My '88 TII build/resto

[Buggy]

Well just this weekend I picked up my very first turbocharged rotary. I got extremely lucky and snagged this 1988 Turbo II for a pretty good deal. It's all original, completely stock with 55,000 original kilometers. (yes it's a true Canadian car.) My plans for it will basically consist of fixing a few little odds and ends on the car, and then do simple mods to improve handling, braking, and get a bit more power. I'm shooting for around 250rwhp. I'll be running a rtek 2.1 ecu, S5 turbo with ported wastegate, exhaust (probably the Racing Beat RevTII system), home made intake, GSL-SE injectors in the secondaries, walbro pump, and a few other odds and ends. Anyway time for some pictures. These were taken the day after I brought it home.

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[Buggy]

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[Buggy]

One more...

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[Nismo]

Cut the flange off the down pipe, and bring over the 3" RB one and I'll tig it up for ya

[need RX7]

Very nice! :icon_tup:

[Buggy]

Cut the flange off the down pipe, and bring over the 3" RB one and I'll tig it up for ya

I'm thinking about it. Nice dirty 3" single setup would rock it nice for a while untill I can find/afford the racing beat system. I should get you to tig a nice trumpet on the outlet of my BOV as well.

[Buggy]

Very nice! :icon_tup:

Thanks. I'm hoping to have this car on the road next weekend. I have to put some new brakes on it and figure out what I'm going to do for tires. Apparently my 17" Sumitomos that I ordered to fit my Fast FC01 rims won't be in for another month or better.:( Might have to take the old ARE's off of my other FC and rock them for a while.

[Buggy]

Little update: Put the new brakes on last night. I don't think the brakes have ever been touched on this car. The white paint marks were still on the rotors and the phillips screws that hold the rotors to the hubs. The rotors also came off of the front hubs with just a few taps of a dead blow. (May not seem like a big deal but here in Canada those alluminum hubs are notorious for being a royal bastard to get the steel rotors off of.) I also found a set of 215/50R17 Bridgestone Potenza take offs here at work so I threw them on my Fast wheels and mounted them up. Those tires will do temporarilly untill my other ones arrive.

[jerd_hambone]

Get us some pics with the new wheels!

This is one clean car man.

[Buggy]

Hopefully I'll get a chance to detail the car up tomorrow before the guy comes to appraise it. I'll be sure to snap some pics then.

[need RX7]

Man, even the zinc coating on the underhood parts is mostly intact.

[Buggy]

Man, even the zinc coating on the underhood parts is mostly intact.

Oh ya, the car is crazy clean. I don't know what they did to preserve this car the way it is, but I'm glad they did it. The car is spotless underneath. It still has all the factory paint marks everywhere from the assembly line and it even has the little tag on the diff plug saying it requires special LSD fluid!

[speedjunkie]

Holy crap that's clean!!! I can't get over the interior! WOW!!! Good find!

[Buggy]

Here's some more pictures as requested. This is with the new wheels and a wash/wax. Cleaned up pretty nice! There's also a group photo of all of my rotaries lined up on the front yard. Rx-4, GXL, and the TII.

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[Buggy]

Not much to update on this as of right now. I've been driving the car for over a month and have put on about 2000kms. The car has been running flawless other than a bit of tire rubbing on the front fenders. Rolling the front fenders is on the list of things to do in the spring. I plan on driving it for another week or two and then it will get put away for the winter. Stay tuned in the spring for some real modification though......

[Buggy]

Well as always plans have changed a bit. A nice hybrid turbo came up for sale at a good deal so I snagged it up. It's a stock S5 hotside with a Garret 60a/r cold side. Haven't really had a chance to measure the compressor wheel size yet, but I should be looking at hitting around 300whp now! Can't wait for spring...

[diabolical1]

congrats on finding such a clean car. i can't wait to see how it turns out.

