Back from holiday in Dubai. The focus for this coming week is on finding a unit to work from, an mk1 MX-5 or Eunos Roadster and a trailer to carry it on. The trailer is less important as we can hire one if need be. The Eunos/MX-5 can be any colour but a black interior is preferrable. Not worried about the paintwork (it will get a full respray later) but, no rust or dents is important. It can be a non-runner but, an MOT'd car that runs would make life easier.
We have booked our Mazda CX-30 in to have a towbar fitted. We are going to need this to transport our MX-5e. We have also found a few MX-5s to view this week, with one looking like a very good candidate for conversion.
Fantastic news! We have bought a 1992 Eunos Roadster which is going to be our test platform and turned into our MX-5e. You can read more on this project.
Paid for and picked up the Eunos Roadster today. The car was basically sold as a non-runner because of numerous electrical issues and because it would idle (if it could be started) and stall as soon as the throttle was touched. We solved all the electrical issues by fitting the leads to the battery terminals properly.
The engine won't rev because we found a massive hole in the air intake pipework after the MAF sensor. We have no idea how this could have happened.
This huge chunk of plastic was found sitting on the under tray.
You can tell a lot about how well a car has been looked after by the state of the coolant header tank. Our MX-5e has suffered in recent times. Not only was the header tank empty, it was also filthy inside. The radiator was full of coolant fortunately. We removed the coolant header tank and gave it a good clean. It might just get used in the MX-5e.
We are going to completely drain the system and refill it. This might be considered a waste given that we are removing the engine but, we want to make sure that all is good before we do remove it because this engine could well end up in Yoko in the future. It would need a new water pump and cam belt though.
This afternoon, we checked out a few more things on the MX-5e. The prototype smartphone wireless charging tray fits well and looks really good. The floor behind the driver's seat is wet but, this doesn't surprise us as the soft top has holes. The throttle pedal had over 25mm of slack, so we adjusted the tensioner to remove the slack. We were told the car stereo wasn't working but it is now and it sounds really good!
Rob doesn't name his cars but, the rest of the family does. Over dinner this evening, we agreed on a name which is a little bit more catchy than 'MX-5e'. Kaminari is born. It is Japanese for lightning (or thunder).
The first thing we did today was check our fix to the air intake system worked and it did 🙂 The car now revs properly and runs smoothly. As soon as the V5 comes through, we are going to insure, MOT and tax the MX-5e, so that we can check out and test stuff on the road. Summer is coming! 😎.
A really busy morning stripping out the interior of the MX-5e. We started by taking out the seats and then all of the carpets. As we were doing this we found a lot of English coins but also this Japanese coin that pre-dates the car by some way. According to Wikipedia, the '52' denotes the 52nd year of the Emperor Hirohito's reign, which means it was minted in 1977.
Some people say a coin is added in the factory for luck and that this only happens/happened for cars destined for the Japanese Domestic Market (JDM). I don't know how true this is. Either way, this one has been cleaned and is considered part of Kaminari now 😊
The floor was damp on the drivers side but, we knew that as the soft top leaks. We found a bit of surface rust but nothing of concern. The metal panels that form the parcel shelf have already been treated and resprayed. The soft top has been removed as we have no plans to use it.
We had the radio out to see what was going on and it appears to have two USB connections, both of which charge my iPhone.
Another mad busy day 😮. The first thing we did was to pop out and buy some black paint, both gloss and satin. We then painted the last few parts of the smartphone wireless charging tray project.
The plan for this morning is to get the interior of the car behind the seats complete. This meant painting the soft top clamps and removing the rain gutter. We then realised that this was never fitted correctly 🙄 The bottom of the soft top is meant to sit inside this gutter so water on the roof is carried to the collectors on each side of the car. No wonder it leaked! It was also full of holes and patched with duck tape, so it has gone in the bin. We don't plan to have a soft top on the car, so this is no loss.
With any rust treated and panels sprayed, we could fit black carpets on the firewall and the parcel shelf. Behind the seats, the MX-5e is complete for now. Out focus now shifted to the front of the car. We know from our experience with Yoko that, this bit can be very time consuming and hard work. So we set on with the task of removing the front bumper, crash structure, wings and wheel arch liners. Being familiar with the construction of these cars helps a lot! The amount of rust we found was incredibly small. Only two bolts sheared in during the whole afternoon and these were the two bolts we most expected to fail.
The braking system is in need of a serious over-haul but, we knew this. We are getting all four calipers refurbished as new and painted gold in colour. Stainless-steel brake hoses, new disc and EBC Greenstuff have been ordered.
The track rod ends need replacing before we MOT the car.
Bought some more parts this morning. Stainless-steel braided brake hoses, new track rod ends, alternator belt and a new dipstick. Total MX-5e project cost is now at £1858.33.
This morning we continued with the front of the car and taking the crash structure and bumper down to it constituent parts. This is a time consuming job because you always find rusty parts that have seized.
Looking down inside the chassis rails it is all remarkable clean 🙂
Before we put this back together, every single part is rust treated and spray painted. Every bolt that is going to be reused is cleaned up too. Many get replaced with stainless steel equivalents. Some plastic parts are replaced too. We put grease on all the threads.
If there is just one bolt/stud on the MX-5 / Eunos that will rust and shear, it is this front bumper side mounting bracket and sure enough the lower bolt on both sides sheared as we undid the nuts 🙄 You can buy new ones for about £11 each and honestly, they are worth it. The two studs are a press fit into the bracket and it is not worth the time trying to fix them.
Bought more parts this morning. Engine oil, spark plugs, oil filter, air filter, bumper side mounting brackets, cam cover gasket (it is leaking badly) and some new unpainted door mirrors. Total MX-5e project cost is now at £2069.52.
