the end product this way. I start to mock up something and it doesn’t fit like I had pictured so I spend more time thinking how to do things all while keep aesthetics and serviceability. Aesthetics have become a key part, I’m not wanting all this effort to be ruined by not liking how it looks in the end.

pickup up where I left off on the oil pan;



the first pan I cut up for the flange, I kinda decided I could do better. But not wasting the old one I used it to give me a good idea of clearances



fully flat this time



I had bought some 20 Ga sheet metal for this, probably could have gone thicker in hindsight. Using the plasma cutter to cut faster and make less waste





bend to shape



Leaving the mock block in the car and I wanted to be able to tack it without pulling it out so rather risky but I put a garbage bag to keep dust out and used the real deal engine





Same drill as before, I found that if I cut the areas that bend around on a curve going up from the flat sides they fit best





made some paper templates of the yet to be filled in areas



to get the curve shape I tacked it to a pipe and rolled in like a rolling pin on the welding bench





tack and grind off any overlap







Before I got any further I wanted to know what I was looking at for oil capacity. I forgot exactly what I measured it at but it was something like 7 litres lol. Stock pan holds like 4.9L, and I’m adding a remote filter and cooler that I expect to add another litre at least.

Then I went to fit it in the car and It hung below the subframe and hit the steering rack and the lines lol. Decided it would be easier to cut it off and start over. Modified my template and made a new one that fit much better









welded the inside as well. I am very confident there is no pin holes





Put in some serious work to get the stock dipstick to work. Its in a really bad spot for this chassis, its at the front of the engine right above the steering rack. I really like the dipstick for some reason and always like it back when I had these engines in FWD form

some hammer and rewording and grinding later lol its done. Still need to baffle the the pickup, which I haven’t made yet and add a drain and a pair of turbo drains. But kinda holding off on the drains until the turbos are finalized, and I don’t want to put the drain right into a downpipes so ill hold off there too



Quick little afternoon project was making the oil block mount.





I have mockup pictures in a previous post



Got -10 AN weld on fittings in the mail, they were a little smaller then the ones I machined down so I used some filler rod to fit the space. then I screamed yolo and tried welding it myself cuz thats who I am as a person





before you say “oh that doesn’t look that bad, lol it is. Burned through twice, tons of porosity and I ruined the threads. Tried welding the back and that went even worse.



So remade the whole piece lol



side to side comparison. Also note the tapped hole in the sides, one for oil pressure and one for the turbo oil feeds







Hand ported to match the gasket. Hoping this improves flow and reduces pressure drop







fits around the turbo decent, kinda close with the fittings on. Not planning of having to take it off very often

Made templates for the rad mounting. Going with the same design as the V8 where the side mounts are also ducting. Best idea I’ve had, 2 functions in 1 part combo









brought the templates to my buddy Travis’ shop where he has a shear and a hydraulic press brake and whipped these up.







forgive the blurries. Intercooler seals on the top, I later cut a drop in the top to get the intercooler to clear the hood as it did with the mockup



Happy birthday to me, my wife and parents bought me a sick drill press. I had been looking for a used floor standing decent one on craigslist for months and was either too late or it was too expensive. local tool place had this on sale so I bought the floor model.



Got the real turbos from Spectrum Motorsports



While I don’t know all the specifics these are a mixed matching of ecoboost turbos. The later years had a remote BOV and the early years are a smaller compressor or something. I just told Spectrum about my build specs and goals and he gave me this lol



They also got my flanges cut. They had the turbos flanges in CAD already so me and SCG didn’t have to make those which was nice



quick cleanup to fit the correct bolt through



with flanges I can accurately make the jigs for the collector side



using my shiny new drill press



Found a tip online to use the drill press to by hand for starting the tap then finishing it by hand to ensure that its square





went one by one to make sure the hole enters as accurate as I could









didn’t take any process pictures but finally made sheet brake 2.0



has an actual 25” bending area and uses thicker angle iron. I spent more time making sure the hinge alignment was mint



geared up to make the most overkill manifold jig, bending a 180* is actually pretty hard







Idea here was to allow room for the tig torch while doing my best to keep it from heat warping





started to realize how little room I actually have to work with, at least If I’m doing anything other then a log manifold which was not the plan



Kris had some 1 1/4 steam pipe from a previous thing that I was using to get a rough idea for how much stainless to buy



added some holes for back purging, still need to tap these



drilled holes to make taking the trans mount on and off actually do able. Didn’t like the way I couldn’t torque it before, as its not the best design lol



time to do real engine mounts

jig, paper templates, plasma cut

[img[https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/49906699473_4c8ef26a3e_c.jpg[/img]



drill some holes, mark some bends, make a slit to have it bend







realize I marked the inside of the bend on the outside and after its bent it doesn’t fit right



cut off and trim the ends and weld it all up



I always seem to choose to not have welds visible. This probably started back when I couldn’t weld very good but now I can weld passably but still choose to grind down welds





its 3/16” plate but just to be safe I added some little vertical pieces, which I also bevelled and ground flush