[Buggy]

Update time on this beast too. I recently left the car with Joe (classicauto) so he could work his magic on it and give it a face lift. He's giving it a good going over ,buff, polish, touch ups, and repairs where required. New window and rear hatch glass trim, along with installing a spoiler, rolling the fenders, and replacing all the body decals. The car should look like it just rolled off the showroom floor! I'm told I'll have it back next weekend. Also on another note, I've bought some other goodies for it again. Pics to follow. :)

[Ian]

subscribed,,,, :)

[need RX7]

Can't wait to see it! :biggthumpup:

[Buggy]

I got the car back this past Sunday and finally got a chance to clean it today. I'd like to thank Joe for the fantastic job he did on the car. Enjoy the pics. :) Oh and there's some pics of the goodies to go on it too.

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[Ian]

Dam that is one clean turbo? A ton more shiny that last I saw it..

[Buggy]

Oh yes, it is quite shiny now! I've had people already ask if it was repainted.

[classicauto]

Pics look good Bryon, glad you're enjoying her :)

[Buggy]

^ The only thing I'm not enjoying are birds targeting my hood with their $*#!bombs and being paranoid about damaging the car in any way. It's hard work owning a nice car....

[need RX7]

I think this car could use a nice set of TII sawblades.

[Buggy]

^ Got em! Look at the first pics of the car before I put the Fast wheels on it. :)

[Buggy]

Update time. After driving the car all summer it started to develop some issues. First issue was a noise when downshifting and when you had the clutch depressed. Second was that the shifter started to feel really sloppy and sometimes wouldn't shift at all. I decided it was time to remove the transmission and install my ACT streetlite flywheel, ACT 6 puck clutch with HD pressure plate, and new release and pilot bearings. When I removed the shifter I found NO shifter bushings! They had been mashed into a million pieces and where just mush basically. The release bearing was making noise, and the pilot bearing fell apart once the transmission was removed. The car now works much better, but I think the clutch master cylinder is also failing. I'll replace it and the slave cylinder in the spring. For now, it's tucked away for the winter.

[Buggy]

I picked up more goodies for this car. Got a set of KYB AGX shocks with Eibach springs and RB lowering mounts. They should help the stance and handling!

[Raksj04]

Does the car has Single stage paint?

[Buggy]

^I'm not sure. Whatever the factory paint process was that's what it is. The car still has all of it's original paint.

[Raksj04]

I was told you could buff single stage paint to make it look brand new. It has no clear coat.

[Buggy]

Ya I could see that working as long as you use a fine compound and are careful not to go right through the paint. Just be careful around edges and body lines where the paint is the thinnest.

[Pete_89T2]

I was told you could buff single stage paint to make it look brand new. It has no clear coat.

True, but you can also buff a clear coat (two stage finish - base color + clear) to make it look brand new IF the clear coat is still intact. In other words, if the clear coat is so badly worn down that it has delaminated off of the base coat, game over - no amount of buffing will help.

[I love pop-up lights]

Car looks absolutely fantastic. Super clean FCs are harder and harder to find.

[Buggy]

More parts will be arriving soon for this beast. I was able to get a pretty good deal on a Racing Beat RevTII exhaust so it's on the way! That's the last majorly expensive component to this build. Everything else from here on in will be relatively cheap. Should be able to start building this over the summer and try and have it tuned by fall before it goes away.

[Buggy]

I got this car out of storage about a week ago now. The weather has been beautiful for mid March. I've had a few issues with the car that I'm trying to fix. First thing I did was replace the clutch master cylinder and slave cylinder. Clutch works great now. Also, since last fall I've had some issues with the idle. On fast idle the car will start to surge at 1500 rpm and after a good hard pull when the car is hot it idles low, rough, and will stall sometimes. I replaced the coolant temp sensor thinking that was the problem. Didn't fix it, but I did find out that somewhere along the way my radiator caps got switched around. The pressure cap was on the thermostat housing instead of the radiator. Did a compression test just to calm my nerves. Nice even pulses on each rotor face of 75PSI! :) I checked the TPS adjustment and found it was out. Tried to adjust it, but couldn't get it to adjust right. I then grabbed a spare TPS I had and put it on. Got it to adjust right (just barely though. It would switch in and out of ajustment) and took the car for a drive. Seemed to work great! Got back to the driveway and the car started running stupid again. Checked the TPS and it was out of adjustment again! I'm going to order a brand new TPS and see if that helps. If not, I'm going to tear the whole top end of the engine apart, replace all gaskets, vacuum lines, and overhaul the throttle body. Also going to do emissions delete while I'm at it.

