Mazda + Toyota

Achievement Unlocked; The Dream

I know it sounds extra regular, crazy or dumb, but when you swoon over something, a concept, a style, an image in your head and you immerse yourself in it that "something" for so long; you start to think it may never come to fruition. When life just keeps throwing curve balls, poor decisions are made, smart decisions made to trump poor ones; something so easily attainable to an individual is not to the next. When you get wide-eyed and that rush of excitement when things start to line up, that extra motivation surges through you to move on to the next item on your checklist. And then it happens, one chilly Saturday morning, a few hours of wrenching, bleeding and cursing. You take a step back, adrenaline pumping, brain ready to orchestrate the symphony that your hands and feet itching to perform. The image that has been burned into your head isn't just in your head anymore, it sitting right before your eyes, less than 3 feet away, and mere inches from kissing the earth, ready to swerve off into the sunset.
My dream has come true.

Spoiler alert; I don't swap a 2JZ in it.

TL : DR; Bought new car, went to Japan for 4.5 years while it sat in storage, came back to the states and lowered it.

Anywho, here's my car, 2009 Mazdaspeed3. Bought it brand new May 2009, then I got sent to Japan January 2010 and then spent the next 4.5 years running around Tokyo (best time of my life). My transportation office lied to me and said I could not bring my car with me, so it sat in storage in Texas for that time. Come home July 2015 to a basically brand new car. Here the timeline of what I did, it's not in exactly chronological order because I sometimes forget what I did yesterday, much less 6 years ago...
Driving off the lot, happy as fuck
IMG00173-20090529-2005 by Jared , on Flickr

Swapped my cheap wheels from my Mazda6 to the 3.
IMG00217-20090612-1439 by Jared , on Flickr

De-badged, never liked them, take them off every car.
IMG00204-20090608-0855 by Jared , on Flickr

Limo tint and a base car show
DSC03312 by Jared , on Flickr

Greddy type RS BOV (set to atmospheric of course! what youngin' wants a turbo car with no PSH? I didn't, you probably wouldn't either, so it happened) and a Cobb short ram.
IMG00136-20090822-0927 by Jared , on Flickr

Started dating the hottie that sold me the car and she bought me a Cobb SRI. Buying me car parts AND drives a nice blacked out Pilot on 22's? Bet. Little ways down the road I asked her to change her last name, I guess she liked me because she damn sure knew I didn't have any money, especially after the contract she stuck me with. Cheap black wheels are cheap so I got these fancy pants cheap gold wheels. Hell of a lot easier to clean but they never balanced properly. Window paint was from the day me and my lady got married.
10102009120 by Jared , on Flickr

Went with the red and gold and did an Iron Man theme, got some letters and painted them gold along with the emblems and plate cover. Corny to a lot of people but whatever its my car.
DSC01468 by Jared , on Flickr

Swapped almost all the halogens to LEDs and put HIDs in the lows and fogs. I can't remember if they're 6k or 8k, but I picked the light blue to reference Iron Mans light blue eyes on his suit and other light up bits.
DSC01500 by Jared , on Flickr

Then there was that day the BOV fell off, never let your Honda friend wrench on your car, haha jk. Jimmy rigged it until I got a new cold pipe.
DSC01480 by Jared , on Flickr
DSC01488 by Jared , on Flickr

Then it sat in storage for forever...

Now for the recent stuff.
"Sir do you need a truck?" NOPE! Bought my daughters matresses for their beds
IMG-20141001-00096 by Jared , on Flickr

At the airport picking up wifey. Acquired a bitchin' temp tag from Japan before we left, mounted behind the grill to hopefully deter thieves, and of course its mounted with zip ties, it wouldn't be as JDM any other way
IMG-20140930-00093 by Jared , on Flickr

Got bored, plasti-dipped the lower bar thingy, called the "smile delete mod", also got a cool Lightening McQueen sun shade.
DSC_0668 by Jared , on Flickr

Tis the season! Threw the christmas tree up there, didn't want all the needles in my car
IMG-20141129-00158 by Jared , on Flickr

Almost made it all the way home without getting stuck. Super bald summer tires are not the business in the snow. Made it 30 feet before my drive way and needed a little extra help.
IMG_0282 by Jared , on Flickr