Neil at SCG let me sand blast them



gave them 2 coats of black



and done

Bought QR Van Jen clamps on Ali a long time ago, they were a bit more then the hypertune rip off ones that use an allen bolt but other then the fact they use a cotter pin to lock them (I’ll try to find a detent pin like the Vibrant HD ones use) I like them. They seem to seal tight and don’t have any machining flaws. Probably should pressure test them before I go on record though lol



Bought a 3” for the side going to the TB (also 3”) and a 2.5 for the other side from the turbos which are 2” outlets



the intercooler is 2.5” so the 3” is a bit of a tough fit



I don’t want any shavings in there ruining my engine later on so the solution I came up with is a shop vac on blow









have some small gaps to fill but I can probably get a more experienced welder to help right?



the 2.5” side fit up was much easier







fit check before going any further

So around now is the time when Im discussing turbo waste gate actuator with Spectrum, and theres less wiggle room then I had thought. The OEM location is really tall and basically into the heads on my engine, but as I understand to get proper seal and such the rod needs to be perpendicular with the flap. We are going to do a heim on the flapper arm to let me get the actuator diaphragm closer to the compressor housing (still need to maintain some room from the exhaust to prevent melting it though)

so heres a bunch of fitment photos











what is really not ideal is how close the waste gate actuator is to the steering column, which has dictated the placement of the turbo already (even though the waste gate likely won’t open that far)



so went back to an idea I had a while ago which was to flip the turbos side to side and bottom mount them. So I cut another set of manifold flanges (quick and easy with the water jet flanges as templates and the plasma cutter) kept the old ones just in case and started playing around with flipping the turbos









engine crane is the best way to do this























there is more room here than it seems. spent like 2 evenings getting the drivers side turbo positioned just right. The passenger side took 1.5 hours













much more actuator room now, oil drains are still above the pan, less downpipe material and the best part is I can do equal length now











built the jigs and ordered material



kinda missed this in earlier mock ups but this isn’t good lol. Made a new one that moved it away by a bit. (don’t have pictures)

some random progress shots





got the real deal adapter plate back from water jet. Made a few small changes this time, some of the holes will be tapped and bolted to the engine from the engine side. Currently its with the machinist getting worked on in his free time





made -10 oil lines for the engine to remote filter





as my wife would say “this is an aesthetic”
very much like the look of black fittings, braided stainless and red plugs



screamed yolo again and took a crack at welding the intercooler





screwed up the weld on top of the 3”, like the most in view weld on it. Will have to grind it down and weld the top again and hope that goes better



started on the intake manifold. Dream here is to do this in carbon fibre, I found this company Performance Design after I had started but it gave me a good goal in mind as I really like the way theirs looks. They make a few of these, one is a top for the Holley high rise and mid rise intakes. From what I can gather They use pre-preg carbon and 2 pieces at least on the outer layer. I don’t have an autoclave or a vacuum pump so pre-preg is out. At the moment I’m unsure if I should make it a top shell or be risky and try a 2 piece mould and use a little spray tack to hold a second piece (or one if I can figure out the shape) upside down while I do the rest of the layers. I started on making a plug for it, getting the shape to look nice and clear the hood etc















that 45 zip tied to the timing cover is to clear the water outlet from the heads, which I might change



on that, can get the coolant temp and pressure sensors to fit under the intake manifold. the upper part will be held on with hose and clamps so removing it won’t be hard if something needs to be changed. Still debating on how to do the water outlet. either under the throttle body or under the timing belt to give the throttle body more room but then I’ll need a bleed line because there will be a high point

since welding cast aluminum had gone ok thus far (and since I discovered washing welds lol) I welded the van jen onto the throttle body



at first I was being careful about not letting it get too hot for fear of melting the sensor, but 30 seconds of googling while waiting for it to cool showed me how easy it was to remove and reassemble











smoothed out the inside. I must have warped the housing a little bit because with the motor out and letting it snap back on the spring the blade would get stuck. Not sure if that is always how it was but I shaved a little off the areas it was catching (mostly the top and bottom furthest from the shaft. I also drilled out the holes to all be M8 bolts.



cleaned everything up and lock tighted the blade bolts (V important) and all done.

