When I first started, yes. I would swing wide for all my corners and slam on my brakes for 11 foot bridges lol
When I first started, yes. I would swing wide for all my corners and slam on my brakes for 11 foot bridges lol
jdogg said:I never understood why people throw these cars away. They're magical if you build them right.
i love it. always thought they were cool (especially the MX6 which i thought looked super sexy) and these always had the best sounding modern V6 in the business.
i think the disposable aspect mostly comes down to effort. doesn't seem as simple to hit the "easy button" on these once you get past boltons. for your average joe it seems easier to just get a honda and you've got 3 or 4 big players for literally any aftermarket component you can think of. shame.
The weird thing is, these car on paper would mop the floor with all of the Honda Civics save for the ITR and the Si with bolt-ons, the Probe walked them all out of the factory, but it was never in a movie or Japanese anime, so no one cares about them
So, some friends and I are figuring out how to get to 200mph. The engine is ready for it, at least the one I'm putting in, but the stock G-series gearbox is a gamble even fully built. We are thinking of Toyota E153 swapping it, with a custom billet bellhousing and some really tall straight cut gears. Do you know about the SW20 specifically its 5th gear? What about those sequential racing Xtrac gearboxes I've seen for touring cars, I read they only hold like 300hp
jdogg said:The weird thing is, these car on paper would mop the floor with all of the Honda Civics save for the ITR and the Si with bolt-ons, the Probe walked them all out of the factory, but it was never in a movie or Japanese anime, so no one cares about them
yep. probably also an unfortunate situation that it shared its existence with the mustang. that car just had too much heritage and brand recognition tied to it to allow the probe to get out from under its shadow.
Well, I'm back in town, after 7 months on th road it's time to work on this project.
We have fixed a lot of little things. The condenser had a hole in it, so I got an OEM Ford NOS one, not a Rockauto Chinese replacement. SCORE.
The AC fans weren't coming on because of a wiring issue at the relay connector. That has been fixed. We still have a ways to go, tonight we should have working AC. But the biggest upgrade was these big beefy boys right here. Corksport 13" big brake kit, for Mazdaspeed 6. The Probe in all years uses the exact same brake caliper setup but when it went to the Mazda 6 they just got bigger and Mazda decided "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." So they used the same bolt pattern for everything.
Unfortunately, those sick RPF1s don't fit the Corksport kit, at 17", so now I am back at the fork in the road, do I go 18" RPF1 or do I find a set of BBS LM's in 18x9.5 +22 and sell my soul and kidney to pay for them? Probably will end up with the RPF1, I can get them for 1000 with tires if I'm careful.
For now though, RX8 wheels with a 5mm spacer and new cheapo Sentury tires, I'm not putting 595 RS RR's on curbed and scratched (and horribly plastidipped) RX8 wheels.
After tonight, all we have left on this car really is the AWR suspension which is here but the mounts are not so that will have to wait. I have the last AWR solid mount which is a 15 minute job, that might happen tonight. I have to do some minor interior wiring as well but we are getting there. I bedded the pads last night and it will lock the tires halfway down, but I need to get to a track day before I decide to upgrade the master cylinder. It also has clear corner turn signals up front, because it's a 90s car and that's what we did back then.
Well, bit of an update here. It has AC now. This car hasn't had working, really working AC in almost a year and we found it was over a $1.89 orfice tube. Replaced that, filled the system, it's cold now. It has a leak on the condenser side by the high switch it's just the Schrader valve, I should have it sorted out after vacation.
All Ford Nationals killed two of my struts, just in time for the AWR install. The coils are too small though, so I need a set of helper springs so they don't unseat when I lift a wheel. Also scored a $20 AFR gauge at AFN. Dragon is in a few days. Windows need to be re-bushing'd for the windows to seal. It has an oil leak at the oil pressure sending area and the PS is leaking by the cooler I'm going to sort that out when we get to Tennessee.
Progress, little by little.
Baptized the Corksport 13" BBK on the Dragon
Storytime: This past weekend was Miatas At The Gap, I knew I had one shot at a clean run until they got there and brought the police with them. Early, Friday morning I set out and went basically flat out most of the way, save for some slower traffic that pulled off.
So, here I am, brake pedal almost bottomed out, rowing down gears for a hairpin curve, one of many, on the Dragon. The curve has a good straight right before it so in this car, you can wind out 2nd gear all the way to 7800rpm then stand on the brakes and heel-toe downshift into first. This car did that, through headers and a GReddy SP2, which above 5000 howls and may as well be on electric cutouts.
Sure enough, there was a Tennessee Highway Patrol coming down the mountain on the other side, and we met in the apex. The one time I didn't look to apex. There he is, with his windows down. I know for a fact, he had to hear me coming down that hill. He HAD to. There is no way he didn't, because all of the photographers had their cameras ready when I came around corners so I know they can hear me coming.
We looked at each other, mid apex, I short-shifted 3rd and waited for him to turn around. He never did, probably because he was in one of their ubiquitous Explorer SUVs and had no chance to catch me, after I rounded the next corner I stood on it the whole way to the state line. We took it easy the rest of the time and saved the fun stuff for the Cherohala Skyway, which this brake kit proved to be outstanding toward the bottom on the downhill side.
The fun time is over now though, as I am heading back home, with literally no clutch pedal, I broke it in half on the top of Clingman's Dome and floated gears all the way to where I'm staying.
It will have a few more small updates but the next big one will be the AWR coilover and suspension component install, we're done under the hood for now. It's time to begin the transformation from weekend pocket rocket to full-fledged racecar, WITH AC, because Florida.
ha, this thing rules. 13" brakes, nearly 8k rpm and filthy. you gotta hook a mic up to the bumper so we can hear it raise hell.
jealous of your trip, i gotta get up to that road soon, and hopefully time it so i'm not stuck in a parade of boomers and baggers.
i loved my 2nd gen PGT. when the B pipe broke, i left it that way for 2 years because the KL sounds so good.
