The best picture at the moment is in post 76. I bought/supplied the parts for the hatch and the shop put everything together. It's the stock frame with a poly-carbonate window from Optic Armor Windows.

Body work is done. I'm going to the shop today to wrap up everything and hopefully take the car home!

TII lip installed and the car is back home. Now time for me to get to work!

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-9..._131942536.jpg

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-l..._153333323.jpg

Ooooh color is even better in natural light...:biggthumpup:

Did some stuff. The doors are back together and the headliner is in. I might need to dye the faded sun visors.

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-j..._212022226.jpg

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-l..._212035402.jpg

I threw one of the wheels on to check fitment. It looks like it'll clear just fine but front camber is like -3.x degrees at this point. I spent a lot of time on Saturday hacking up the stock fender liners to work with the ~1 in. wider fenders.

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-J..._210542601.jpg

That's is how the car looked when I stopped last night.

Most of the body is back together but before I start putting the wiring back in I need to figure out a heat shielding solution. I removed all the sound and heat insulation material from the car. There's only bedliner, metal, and carpet between the underside of the car and the interior space. Fortunately the exhaust manifold is ceramic coated but I want to add something to the inside of transmission tunnel and passenger's side at minimum to shield heat away from the interior of the car. Does anyone have any experience or products they could recommend?

Did you already chuck the stock heat shielding sheet metal that runs under the trans tunnel/cat area? If not, I'd say just bolt those parts back in - it weighs very little and works well enough.

The most effective heat shield is to place a sheet of aluminum between the exhaust and the body. Leaving an air gap on both sides and attaching the heat shield to the body not the exhaust. If you still have the factory heat shielding, it works better than any stick on alternative.

:edit: Pete beat me to it. I really must learn to type faster.

Had to chuck the stock heat shielding because it didn't fit with the Defined Autoworks header. I'm looking into wrapping the header and adding that reflective insulation stuff to the firewall and underneath the car. The latter depends on how much space is left between the manifold and the body and if the insulation will adhere to the bedliner coating. If that works I won't need anything inside.

Maybe you can fabricate your own heat shielding out of some sheet AL that uses some/all of the stock mounting points that will fit with the header?

That's another option because I did keep all the heat shield mounting points. One thing I did before taking the car to the body shop earlier this year was bang in parts of the firewall and transmission tunnel. Hopefully that gives me a little more room to work with. Unfortunately with no engine in the car it's hard to line everything up.

Almost three months since the last update. I've got some "life issues" going on, which prompted me to build the engine earlier than I had originally planned. After a brief setback due to receiving a wrong oil control seal spring I got the short block assembled last night:

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-V..._205153160.jpg

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-Q..._210120231.jpg

My goal is to get the oil pan, water pump assembly, and clutch installed tonight. I'll then bolt on the transmission and drop everything in the car tomorrow or Thursday night.

Here's a couple things I've noted along the way:

1. Somehow I managed to mix up the rotor housings. I have the "rear" housing in the front and and "front" housing in the rear. Everything I've read seems to indicate this isn't a problem. I have S5 N/A housings with TII exhaust sleeves, by the way.

2. Eccentric shaft end play is within spec but near the high end of the tolerance at somewhere between .0025 and .0030 in. (my dial indicator is only accurate to .001 in.). I'm using the second smallest spacer, "V." Going to the smallest, "Z", would give me approximately .0008 in. less end play but I figured it wasn't worth the wait.

3. I'm confused about these "water pump housing shims." The S4 has two ~0.5 mm thick metal shims between the water pump housing and the front iron. I have an earlier-style S4 front iron but I'm using a S5 water pump and housing. Everything I've read says to match the washers to the iron, but when I mock up the water pump housing I'm not seeing any gap for these shims. I'm concerned if I use the shims they'll cause the housing the stand off from the iron and fail to seal.

Just about ready to drop in the car.

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-x..._204818227.jpg

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-a..._204827900.jpg

Need to install the water pump assembly and that's pretty much it. I think my rear iron is one of the earlier ones with the BSPP water temperature sensor so I need to find a 1/8 in. BSPP plug

So pretty!

Yep, that makes me drool, how spotless it is. mmmmmm

We'll see how long it lasts. I have no delusions of a leak-free engine.

Got the engine in the car last night. Doing this by myself was certainly interesting...

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-w..._182413652.jpg

It's definitely easier to drop the engine in without the fenders and hood installed. I didn't feel like realigning anything so I left them in place. The wider fenders made lining everything up difficult so there was lots of pushing and pulling.

This is how everything looked when I called it a night:

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-O..._220510620.jpg

It's funny how noticeable the engine slant/tilt is when the engine bay's empty. I'm going to keep bolting things on that won't get in the way of finishing the wiring. There may be a slight problem with the oil cooler lines and the side-mounted alternator though. The front line appears to be about 4 inches too long, which causes the fitting to point upward at the front cover, which may interfere with the belts. The line isn't torqued down yet but worst case I'll need to shorten the line by 4 inches or so. The rear line could be shortened an inch or two as well.