further messing with intake manifold shape. The pipe joining the intercooler and TB doesn’t have as much room as Id hoped. I really **** pie cuts and want to avoid anything that resembles that but I’ll need a pretty tight CLR 3” 90 bend to meet them



oh yeah somewhere in there I remade the mould lol









hat tip to my buddy Miguel for the hookup on the OEM Ford turbo gaskets. all the research said these are the only ones to get. Im not sure if they are considered reusable, being MLS and all but at $126 for the lot they sure are to me



Got my order of stainless and messed around a bit. This is really satisfying and I see why people get so into it. Stainless seems like a finicky thing to weld nicely though, as usual prep is key and its very intolerant of mistakes. I was trying a few different techniques to see what they did, no filler root only, root + cap and single pass with flller. With the thickness of sched10 root without filler and then a cap pass with seems to yield the nicest looking welds consistent with what I see done on high end manifolds.

As usual the drivers side is the most difficult to fit. Once I have a complete manifold I’ll just more or less copy it to the passenger side. The turbos sit nearly identical side to side and the passenger side has little to no space constraints so copying the drivers side for rough shape and more importantly runner volume shouldn’t be hard. I always thought that equal length manifolds meant the runners were equal length, but never understood how that was measured. Using the longest path? or the shortest or the CLR of a bend? Well turns out what matters is volume, which makes far more sense to me



Its a 3D jigsaw puzzle but also a math problem balancing the runner lengths.

[img[https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/49906680508_d92cf965f5_c.jpg[/img]

First thing I was told to do is make a collector and make sure it fits



modified the drivers side jig yet again



And big surprise its not going to be that easy. I’m going to spend my long weekend figuring out how to make a collector with 90’s as using straight pieces will have the 90 hitting the steering rack. Im probably not going to be able to have studs on the head like factory if I actually want to remove the manifold.

Should be getting some big pieces figured out here, but probably (sadly) a few months away from firing it up. Hopefully the Canada/US border opens soonish or I find some other way of getting parts across without getting hosed

[Teeson1111]

One of my favorite cars ever !!!! Keep up the awesome work.

thanks dude!

[BUILT_S2K]

One of my favorite cars ever !!!! Keep up the awesome work.

[Teeson1111]

Love to see your still working on this. Thanks for the huge photo dump as usual. Keep up the good work.

thanks! and ya always a huge photo dump lol...

[hinrichs]

Love to see your still working on this. Thanks for the huge photo dump as usual. Keep up the good work.

[Teeson1111]

Greetings everyone.

Wild time we live in right now, but since I’m stuck at home binging Netflix I will take the time to finally update this again. My wife and I just went to New Zealand for a friends wedding and got back just in time. Well in time to actually get home but not in time to avoid the 2 week basically mandatory self isolation period.



This isn’t even new, but I am just terrible lately at taking even the small amount of time required to find new music from bands I am already familiar with even. Hozier’s 2nd album Wastetland Baby; little more up beat then his 1st but really really good. He played a few songs off of it when he came to Vancouver last. I appreciate that he doesn’t seem phased by having a huge gap in between albums, as that can often ruin the process I think.


picking up where I left off



This needed a slight reduction in OD to fit the flywheel but its perfect now. Have to smack it on with a rubber mallet so I have no fears that its not centric. However I haven’t had a chance to try the whole package together yet as the bolts are a very fine thread and the ones from the engines I have are all too short. Only one place Ive been able to find bolts with the right thread and length located somewhere in california. I’m surprised I can’t find anywhere locally or even in Canada with a good range of metric bolts. Any suggestions lemme know but I’ve tried many of the go to places.

finishing up the intake flange pieces





sort of a step by step. Crush the tube until it stops, then pull it out grab the ring and smack out the machined piece.



then put the ring on the open jaws and take the other machined piece to push the now shaped tube out.

probably over kill but made for really consistent pieces. I took them real quick to the belt sander and made sure they were flat, then brought them over to SCG and got him to glue them together.





I/we were expecting it to weld terribly give that I didn’t bring him anything to test weld lol and the manifold flanges I cut down and made flat were cast and the tubes were thin. But turned out pretty decent. Heat sink block was a nice touch i thought.



Next issue I knew I was going to run into was fitting the injectors and rail in the tight little space I have to work with.





Tried flipping them every which way and this was the most room I can squeeze. I don’t like that they don’t sit like equal, horizontally I mean. Thankfully they are under the intake manifold so I won’t see them. One day when I buy a mill I’ll buy some fuel rail stock (or a RB rail cut in 1/2) and make a better one.

since I don’t have a mill and frankly even if I did I’m not too sure how to set this part up anyway, I need to counterbore a hole for the O rings to seat the bottom of the injector. The injectors I got a deal on are from an RB and use an outdated O ring that the injector sits on instead of it going around the bottom and the injector sitting directly on the manifold. Hope that makes sense.



lathed a piece that would hopefully allow me to set up a drill press or mill with some accuracy as to the location and angle the hole sits at. Finding hole centre isn’t the hard part here, I’m guessing theres a tool out there somewhere that does this but I’m sure its $$.
So thats where that is at for now, I don’t have a drill press and haven’t bought one yet.