Beautiful!
Thank you, it's an absolute riot on the edge. It's all top end power and noise but on stock-ish blown suspension so when you toss it into a corner it dives like boat and lifts tires in corners that it shouldn't lol. It really does have a personality. The sound is glorious. On the Skyway It was tripping the ABS on leaves and stuff and because it has an upgraded swaybar the back end will step out if you get cocky. I definitely got brave a few times on the Skyway and got it up over triple digits before standing on the pedal and praying it didn't fade and throw me off the cliff. There are corners I took on those 13" brakes that if I had done at those speeds even on the Mazda6 slotted and drilled with EBC pads I would have bought the farm.
I left the GoPro home or I'd be posting video but I scoped out a tunnel on I-77 that I plan on bombing next time I go up. It has AC and that was thoroughly awesome driving through FL. It is the quintessential project car all of its money is under the hood and only until very recently have I decided to add comfort.
The Dragon, the key to avoiding the boomer parade is to go early or late, and avoid weekends and any major tourist holidays except Christmas, which is the best time to go because all the police have their hands full with tourists in Gatlinburg, Pigeon Forge, Cade's Cove and the Smoky Mountains National Park. We got one good run in before being stuck behind a funeral procession of boomers in Corvettes. Imagine paying 100k for a ZR1 only to do exactly the speed limit on one of the world's most famous driving roads then getting dunked on by a 90's Camry on ebay coilovers and crappy Nexen tires, true story. I bore witness to such atrocity.
In reply to AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter) :
I bought it like that and it was fun for a week until the police start following you everywhere lol. It still has the sound up high I think the GReddy is a passthrough muffler.
By the way, filthy is an understatement. The whole back turned black from my Megasquirt tune. It dropped all of it's oil, ALL OF IT, on my last day of vacation over a nylon pressure sending line that either got nicked by the fan or picked up road debris. The engine is safe and I killed it before it got too low but everything got covered in oil at 75mph and it took a good hour of pressure washing and scrubbing to get it all off. There's probably a picture of what I did in an EPA manual somewhere with a circle and a line going through it.
Small update, just heard back from a bulk-buy I bought in on, the KAi H-beam rods I had made for the built engine are done and should be arriving soon.
Probably sometime in October I will have the suspenson install on here.
Parts fairy arrived.
Go big or go home!
Small update, I have been upgrading the old IBM T30 Megasquirt laptop with GPS functionality from an old DeLorme unit I managed to find. It only updates every second but if I can make it work I can upgrade to a newer one and run that for tilemmetry.
I have been working secretly on a project to add ITBs to the Mazda KL with variable intake runners similar to what the 4-rotor engine in the 787B used. It's a bit ambitious and I'll probably have to cut the hood to make it work but we will see. I'm designing it with either a servo motor to gradually shorten the runners starting at 3500rpm and culminating at its lowest point at 4500rpm or utilizing the engine's own VRIS solenoids to do the same thing in stages.
The first plan of action is to get the ITB kit working and fine tuned and see where the power and torque curves are and go from there making the kit. These engines typically see major improvements on the top end with custom manifolds on and ITBs they can make power all the way to 11000rpm with the proper cam profile, which I have.
This thing is awesome! Keep it up.
Just read the whole post from the beginning. Really great.
I'm in town and the AWR coilover install is happening soon, along with the 7/8" AWR rear swaybar.
Coilovers assembled. Hyperco 900lb front, 700lb rear. Should be fairly stiff. Bilstein inserts, pillowball mounts. The swaybar is also apparently an Addco 22mm with Energy Suspension bushings.
It begins.
By the way, all this crap back here except the endlinks and swaybar haven't been touched since George Bush Sr. was president. I forsee snapping some bolts in my very near future, which is fine I planned on changing a lot of this hardware out for newer stainless stuff for track days so I can change out springs and suspension setups for various courses. Also I fixed my sticking ebrake.
Some stuff I've done. 30 year old hardware is a bitch, so I replaced what I could and cleaned up the rest. This is all rear suspension, which now sits 4 inches higher than it should so new spring setup is on its way. It's a little softer but a good starting point and if I don't like it I can always turn it up.
AWR coilovers are on. The springs were changed to 8 inch and 350 lb in the rear and the fronts are 425 but those will be changed for a 6" 550 Eibach either today or tomorrow.
Clapped out old junk out. The pervious owner literally NEVER changing their axles and letting the grease get all over everything doubled as a rust inhibitor and made getting the front off REALLY easy. I slipped new axles on when we did the engine swap but left the grease because I knew these coilovers would be going on. I also took this opportunity to clean my Corksport calipers and make them look good again, then I PB-blasted anything I haven't put a wrench on yet because when I do the tubular arms I will be touching them.
Assembling the unit.
Rears on. EBC rotor, Yellowstuff pads, SS brake lines, AWR coilovers with helper spring and 350lb spring
Fronts, same setup but with 425lb spring. Corksport 13" big brakes. Everything is covered in oil from losing 4qt of oil at 90mph I just haven't found somewhere to pressure wash it all off yet and I've been busy with E36 M3, and it's a nice rust inhibitor lol
Installed, will drop the front an inch with a 6" spring. I noticed a dent on the first oil filter I may either move them or put in a skid plate.
I also changed the clutch slave cylinder to resolve a clutch pressure issue. This thing is awesome, I'm so glad I've finally seen one of these projects through to this point.
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