oli8925's Car Diary - New JDM Arrival

Damn, sending a virtual pint and hoping you get sorted without too much drama.

Bad luck! And very poor service from the RAC :/

Not sure where abouts in the UK you are, but I have two 1.6 driveshafts sitting outside the garage near Warwick that you'd be welcome to. The hub and uprights are attached, but I'm pretty sure the nearside upright has part of the lower bolt still stuck in it.

They're bolt ons. I also have some push ins but they're very seized to the hubs!

I seem to remember us having a very similar conversation on my thread! Hadn't realised you'd swapped out the diff though - at least I'm presuming you have as the push ins were off a '91 1.6

Little bank holiday weekend update. My brother in law came down to visit now restrictions have been eased and very kindly brought a push in shaft out of a mk2 he broke this week. Unfortunately the outer CV on this had a bit of play and was the 32mm hub nut type, as opposed to the 29mm hub nut used on some mk1s. Seeing as I'd have to wait on delivery of a new hub nut anyway I decided it would be rude not to strip down both CVs and fit the 29mm version off the old driveshaft to the new driveshaft. And a lick of paint. Truth be told my OCD wasn't keen on having a 29mm nut one side and a 32m nut the other.

Fast forward a day and both CVs stripped down, old CV seemed to be in pretty good condition, and a splash of paint later.



To confirm, this was the issue that cost me a couple hundred quid. Very odd, hoping there isn't something else wrong that caused it but I can't think of anything


Waiting on a pack of CV boot clamps before I pack it with grease and put it all back together. I'll buy a new 29mm hub nut anyway as the existing one was split and a bit nasty where it was improperly punched. Tomorrow I'll also attempt to resolder the flasher unit seeing as a new one is £70!

I think it's just areas of poor/old fashioned design causing water traps. There are areas of this van that are surprisingly good and the metal seems stereotypically good and heavy, but I'm not sure if there are any significant material differences to the cars. This was sold by VW as a commercial van so maybe lesser materials were chosen to help profits, as vans had a harder and thus shorter life anyway at the time? Only a guess.



Tried to get a little bit more done today of the smaller jobs on the MX5 without too much success. First a present arrived


These are the Schroth E-approved harnesses I found as a result of the MOT shenanigans. They're in excess of £600 new but I thought I'd check ebay on the off chance and as luck would have it there was a pair of excellent condition FIA expired harnesses on a no-reserve auction, so I bagged them. Still need to buy the crotch straps which, new, are annoyingly only a few quid less than these harnesses were. They also seem to have sold out on DT since I last looked. My TRS set will be up in the for sale section soon if anyone's interested.

Seeing as I can put these through an MOT with every confidence they'll pass I set about pulling out the drivers seat and seat belt yet again. While the harness bar is out I wanted to make a set of spacers that are needed to mount it to the seat belt towers. Up to now I've been using a pair of 6mm thick washers on each end which is fine, but a properly made spacer would look better (not that you can see it when installed but that's not the point). All was going well with an offcut of 6mm stainless plate I had lying around until it came to drilling the holes. My 7/16 cobalt bit seems to have bitten the dust. I must have absolutely abused it last time out but not remembered, so I'll need to pick up a new 12mm in Screwfix tomorrow to finish the job. I also need the bit to open up two holes in the car floor to make a 6th harness point - handily the chassis rail protectors have mountings in just the right positions so I can use one of these points each side with a spreader plate on the underside of the protector.

The only other pressing matter was the lack of nearside indicators. The fact I could hear the relay going but none of the lights were working on the stalk nor the hazard switch pointed to a problem in the relay, which is known to suffer dry and cracked joints. After a bit of a fight to get it out it was clear which joint was the offender


The last few solder jobs has made it clear I really need to get some better equipment, or maybe just some better tips or I need to learn how to look after them better. After yet another struggle I eventually managed to get my gas iron hot enough to use and cleaned up the tip well enough to tin, and reflowed the joint. Indicators working again and £70 saved.

Ah, you know it well. I was so close I was in their service entrance...they weren't best pleased.

So, this sorry chapter is finally over! Last week the last few bits arrived and the driveshaft was put back together


Reinstalled on the car. It went back in no problem, new hub nut and suspension arm bolts retorqued with the wheel on a ramp. While I was there I lowered the coilovers a little bit to get a F:310mm/R:320mm height from hub centre to arch top which is supposed to be the ideal height. A few weeks ago I'd packed the wheels up on planks of wood to get it level and weighted down the drivers seat so I knew how much I needed to go down by, which ranged from 3 to 13mm - does seem to sit a bit better now. Rechecked and adjusted the handbrake while I was there.

Spacers for the harness bar made and painted (yes, I dropped one of them mid-paint!)


And changed coolant. I flushed it out several times when I first got because it was just a rusty solution and the water pump had seized. It then got another flush a couple of years later when the thermostat housing cracked but that was 4 years or so ago now. The coolant in the header tank looked ok but once out and in a bottle it was obviously due a change


I'd asked on a local retro car facebook group for MOT centre suggestions and had quite a few suggestions, but one of them was actually from the guy who'd MOT'd this for the past 4 years, and his new centre was only 2 minutes down the road from his old place. Turns out he left a little while ago because the new owners were pressuring staff into finding reasons to fail the car and earn a bit of extra work...which explains things. So the car went to him first thing Saturday, bucket seats and new harnesses refitted, and came out with a nice clean pass.