Since I’ve decided against using the distributor at all I made a plug for it. I will later drill this out and put the ford sensor in it





I’ll be adding a plate that attaches it to the head just to prevent it coming out and keep the sensors air gap consistent, but thats a later thing.

made a bracket for the DBW pedal. Thankfully pretty simple









theres about 5 minutes of mods to the pedal and only really to the plastic bit at the end. So replacing it should I ever have to is simple. I am also pleased this pedal is off the same vehicle as the TB, not that it matters at all lol.



Got a pair of these, going to mount one on each turbo to simply vacuum lines. I chose aesthetics over cost and possibly reliability. Don’t know what happens if one fails and one turbo is over boosting the other but hopefully EGT’s or AFR’s or something will give me a sign in that rare event.



This was a milestone event. The hardware I got fit, the bellhouse fits, the engine fits. The same machinist tapped some holes in for me and machined a dowel (i ruined one getting it out of the 13B iron) so it could all be bolted together. This was also the 2nd to last moment of truth as I was going to measure the centre to centre run out and see if any changes needed to be made.



It probably took me over an hour to get this setup correctly



had to get the arm to sit just right, remove anything in the way, get the dial sitting just right so that I could see it as it spun around. In all the videos and research I did the hole in the bellhouse was always bigger then this. I was also advised after that I could have used a lever dial indicator (which I don’t have anyway) instead. The base is usually mounted on the flywheel as well but I don’t have bolts to do that either soooo here we are. I was way to nervous/excited/impatient to not do this asap.





I did the test at least 4 different times, and actually remembered to write down results twice. I would take the bellhouse off and put it back on again to simulate removing the trans in an effort to see if the results changed.





from all the research I did the most allowable runout seems to be .030”
If you know otherwise please share, I have yet to try it on an hem bell housing to a normal oem to see how much out they are due to manufacturing inconsistencies if there are any.



starter fits





adaptor matches the curves and blends it all together quite nice. I don’t think I will be making any changes to the design aside from the hole size and probably tapping a few holes instead of passing them through on for the engine blocks side.





Here is the engine so far as a package. I am quite pleased with this so far.



here we are using some CAD to get an idea for the intake







really like having those plastic covers lol, feels professional. Ideally want to one day put everything on it and then drop it in.



got a large order from Rockauto including these which are not what I thought. not sure why these are different then the picture, looks like NGK bought them from some one else and skimmed the top with a mill or sander. 5 out of 6 have the logo on top and one has the logo on the connector. I should have bought Bosch and I probably will buy Bosch, cuz i **** how this looks.







but anyway







got a sick deal from a local rx7 guy on a turbosmart FPR with a sensor.



took it apart and checked the diaphragm and gave it a clean

was debating on buying a rep aeromotive from china and put a aeromotive diaphragm in it. this ended up being the same price and sits better with me. Aeromotive do not manufacture in china and have made great effort to prevent their products being ripped off and they make good stuff to begin with, so I’m gonna respect that and not buy a rep. or theirs LOL.

a weird philosophy I know…



the fitment hood makes an appearance







looks like it will be really close if I don’t want to cut webbing near the TB part of the intake manifold



my mom got me and my dad a neat christmas gift. Maybe one day this will be an actual thing but for now its a great running joke between me, my friends and my dad.

next issue to solve

where to put the remote oil filter block



option 1: this is how I had always pictured it, but it doesn’t fit really. The sway bar hits the filter, if it move it towards the rad the fitting ends up in the fan. If i move it up the fittings do the same thing and filter becomes harder to take off due to it sitting above the sway bar.



option 2: now this solves many of those, doesn’t look as cool as I pictured but it fits. And draining the filter would be less messy. Can also get at the T stat plug in it. I also really didn’t want to put it on a funky angle or anything.

so with a solution there I can go ahead with final radiator location





got real fancy with a laser level to help insure that the rad is sitting level and square and at the height I want it at.



some quick tabs welded on to make an upper location



bent a tab to get a profile for the intercooler to sit at. I will bend a sheet the entire length of the rad that will hold the intercooler up and some foam to seal it



this is sitting how its going to be I think



had to factor hood clearance in there



then back to the oil filter





I didn’t like how flexy it was without any triangulation. So I figured to use the sway bar mount and the plate I had welded on originally (one bolt anyway). Need to remake it thicker material, I like making stuff first out of thin and easy to cut all sheet. Bends easy, un bends easy, can cut it with tin snips if need be.