[Buggy]

Looks like I'm bringing this car to DGRR this year! My idle gremlins seem to have worked themselves out. I think it was an issue with the thermal wax and the fact that with my rad caps switched around it wasn't getting a proper coolant temp reading. Now I have a few other issues. The car mysteriously lost all battery power on Sunday and wouldn't start. Then it just started working fine again... I'm going to check all wiring connections and possibly replace the crappy Canadian Tire Motomaster battery. The other issue is that my clutch makes a slight squeal when you slip it taking off in 1st gear. I did some reading online and it seems the 6 puck performance clutches are notorious for that. Anyone else ever hear of or had this same issue?

[Buggy]

Wow I haven't updated this in a while! I took this car to DGRR 2012 and it won 3rd place for best FC. I also found I had a bit of a corrosion issue at my TPS harness connector which was causing a lot of my idle issues and things. The car worked great all last summer and I put lots of miles on it. The time has come though. I'm going to start the major build up in the next few weeks. I already got my KYB/Eibach setup painted and ready to go in and I cleaned and polished my RB RevTII exhaust system. Here's a rough list of mods that will be taking place:
Rtek 2.1 ECU
GSL-SE secondary injectors
Hybrid Turbo
Walbro 255 fuel pump
Custom aluminum intake
HKS SSQV BOV
Emissions Delete
Racing Beat exhaust
Koyo rad and electric fan setup
Braided stainless oil cooler lines
Apexi AVCR boost controller
KYB AGX struts with Eibach springs and RB mounts
Prothane polyurethane bushings
Gauges (haven't decided yet what I want)

That should keep me busy for a while.... Look out for pics of the progress. I'll try and document it as best as I can.

[Ian]

Nice. Sometimes projects are a long time coming! Keeps the pics flowing...

[hybrid G]

yep, she is going to be a beauty...pics man!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

[Buggy]

I'll be sure to take as many pics as possible while I'm doing the build. I have a new phone with a great camera so I guess I've got no excuses for no pics...

[Buggy]

Next week at work looked dead so I booked a staycation and I'll be bringing my car into work. Let the build begin!!!

[Buggy]

I worked at the car today. Basically today was just a tear down day. I removed the entire air injection system, rad, fan, shroud, exhaust, and turbo. Man there are a lot of PITA shields around the factory exhaust and turbo! I also got a piece of plate aluminium to make my block off plates with and I picked up a rad fan from the junk yard. Tomorrow I want to get the block off plates made, get the rad fan sorted out, and I also need to order some gaskets and stuff for the exhaust from Mazda. I took a few pics with my phone that I'll post up later. My camera battery should be charged for tomorrow!

[Buggy]

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[Buggy]

Day 2 of the build went pretty good. I made a call to the local Mazda dealer and ordered all the gaskets I need. They should be here tomorrow with any luck. I then started making my block off plates for the ACV valve and the cat air pipe. They were pretty simple. Just trace, cut, and sand. Pretty straight forward. Here's a few pics of that. There's also a pic of some of my left over parts.

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[Buggy]

I then turned my attention to getting my rad and fan setup sorted out. I swapped the factory rad mounts over to my koyo rad and then roughly figured out where I wanted to mount my scrap yard ford fan. I had to trim the fan shroud a bit to make it fit the way I wanted. I then started making mounts that would bolt the fan to the factory fan shroud holes. I did some measuring and grabbed some scrap angle iron we had at the shop. After lots of cutting and welding I had some mounts! I also installed new solid engine mounts while I was waiting for the paint to dry.

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[Buggy]

Sorry for the lack of updates on this. I realized I bit off a bit more than I could chew on this so I focused all my attention to just getting things done. I did take some pictures that I'll post for you guys. In the last days of my staycation I installed the rtek 2.1 and routed the palm wiring. I also installed the Apexi AVC-R boost controller and wired it all in. That took a good chunk of time to do. I swapped out my bald rear tires with some fresh ones and I installed the RevTII exhaust. I also installed the rad and wired up the electric fan. I used the factory coolant temp fan switch to trigger the relay for the new fan. I've been picking away at a few small things on my spare time this week too. I got the ABS unit put back in and bled the brakes. I also got my intake piping and AFM mounting all looked after. Just have to get the intake piping welded, sanded, and polished!