And that's pretty much that for the MX5 for now, other than a few little tidyups, while I try to find somewhere for a paint job. I did a few little jobs to it on Sunday seeing as there was a bit of sun. Replaced the tape on the rear window (zip failed on the motorway sending the screen flapping about and left a whacking great split down the middle) and gave it a clean up with quick detailer, put the pedal covers back on and destickered the sides




Interestingly I found the imprint of a Mazdaspeed decal in the paint on the rear quarter, just above the swage line, but Googling doesn't bring up anything meaningful.

No rest for the wicked, the MX5 was immediately kicked out of its resting place and replaced with old Rodney

I've not really done too much to this for a number of reasons; lack of spare time, lack of spare money, and to be honest feeling s bit overwhelmed by the task ahead and mentally drained from having just done it all on another car.

To make it more manageable I'm going to break it down into a few phases. The first phase is to replace the brake lines as that's the MOT requirement, so that's brake lines, flexis and caliper rebuild, rear bumper and side skirts, de-rust the underside and underseal, replace any needed parts (fuel hoses, clamps etc), sound deaden and run audio cable to put carpet and interior back in.

So far the rear interior is stripped, I need to make more storage space for the front seats and carpet to come out. It's up on axle stands with wheels off so today I had a nose around underneath. It's not too bad, a good few rust scabs though all over the place. Some bits will definitely need welding but in general unless the metal is holed or significantly weakened it will be treated rather than cut out. Everything will be treated/repaired, the full underside degreased and fresh Bilt Hamber underseal applied. One side of the quarter repair carried out by the body shop looks really nice (oddly enough the worst side) but the other side looks like there might be some bird poo hiding beneath the stone chip and the rear part of the skirt/return for the bumper mounting has been missed so I'll redo or add a bit on. In hindsight I might as well have saved my money and done it all myself but nevermind.

Fuel tank strap bolts are soaking in GT85, O/S strap looks new but N/S will be replaced. Tank breather hose had split right the way through which explains the strong petrol smell. Will need sort that out before I start grinding and welding. Might choose to drop the suspension for access to the bidy, and will likely refurbish the components and replace the bushes while I'm there. Or I might need to leave it for later.

Some of the nastier bits








Hoping to order and awful lot of stuff in the next week or so and get really stuck in to stripping the underside back now weather's better.


Meanwhile the MX5 has been performing pretty well. I've not managed to get the alignment done yet so not given it much stick in the corners and the engine doesn't seem to sing at high RPM like I remember, so may need to look into that.

OK so back on with this, I got the heat shield and the rest of the bracketry on the underside off and the skirts, please to say other than a few pathes of what I'm sure is surface corrosion there were no horror stories.


Gave it all a hose down, wash with shampoo, scrub with a TFR/degreaser mix and then rinsed it down. From here I used a panel pen to mark all the areas I could notice that would require some kind of attention, even if it was just mild bubbling under the surface. Unfortunately this showed more work was needed to the driver's rear arch than I bargained for, in particular this odd penetration hole in the very top of the arch that had been undersealed over.




Passenger arch




Rear panel, need to tackle the awful rust around the seal lip at some point


Looking at the driver's side inner sill


Passenger side


Back at the spare wheel well


And then it was on with the angle grinder and a wire wheel.







I have to admit, after this little lot I felt reasonably dejected. None of it was too surprising but seeing it in gaping holes brought it home, and there's a bit of pressure that I can't let this one come to the same fate as the grey car, or other cars that have come before it that are still waiting. This one needs to be welded up and returned to the road within good time.

Before the light and the wire wheel forced me to give up for the day I stuck it into the ropey looking repair done to the offside rear skirt. I'm a bit peeved at this, considering the guy's reputation and that I paid a decent amount of money for this repair, its not to the standards I would expect. Thick underseal was used to cover holes and significant rust that remained.


The external skin was also worse for wear, although no major holes it's pitted enough to need to be cut out and replaced and will take care of the inner return



Offside chassis section is starting to go at the rear aswell, not sure of the best way to repair this


I have the rest of the week off work although plenty I need to squeeze in, so will try to make some more progress. I had thought I'd have the welding done and the rear half freshly undersealed but fat chance of that.


In other news the mrs and I recently took a trip up the country to see family so thought I'd take the MX5 and drop in to her brother who works at an MX5 place to get it on the ramps and work out this odd wobble. After many hours, a wheel balance and another alignment the wobble is still there. Strangely when looking back to front underneath the car it look by eye that the prop isn't running centrally down the tunnel suggesting the diff is off alignment. Unfortunately there is no diff alignment on these so it's likely the subframe I resprayed and put on in place of the previous due to stripped threads is bent, although really odd for the diff mounts to be bent but the subframe straight enough to bolt up and not cause any geommetry issues. Other potential culprit is the diff itself? Which needs replacing anyway so I'll start with that.

While there he thought it would be a good idea to fit the Megasquirt MS3 Basic I'd bought because the deal was too good to pass up. I wasn't exactly prepared for this so the additional £200 of parts to make it fit wasn't very welcome. What was less welcome was learning that my alternator is only pumping out 12.9v and my compression is down on cyl 2 and 3, to such an extent that to those in the know it feels very underpowered and isn't responding to tuning in the way it should be. Because of this I don't think the map was finished anywhere near to the extent that was promised and to make matters worse the TPS died on the way home. It's still just about driveable because the map is based off MAP rather the throttle position but it's pretty nasty. I have a new TPS (now E36 1.8 IIRC) arriving on Tuesday which will hopefully get me back to a position where it's driveable and I can start fine tuning the map (or perhaps TunerStudio is better placed).

In other other news, the T25 is booked into the body shop for February. A lot of work to do in the mean time though. Maybe I should throw the 9000 and MX5 down there with it???