Since I’m building everything why not keep going right?





the power steering pump is on the back/passenger side factory, this doesn’t work for me. The rack connections are on the drivers side, and if the alt swapped places with it then its closer to where the connections are as well. I also didn’t like how high the factory brackets put them, it interfered with where the turbo piping will fit. I experimented if the turbos sat lower or flipped over and everything has compromise. I deemed this to be the way I want it so thats how I’m going to do it. If I find a better way I’ll probably change it. Theres no rule book here, as they keep saying at drift works during the E46 V10 restoration youtube series “we’re just having a go”

As usual flimsy thin sheet to give a good idea of what I’m after. Holding it in place with my hand just doesn’t do it for me lol. I also struggled here to find a way to make sure the belt is aligned. The other part that sucks is the belt rib counts are switch from P/S to alt. Mazda put the water pump and power steering on the same belt, which I think is silly. I deem the alt more important than power steering, can limp it home with out but can’t go very far without a water pump and alt. Perhaps they had other reasons for it, alt loads up fast or something. Ill find out I guess lol



so anyway, it fits here (very nice to have a block on the stand and one in the car to be able to mock up on both) but I have no way to tension it. But we’ll come back to this in a bit



I bought these fittings that kinda ended up being useless. I didn’t want to lose any diameter in the oil system and I was trying to avoid welding aluminum so I got these which were -10AN to 3/4 NPT. They are just huge. I might use them into the oil pan but I wont have room anywhere else. That idea comes from Al from Skid Factory, he doesn’t like weld on AN fittings as the surface of the taper is what seals the fitting. Any damage it takes during removal or assembly can ruin it and then its welded to the part and a big job to fix. you’re less likely to ruin inner threads.
So I took the threaded part off with the lathe and made it a weld on fitting essentially. I picked a size I could actually get a drill bit for (important forethought) and cut it down to 7/8”

then I set about making a block for it out of a large chunk leftover from the exhaust manifold heat sink/weld block





need a drill press right about now. even better a mill.





the issue here is as usual space. The probable location for piping was going to put it all up in this oil adapters face. So i was like “oi ill just start with a thick block and machine it with an angle grinder and belt sander until the fittings can go in at angle and problem solved”

after many wasted hours that didn’t work. I need a 5 axis CNC mill to achieve what I was after lol. Made a mistake grinding and tossed it.
I never exactly liked how close the turbos waste gate sat to the steering shaft. After messing around with the turbo position I found a different place for it to sit that may make my manifold slightly harder to build but keeps it a bit further away while suiting downpipes and everything else clearance. Thats exactly why I like building everything with mock locations and mock brackets until everything fits. So many variables here its hard at times to make choices. I even mocked up a single turbo location and decided that it would have comprises just the same as twins





everything is a compromise



so to plan B. 1/2 Alu plate which came out looking much nicer with the same tools on hand. Transfer punches are key here







put it all together aaaaaand

It looks like ill be needing to do 45* couplers coming off the turbo inlets anyway so i ordered 2 more. Just need to weld it up, may or may not use my adapters. I ordered -6 weld on along with 45* -10AN fittings

now the keen eyed will notice thats not the same bracket holding the power steering pump on, one more story before getting back to that



after much googling I found a company that sells these “mini” alternators. They are actually for a mercury outboard motor but are smaller then the stock KL alt and only give up 10amps peak. not sure what rpm the stock alt gives its 90 amps at but I might be able to play with pulley size here and make this one work. They are also super cheap compared to a KL one and next day amazon prime eligible. They also make a hotter wind version in the same frame size as a more expensive option should I find that I’m maxing the output.



I don’t feel this does the size difference justice, it doesn’t look like much but it kinda is.



same issue finding a way to align the ribs



this is so much easier then the power steering pump, and does anyone know a proper name for those tubes that are threaded on both ends but opposite threads? I can buy them from summit and Jegs and whatever else but they all seem to have different names.



trying to use whatever I had around the garage and then I had a brain wave



I love these “aha” moments

In this case I can measure off the bar to the rib with a caliber and make sure its bang on





it fits in the car, pretty close to the oil pump and steering rack





just to prove to myself i didn’t waste $60 i tossed the stock alt in to see how it sat, kinda tight. It just can’t get as close to the block which make it seem even bigger



tried the same mounting location aaannd pretty similar but kept the original





theres just going to be a lot going on piping wise….

so finally back to the power steering pump



bar makes it super easy to clamp and be 100% in alignment with the pulley. The alt has the advantage of bolting to a machined surface which is parallel with the crank pulley. The pump’s bracket will be welded so its important that I can keep it square



so using the same idea as the stock tensioner, a bolt that slides a pulley up and down, I made a tight fitting solution.







