This is to be more of a build blog than a page for a finished car.I have owned this car for roughly 4 years, and at no time has it been running. The 8 years ... Show moreprior to me buying it, it sat in non-running condition in another guys garage. I had planned to get it going 3 years ago by swapping a 12A from another RX7 into it, but I got held up close to completion, and never finished it. Now, being bored and wanting a project car, I pull this guy out of hiding and start plans for a bad ass V8 build. Engine and transmission has been stripped, rear end is close behind. So far I have already purchased a 302, with some goodies already attached, and am currently saving up for the Granny's Speed Shop Ford 8.8 rear end swap kit for stock suspension. Once it is in place, I will have to track down GSL-SE brake parts, do all of the suspension upgrading, find a WC T5 transmission, buy the other several dozen pieces I need, and weld up an exhaust. The engine will be as simple as possible in terms of electronics and complication. It will be carbureted and with a mechanical fuel pump to reduce electrical. Power goals are in the 275-300WHP range, with whatever torque comes from my mods. It will be a stock bore 302 bottom end, stock '85. New E7 heads, ported and milled .020'' or roughly that, 1.7 rockers, Edelbrock RPM manifold, Edelbrock 600 cfm carb, some brand shorty headers and a custom single 3'' exhaust to a Flowmaster 50 series in the rear. I want to retain a stock-ish appearance.I will have more pictures later. As you can see from my Miata page, I like to take pictures of a lot of useless stuff, so you can count on lots of useless pictures here too. Right now, it's nothing to look at. Paint is terrible, roof is dented, rear is dented, tail light broken, no header panel between the head lights, all of the rubber window seals are rotten, windshield is smashed... but what keeps me interested in this chassis is the unusually good condition interior. Amazing for a car older than me.Keep tuned for updates. It should start moving a bit faster once I get the most expensive chunk out of the way, being the rear end conversion at $2500.Warning - Everything below this line is boring. Newer stuff at the top.---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------05/29/2011---I went in a slightly different direction than I had planned with the brakes/wheels. I had originally planned to do hub adapters on the front and stock SE brakes in the rear, but I have now gone with a custom thrown together FC brake swap. I'm going to be using the ReSpeed BBK in the front, using FC 4 lug hubs, redrilled 5 lug rotors (to 4 lug) and the 4 piston calipers from the FC. Not only will this brake setup be FAR more bad ass and efficient, but it will be better in the long run, avoiding using adapters, which will not only set the wheels out too far, but will also add another failure point.The rear will probably still be the stock SE parts, to avoid having to do the whole redrill thing again. Plus if I remember correctly, the FC rear brakes aren't that much better than the SE's. Figuring out how difficult it will be to mount a 5 lug FC master cylinder to the firewall will be my next task, along with getting the other little various parts.I also went ahead and picked up my wheels and tires. Not exactly what I wanted, but it's close enough. I wanted an 8'' wheel in the rear, but settled on a 7''. Putting down all of that power with a 7'' wheel and 205 tire will be a lot of fun! I got Rota RB in 15x7 4 offset, Royal Hyper Black color, all around. For the tires, Bridgestone Potenza RE-11 205/50/15. Should be a pretty good setup. I may have traction issues, but the car isn't going to be seeing much track use anyway, so I shouldn't be acting like an ass on the public roads anyway.My next move will be to start saving up for the suspension parts. Once I get that out of the way I can move to the rear end swap, and finally have the chassis on the ground rolling, and move my focus to the actual engine swap and related components, like fabricating the exhaust, fuel system, ect.The suspension will be all ReSpeed stuff. The front camber plates, the front and rear "race" coilover setups, using 325F/250R springs on Tokico Illumina shocks. All new poly bushings will also be purchased and installed, along with the ReSpeed V8 swap front sway bar and end links. Rear bar will be deleted, as one of the mounts are broken anyway, and the hassle to fix it would be pointless, and difficult.---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------04/03/2011---Here is the car as I received it. Pretty rough looking huh? Well, it still looks that way. As amazing as it seems, those rotor housings cleaned up to near perfection and sold for $350. Lucky find, since that is more than I paid for the car.Rough! Show Less