[Buggy]

Oh, I also forgot. I welded another bung on my downpipe and installed my NGK AFX wideband setup. I want to swap it out for a different one later so I just put it in quick for some peace of mind until I get the new setup.

[Buggy]

Picture time!
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I finally received the last Earl's fittings that I was waiting on to make my oil cooler lines, so tonight I went to work. I removed the old oil cooler lines and and installed the new fittings and then made the lines to fit. I also put the rad back in and plumbed it all up. I bought an Areomotive fuel pressure regulator this week too so the fuel system will be getting done shortly.

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I got back at this project today. I filled it with coolant, put the wheels and undertray back on, and put on my welded intake. I then took it for the maiden voyage! All I have to say is I couldn't be happier!!! It works awesome! Now I really need to get my fuel system upgraded. The stock injectors start to run out just as the turbo really starts to spool up and pull hard. This car is the ultimate! Still runs like stock, drives like stock, almost even as quiet as stock, but it can really pull!!!

[Buggy]

More goodies arrived the other day! My Prothane bushing kit arrived and I'm told my Aeromotive FPR has also arrived! I just have to pick it up.

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[casual_john]

And...? did you get'r dun??
(update please)

[Buggy]

The car is under the knife as we speak actually. Finally getting all of the things done that I've been planning for a few years. All of the suspension is done and installed already. Poly bushings, KYB AGX shocks, eibach springs, racing beat mounts, adjustable sub link. The intake manifold is off of it right now and I'm mocking up my aeromotive fpr and braided stainless lines etc. I have to send the 720cc and 800cc injectors that I have out to be cleaned and tested. I also have to install the walbro 255 fuel pump, banzia dual egt gauge, boost gauge, and A pillar pod. I'll have to take some pictures and post them up.

[Buggy]

It's all back together and running, but having a bit of an issue idling when up to temp. I believe I have a tiny vacuum leak somewhere so hopefully I can track that down this weekend and get this beast out on the road again.

[Buggy]

Turns out I had a few issues. The alternator wasn't charging at idle so I replaced it and the battery. That helped a bit, but also my tps sensor had taken a crap. I tried a used one that I had and it was much better, but still not perfect. I have a new one coming from Mazda this week. Hopefully that will solve the last of my issues and I can start playing with it on the dyno. It works good otherwise though. Hits 12psi of boost no problem on a cool day.

[Buggy]

Update time. Got the car working pretty good. Still has a few spots that I'd like to smooth out on the dyno, but overall works great and is safe afr. My wiper switch decided to take a crap on me during our bcm car cruise this year. Still waiting on the relays to come in the mail so I can fix that up. Other than that, car is great! Had wheel spin in 2nd gear last night at 6000rpm and then lots of fire!

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[Buggy]

This car had a busy year. I ended up taking it to deals gap in april because the rx4 just wasn't ready. It was rock solid as always. Only had issues with the fuel system pressurizing the tank at high altitudes and temps for some strange reason. I haven't had an issue with it since then. I also took time to play with the tune on the dyno. After 2 days of tuning we got a consistent 320 rwhp from it which was fantastic. Sadly the engine didn't like that and labour day weekend it said enough was enough. After 98,000 kms one of the apex seals on the rear rotor went. So I will rebuild it this winter and be back at it in the spring.

[Buggy]

Update. I ended up making a trade deal for a low km s4t2 factory remain engine. I swapped it into the car last weekend and it is back up and running again. Still need to try and fine tune the rtek.

[diabolical1]

How did the fine tuning go?

[Buggy]

How did the fine tuning go?

Wow been a long time since I've been on this site. The fine tuning went as well as it could with the rtek. I found out the resolution in the rtek is pretty terrible so trying to get a nice smooth afr curve is pretty impossible. I richened the really lean spots out but that again made my afr curve richer than I wanted but at least it was safe. I ended up selling this car about 2 years ago now. As far as I know the new owner is still driving it around with this setup and is enjoying it.

[ZGN]

Wow been a long time since I've been on this site.

Still keeping the lights on for now. Visit more often! :)