ended up hitting so I cut it and later remade the front of the bracket, I was happier with how the 2nd one came out cosmetically too











I re-used the factory tensioners bolt (cut down a bit) and the pieces that bolt the pulley to the bracket. It works the same way, spin the bolt counter clockwise and it lifts the pulley



added some triangulation, I made it out of 1/4 plate thinking it might be enough but I think this is best. maybe one day I’ll redo it in alu to save half a pound or something





local to me company Serial Nine released new products that fit my car. Toyota and Mazda share many things and thread pitch of their e brake buttons is another



got the interior bling going/matching
(disregard the snap on shifter)



starting to get somewhere/look like something



after one of the most unpleasant experiences with Milwaukee service lack of service (don’t get me started), and some of the best customer service I’ve ever received from KMS tools I now have a brushless grinder. My work has had both the brushless and brushed versions of these and I never noticed a huge difference between them. Turns out not having a wear item is worth the price difference.

not sure where to segway here, onto work or new tools.

Both I guess



Build has been progressing at a snails pace lately, hit some speed bumps that I really couldn’t have predicted how long they would take making everything fit how I wanted. I also kinda foolishly took on a fairly large side job for a friend who moved shops. That will benefit me later as he’s agreed to hour for hour labour exchange lol, and his shops tooling is mile above mine. Then poop hit the fan as they say at work and I did some crazy OT to make some deadlines. racked up a good amount of windfall and spoiled myself lol

got this Everlast Tig from a friend of a friend kinda deal, he didn’t use it much and gave it to me for a good deal with all the consumables he had. Ive read good things about these everlast welders and many people who I know that are welders by trade have bought one. This is a multi process that does Tig stick and plasma cutting. I can basically guarantee i’ll never use the stick function but the plasma cutting is a new era for me



drilled some new holes and got everything to fit on the Mig’s cart. The one stop welding cart now



too bad I have no idea what I’m doing lol. I’ve tig welded maybe twice before and am not very familiar with settings or muscle memory or alloys etc. Been watching a lot of youtube and it taught me one main thing: you have to have heavy metal playing in the background or your welding video will suck





Kris is in a similar boat, though he did welding school one time and has done more tig but claims to have forgotten most of it lol. We’ve welded every scrap piece of meal kicking around and have gone through almost 2 tanks of argon already. Mig is still more comfortable with me for now but id like to get better at it. At this moment I am unsure if I’ll do all my own piping or just tack it and spend some of those hours I have banked for that side job.



still on new tools I was waiting for a need or someone to ask me about a big gauge crimper and someone finally did lol. So another sick amazon prime purchase. We actually have a very similar style one at work from Burndy that costs like $2k, so I’m very familiar with using it



purchase number 3, a printer capable of heat shrink and custom settings etc. I didn’t see a need to ball out on the top of the line Rhino. The biggest advantage I saw there was printing images off a computer. Not sure if this one does 2 lines, don’t see needing that though.



a while back I had cut up my old upper rad support bar and made a template with a piece of 1/8” rod to bend from. Neil has a 1” die so I went by and we argued about how to bend it for longer than it took to bend it (loooool)



pretty sure I missed taking pictures getting it this far but not too exciting anyway. hood pins in a much better position than last time. I want that intercooler/rad opening ducted though



cut up some 1” square tube to make 3 of these



scrap piece of aluminum to get the angle and give a flat surface for the piece to sit on so I can tack it



I forgot and can’t find the quote but something about the best and most efficient solutions solve multiple problems. So the ducting is also the mounting and the mounting is also the ducting for the radiator and intercooler. make a nice complete package that I can pull out in one piece if needed



tacked the nuts on first. did the drivers side that I had mocked up first. Then once that was tacked I took the bar off and clamped it to my welding table and used the table to insure the other 2 brackets were the same angle.

then final welded the whole thing other brackets included



made a goof here where I welded on the inside of the bend and it obviously shrunk and made the angle tighter. So took some heat and bent them back out to where I could just get it bolted back on and then added more heat. fixed



took a large amount of time on again the belt sander but made this nice looking piece for the alternator



still need to make the end where the alt bolts to it thinner in order to align the belt. I also need to order the tube and opposing thread rod ends etc

now for one bit I’m not looking forward too



the factory oil pan



and less of it.