This morning, we set about painting all of the front crash structure and bumper parts that had been rust treated. It has been several years since we used the conservatory to hang up bits of Yoko to dry 🙂
With the front of the car fully stripped, we have painted the front of the chassis with gloss black paint and can now start to put it all back together ready for the MOT.
These are the bumper side brackets that were removed and will be replaced. These are the most likely part of any MX-5 or Eunos to rust, so the new ones will be painted before they are fitted.
We have removed all four brake calipers, so they can be shipped off to Bigg Red on Monday, to be fully refurbished. Every time we take something of the car, it is put in a labelled bag. This is true for the brake clips, springs, backing pads, bolts, etc.
The front brake discs were very rusty and the pads have just a few millimetres of pad left. The rear discs are not so bad but and the pads were at about 5mm left. All the discs and pads are being replaced, with braided stainless steel hoses being fitted too.
Between these jobs we also changed the coolant. The coolant that came out was actually quite clean but, the system was flushed and refilled any way. Despite not planning to use this engine in our MX-5e project, we are taking good care of it. It runs well and has only done about 80,000 miles. There is also no smoke. It is exactly the same 1.6 engine that is in Yoko, but her engine has done 135,000 miles and smokes a bit. Have a like for like swap to hand might come in handy!
The engine is leaking oil from the camshaft cover, so we plan to replace the gasket. The oil, oil filter and spark plugs will also be replaced and a new air filter has already been installed.
The day got off to a good start, with the V5C arriving in the post for the MX-5e 😎 This means we can insure, MOT and tax it very soon.
We have started putting the front end of the car back together. All the parts have been treated and painted.
The plastic parts have all be pressure washed. This includes things like the wheel arch liners, front undertray, crash structure, etc.
One thing we were desperate to remove is the electric aerial. It's really annoying how it goes up and down and getting rid of it saves weight and makes the car more aerodynamic 🙂
0.91kg saved! This is for sale in the shop.
This afternoon, we paid a visit to Suffolk Mazda to collect some second-hand parts for the MX-5e. We got this main carpet in black and a load of other interior plastic parts for £60. The carpet was pressure washed (it has a plastic backing) and hung up to dry. It looks like new!
The first of our orders from MX5 Parts arrived and this included some new tie rod ends. The rubbers have perished on the current ones and it will never pass an MOT like that.
The delivery also included some HEL braided brake hoses. Seeing as we were replacing the calipers, discs and pads, it makes sense to fit these at the same time.
These after-market fog lights are hideous! The plan is to kill two birds with one stone and when the exhaust is removed, the exhaust cut-out in the rear bumper will be neatly filled with a custom shaped, 3D printed LED fog light. This is another project.
A second delivery today from EBC Brakes Direct was our front discs and pads.
The last thing to look at today was the driver's side door. We wanted to understand why the electric window wasn't working. This opened up a whole can of worms!
The cable to the electric window winder had been disconnected, so it was never going to work. The winder motor makes all the right noises though. It looks like it was disconnected because the runners had become too stiff. Simply lubricating them made the window move easily though. More exploring required.
One surprise discovery, was that our car has a Focal PS 165 FX 2-way speaker system fitted. We thought the head unit sounded good. This set of speakers costs over £300. This is really handy, as we plan to fit a premium entertainment system in the OSSEV® and this will allow us to test the other components better in our MX-5e.
A wet and rainy day, so the focus has been on stuff we can do inside. Although the MX-5e is currently painted a gloss black, we are doing some work on one of the sills and fixing a few small spots of rust in places. It also has a few small dents that need removing.
The family agreed on a plan to then get the whole car resprayed in metallic black and have a few subtle gold details. This includes the brake calipers, the tow hooks, the (currently chrome) door handles and the hard top top mounts. We also plan to fit a nose badge and these gold vinyl graphics. Fortunately Rob has a friend with a laser vinyl cutter and these vinyl graphics cost just £2 🙂
The Japanese symbols are Kaminari in English, the name given to the car.
Because our 1992 Eunos is a V-spec, it came with quality leather seats. They are tan leather though, so they are eventually going to be replaced with our OSSEV® seat design.
Whilst taking them out of the car, we noticed the head rests have these holes, which imply they have head rest speakers. The seats are also connected to the car's wiring loom via a small plug and socket.
The top part of the headrest unzips to reveal the speakers. They really do look like something out of the early 90's but, we are going to be testing them and connected them to the head unit as the rear L + R audio channels in our MX-5e. This has now become a new MX-5e entertainment system project in its own right.
Suffolk Towbars arrived this morning to fit a tow bar to our Mazda CX-30. We are going to need to be able to trailer the MX-5e about, to get some welding done on it and to get it resprayed.
The first job this morning was to finally separate the last few bits of the front bumper. The front of the car is the bit most prone to rust, even ahead of the rear sills.
Another delivery this morning from MX5 Parts included these new bumper brackets. It also included some spark plugs and an oil filter.
Also in the delivery was this much needed camshaft cover gasket. The old one is leaking a lot and means the spark plugs are oil covered.
More painting of parts today! It feels never ending but, we are nearly done. We also removed the cam shaft cover to replace the gasket. It is leaking a lot of oil and the spark plugs are swimming in oil 🙄 We spent a lot of time cleaning the surfaces and the cover. It will be refitted this weekend.
We have made good progress with our project to upgrade the MX-5e high-level brake light.
The load cells for our vehicle scales project arrived today.
When restoring an old car like our MX-5e, a lot of time is spent painting and getting the details right. These towing eyes were fairly rusty. They have been treated and painted black, with the visible bits painted gold to match the colour scheme. The gold part has also had a clear lacquer applied.