More things bolted up during the weekend. I'm going to have to remove the throttle body in the future to work on the wiring but I'd rather it move with the car than risk losing it in the move.

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-5..._140803047.jpg

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-D..._140756194.jpg

I also installed the driveshaft and filled the transmission with fluid. I wondering if there's any incentive to go ahead and fill the engine with oil as well. The driver's seat is bolted down and pretty much all that's left is to install the roll bar and radiator. After that this will be on hold for 6 months or so. We're moving into an apartment so the RX7 will have to go into storage until we find a house.

Looks very nice!

Yeah, looking great!

...

Cant wait for more updates

I demand satisfaction: UPDATE YOUR THREAD!

The car is sitting in a storage unit. I try to make it out there every week or so to turn over the engine a few times. We're in the process of closing on a house so hopefully I'll be able to resume once the dust settles in June or July. It's pretty much all wiring at this point. Ugh...

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFfffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff ffffffffffff.


But congrats on the house! :party:

I'm going to have to figure out how to get my car down to my garage and begin the process you've already pioneered.

Did you ever rotisserie your car? I don't see any pics on it so...

It was on a rotisserie, but only for a brief period of time at the body shop. I had the bottom of the car coated in truck bedliner and I think that's really the only time the rotisserie was utilized other than welding up some holes/rust.

car is looking good. Im very intrigued and want to see more. Im thinking of doing a good 4 port build in my car.

Thanks! I wish I've been able to work on it more lately. The last six months have been pretty hectic. All I've done lately is replace the rear right caliper (again) to fix a non-functioning parking brake. The rear left needs replacing as well since I noticed it's been leaking.

Got what's left of the front wiring harness wrapped up. This is the part that goes into the engine bay along the driver's side.

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/rv...=w1698-h955-no

It's not the prettiest but it holds everything together.

IDK, I think it looks pretty good.

I'm in the process of moving both cars over to a collector's insurance policy. This necessitates lots of pictures and this one of the engine bay as it stands today is worth sharing.

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/KQ...=w1698-h955-no

Been forever since an update. Took a break over the Winter but am now getting back into things. I should have the wiring harness done shortly. Then it's putting everything back together and setting up the display and ECU, which seem like daunting tasks.

Once the harness is assembly and back in I've thought about using the starter to turn the motor over and get some oil circulating around. As long as the ECU is disconnected and I remove the spark plugs is there any harm in doing this?

Good Lord thats clean. What intake mani and ITB set up is that? EFI Hardware? I wanna see this car in person... come to Deals Gap.

The intake manifold is custom made by Logan at Defined Autoworks. I gave him the throttle body and am using one of his port configurations so it's nicely matched. The throttle body is a EFI hardware unit. It's the 55 mm IDA setup without the idle adjustment screws. Race Series, I think? I wanted their tapered-bore series with the idle adjustment screws but Logan recommended an inlet size of at least 52 mm. I see now EFI has a billet unit that tapers from 60 mm to 55 mm but it's like $1700!

I want to do DGRR so badly but it's very unlikely this'll be done in time. I'm getting all the wiring done now and assuming everything works I'll still need to setup the display and tune the car before it's driving. Anyone wanna help?

Add lightness.

Pshaw! It's just money, ... the wife will just spend it on shoes anyway. ;)

I would like to tune this one and see what it does and how nice it is to drive after all is said and done.

MAP based or Alpha-N?
What ECU?

:Wconfused:

:rofl:

I just wanted to join the conversation so I got updates on the build. :rofl: adding irrelevant post just secured my email notifications when updated. It is a really great looking build and I love seeing street to race car builds.

It's a Lotus thing....

Gotta simplify as well.

I have no turbo so it's the only way to go.

Haltech PS1000. Being naturally aspirated with ITB's and a big streetport I was advised against trying to use MAP although I have the provision for it. Getting this thing setup properly and tuned is the one task I fear the most. I don't even know where to start. I may have to take you up on the tuning offer. I'd just have to find a way to get the car to you.

I'm hoping it'll drive well enough for what it is and not be an on/off switch at 8000 RPM. Comfort-wise, it's basically a track car: no A/C, no heat, no radio, no P/S, next-to-no insulation, solid engine and transmission mounts, etc.

Duh :facepalm2:

So instead of adding turbo, add lightness? Why not both? :Wconfused:

Trailer! Werd, the MAP sensor is probably NOT going to be the way to go, although it may help with some blending at idle if the PS1k will allow that. Otherwise it's just Alpha-N because physics. Just gotta make sure you've got a rock solid TPS sensor and mounting for it.

Spec's on the internals?