The Tig welder opens up the possibility of doing it out of aluminum. But theres a small hurdle



for whatever reason Mazda put this little whoop in the back of the pan. Making a pan flange out of 1/4” sheet wouldn’t be so bad but with this I either have to bend a piece ad weld it in or get a whole thicker piece of aluminum machined to accommodate it. I like neither of those options right now especially given my welding skills. So for now I’m gonna do a steel pan probably with baffles and look at it later. I really like the look of custom fabricated aluminum pans.





have a ton of room below actually. the pickup which I will probably reuse is in the factory location but the pickup tube was cut off because it hits the rack otherwise.



steering rack is the biggest hurdle because it and the oil pickup tube want to be in the same place. I think with a tighter radius bend the tube will be fine. I also think the pickup should sit further back in the middle of the pan.





this ended up being kinda ugly and many pieces. the less welding beads the better. So it’ll be used to get an idea of clearance and I’ll make a nice one based off of it. As i often do



Its working on my back, I have to lift the engine up a bit to get the pan on and off. Only like an inch though meaning removing the pan in the car isn’t too bad. Not many cars can you remove the entire oil pan without removing the subframe or part of it.

Thats all for now, going to try and get the pan done before I’m back to work. We’ll see if that even happens though as who knows we may be in full lockdown by then…

[PoorMans180SX]

This thing is really cool! I dig V6's, looking forward to the results!

[Miroteknik]

lol 7mount

[Teeson1111]

helps that I saw City and Colour recently but I am deeeeep into this album and the 3 before it. I didn’t dig it on the first listen but there is some jams on here. They opened with Astronaut at the show and wow

so spent a bunch of money recently



eBay interfooler. can’t argue with $80 shipped. 2.5” in and out, going to fit a 3” on the outlet if I can



some of the harder to find fittings and these -3 Earls lines I like from Summit. put in a big order from China that will slowly trickle in



Did some testing of the gauges/senders. My goal here is to use an Arduino and a CAN module to interface with the Black’s custom data stream and use them as functional gauges fed off the ECU’s sensors.



playing with the PWM output I can get the gauge to change, but it won’t hold a steady state. I believe I’ll need a Digital to Analogue converter to steady it out.
I’ll also need help from a buddy with getting the code right, I can copy and paste a working string here and there but I’m pretty in over my head otherwise lol.



moving on, modified my now useless radiator brace bar to fit the intercooler.





so I can get back to my struggle of V mount to 7 mount or somewhere in between



getting this stuff to sit right took some creativity as I only have 2 hands





V mount just looks so cool from the front…







7 mount allows for room up front to play with…



RIP angle grinder. One of my most used tools gave up the magic smoke. I’ll send it out for repair but I won’t see it until next year easily



Since I had decided to move my whole engine/trans back the shifter doesn’t fit anymore. Some research showed me it was pretty easy to modify the t2 shifter but more googling showed me that the NA miata 1.6 trans, FB and FC N/A trans all have very similar shifter turrets and assemblies. So obviously I had trouble finding someone who would sell me just that 2 pieces I needed. Buddy in the Rx7 group chat I’m in gave me a number for a guy with a trans and he was willing to buy the trans off after for the gear set. Its apparently an upgrade for FB’s.



He also gave me a FB shifter turret to see if that fit, and while it didn’t it allowed me to get a photo I hadn’t been able to find anywhere of all 3 together.
From left to right: T2 - FB - Miata



paired with the right length shifter rod, theres no messing around cutting and welding. All oem parts too



Swapping the shifter rod is pretty quick and easy too. Worst part is waiting for the gasket maker to dry



shifter lineup is perfect, bang on stock



some china bits started to roll in, these are M14 to -6 for the turbo water lines. They need a little bit of attention for burs etc but cheeeaaapp even compared to Performance world (and I’m fairly certain they are the same)



very excited to try these out too. Theres 2 types of these Van Jen on ali, this style has been sold under a few names randomly and they cost a bit more then the other style which is a hypertune knock off but the hypertune style have a bolt that secures them vs a pin. I don’t really like the cotter pin, but I’ll figure out a different solution later. They seal really tight, but with a bit of oil on the O rings they wiggle a bit too like they are supposed to. got 2 3” and 1 2.5”. I want to make both sides of the intercooler use these and the throttle body.