Didnt want to wear a hole in my carpet so I took some velcro and made this heel plate until I get some legit digital fit floor mats.
IMG-20140924-00086 by Jared , on Flickr

Noticed the car running real shitty, even more shittier than usual. Had a CEL for an air leak somewhere. Tried tightening all connection, dunno how I missed this gem. Found my un-metered air leak. Got an OEM BPV for cheap and car ran way better but no more PSH PSH

IMG_0297 by Jared , on Flickr

3 star dragon ball shifter. Why didn't I go with the 4 star you ask? Well I have a Mazda3, so I thought the 3 star was appropriate. Man my car is filthy. And yes, the hair ties do serve a purpose, for my children's hair, but I think shaves a few milliseconds off my shifting.
IMG-20150822-00341 by Jared , on Flickr

Driver window was making an ugly clunk noise when rolled down, took the door apart to discover everything is tight like it should be. Put everything back together and the clunk disappeared like magic.
IMG-20150912-00359 by Jared , on Flickr

So I like full face wheels, got these for $50 because I probably won't be able to afford legit wheels, and I'm ok with that because I don't have a problem with these pie plates. Came off a z40 Soarer, 18x8+45. Had to throw on 10mm of slip on spacers to compensate for the Toyota smaller center bore compared to the Mazdas bigger hub flange. Luckily I was still able to get at least 7 turns on my lugs. I also like that the center cap is a Soarer badge instead of the Lexus "L" badge. Blue over the center cap is because I was scuffing them up for paint that still hasn't happened... They will be gold soon...
ms3 pie plates by Jared , on Flickr

BEST MOD EVER, PAID THE FUCK OFF!
IMG_0369 by Jared , on Flickr

Rolled the rear fenders with a hair dryer and a 4lbs sledge to make clearance. Driver side paint cracked a little but the passenger side did not, pluh! Oh well. Covered the head of the sledge hammer with some soft drawer liner junk to help protect the paint.
IMG-20150927-00401 by Jared , on Flickr

More prep work, there is a metal blade that runs north and south in the fender well, I heard it likes to slice through tires and I'm not trying to deal with that noise. I don't think I'm low enough but whatever.
IMG-20150928-00404 by Jared , on Flickr

Of course I didn't take a before picture, so you all can enjoy trying to figure out what I did. But the chipped paint is what I hammered flat-ish. Super awkward to try and swing a hammer plus I'm a weakling, but it got done.
IMG-20150928-00405 by Jared , on Flickr

Made this patent pending device, I call it the Pinch Weld saver. Yes I wear gloves because I'm dainty, deal with it.
IMG-20150928-00406 by Jared , on Flickr

THEN I FINALLY INSTALL COILOVERS, YAY! Fucking, oh happy day. I was useing the base auto skill center so I didnt do all the adjusting to the coilovers there because it would cost me money. Rears still have perches but its lowered all the way down. Fronts had room to go down but I had to trim a tab.
IMG-20151003-00421 by Jared , on Flickr

Tab trimmed. So. Fucking. Happy.
IMG_0374 by Jared , on Flickr

Cleaned the car today before the rain. Had to get some decent pictures and clean off that damn brake dust. BTW, if your a photographer person in the Baltimore area and want to take pictures of my car I would love it. And because I probably suck a whole lot at taking pictures, hit me up! Oh yeah, thing hanging from the rear is a tsurikawa (Japanese subway handle). No its not a "drift charm" or a sign that I'm ready to race all the time. Its an old school Japanese thing, I can explain it if you somehow read all these words and want to know about it and are too lazy to Google. Original one came with a plastic ring but it broke off so I used a "donut wall mount" from The Container Store as a very acceptable METAL replacement.
DSC_0666 by Jared , on Flickr
DSC_0667 by Jared , on Flickr

DSC_0669 by Jared , on FlickrDSC_0670 by Jared , on Flickr
DSC_0671 by Jared , on Flickr
DSC_0672 by Jared , on Flickr
DSC_0664 by Jared , on Flickr
DSC_0665 by Jared , on Flickr

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