got a big box full of bends, pipes and silicone couplers for all the intake and intercooler to turbo etc piping. If I measured right I hopefully won’t have to order more



spent an evening practicing crimps and connectors



finally test fit the adapter plate on the engine, after talking to the machinist who’s helping me with the flywheel adapter he’s a little uncomfortable with the lack of contact the bolt heads make



put the bolts in and used some paint to see how much contact its actually making and well… its not a lot. We had made the holes a bit bigger in order to accommodate if our bolt holes weren’t perfect but we went a little too big. After considering my options I think I’m going to get the plate recut. Which isn’t cheap but worth it if it means I get to keep my legs later. First I’m going to get the transmission side dowels in there to ensure that fitment between the 2 is perfect or close enough to it that I won’t have trans issues later. I understand with a bellhouse run out test I should see under 0.015” runout





set up a test rig to try the Cam sensor out, hoping I don’t have to cut part of the cam distributor drive off to get a useable pattern. I have a log but I’m not yet sure if the Black supports custom cam profiles anymore as with the latest software update its not a option. If I cut the tooth it becomes a 1 tooth signal and thats a useable profile so thats the worst case scenario. But I don’t want to do that every time I swap engines





got some “honeywell style” sensors from china. I’m going to run these and similar temp senders for most inputs. I’m not into risking it for the MAP, Knock, and 02. Most other senders either work or they don’t, and the ECU will catch off set scale readings. I plan to be checking logs pretty routinely.



removed the front subframe, pressured washed and cleaned the whole thing and the engine bay. Very tired of getting grime and dirt on my face and hands overtime I look at it the wrong way.



The power steering lines on the rack were pretty mangled from going through the grannies cradle for the 5.0 swap so I pulled lines off a spare rack and it turns out S4 and S5 are a little different.



bit of tweaking and its fine

After 4 tries I got the right belt for my lathe, apparently not generic tooth and length



I was trying to grind my own HSS tools, but youtube videos are just not enough direction for me I guess lol. Bought a bit holder and bit from a local tool place, which I later found is directly from China… but it cuts so much better/faster



these are cut from the old HSS bits,



This one is from the carbide cutter. The other thing is a press die I made



Bought tube that just slipped over the aluminum tube I bought to do the intake runners with. The runners I used a piece of wire to determine that its about a 1.5” tube, so I got some thinner 1/16th wall or something for the runners and 1/8 wall 1.75” tube for the die. With some heat and a vise I bend it to the same shape as the intake flanges



The machined piece presses into the die ensuring its supporting the roundness of the end and the steps push the tube in while the outer step prevents it from pushing too far. A bit of oil on the whole thing just to ensure I could get it out after. And lol I couldn’t. That was an over sight, once the tube was in there it didn’t have a way out. Either direction forces it into a different shape.

Back to the drawing board



came up with this. The aluminum tube goes on the machined piece on the far right. The smallest diameter at the end is a bit smaller then the port width of the intake, I am using the vice to squeeze it. The steel ring slips over it and the 2 pieces sandwich the tube and ensure that it stays round on the round end. I crush the tube with sacrificial aluminum sheet protecting the tube from the jaws until its tight against the small diameter section. Then hammer that out and use the middle piece (which is a leftover from the first try) to get the tube out of the steel ring.

A lot of effort for something I could probably get away with just squeezing with the vice and eyeballing. Im sure even with this approach to make them more consistent I will still have to blend inside the tube where the weld will be.





Very excited about this. Had to enlist some help for this one from a friend who works at a machine shop but man its so much better than I can do. Makes me want a CNC lather and mill lol. Still need to test fit it all with the bellhouse adapter but this is the piece that will adapt the flywheel to the crank. Its some 5440 or 4340 the shop had kicking around from a leftover piece (need to find out what he used) but the crank is rumoured to be 4340 so that or higher should be fine. The ACT flywheel alloy is listed on their site as “Chromoly” so I’m guessing its around that as well.

I owe him some whisky

[Teeson1111]

Jeez that FC is clean, Nice rims out of curiosity what do they weigh?

thanks! not sure which ones you are referring to, the Enkei's are pretty light, the 1552's not as light. Havent weighed them

You are a madman. Fattest update I've read in a long time. Amazing.

thanks, lucky for you another update is brewing as it took me so long to make the last one

[Miroteknik]

You are a madman. Fattest update I've read in a long time. Amazing.

[Teeson1111]

Glad to see a huge update on this one.

Thanks!

It took me a whole evening but this was so satisfying to read and watch.
Only thing I am thinking about tho is this, on a kind ov V-mount setup shouldn't the rad and intercooler always meet up at the top? Or the air will escape without passing through the intercooler?
I like the "v" more than the "7" btw.

Thank you, and yeah the rad and intercooler would meet in the point of the V or 7. Was a bit hard to show in mock-up, it was even hard to mock-up lol. Everything kept falling out of place if I’m not holding it.
In the end it will be ducted out a hood vent and ducted into the opening, forcing air through the intercooler and radiator

[Fruttolo]

It took me a whole evening but this was so satisfying to read and watch.
Only thing I am thinking about tho is this, on a kind ov V-mount setup shouldn't the rad and intercooler always meet up at the top? Or the air will escape without passing through the intercooler?
I like the "v" more than the "7" btw.

[hinrichs]

Glad to see a huge update on this one.