THE HEART OF THE BEAST

In November 2005, Rosie went to have a 462bhp Vortech chargecooled supercharger fitted. The difference is night and day. Where once was sufficient power, now lay unbridled power.

Before to the Left and After to the Right

Modifications in the UK start with individual items shipped over one at a time due to the scandalous way the UK Government hits us with both 4.5% import duty and then 17.5% VAT on top. And that's on the cost of the parts and the shipping as well.

So to stop the shipping costs getting out of control, it's best to use a shipper and buy everything at once! Here is my Mazda filled with the parts I collected from Heathrow on 7th February 2006 and imported via www.moving-parts.com

So what's in all the boxes? When they're unpacked, you have a set of four 20" Weld Evo Forgestar wheels, a MidWest Plenum Cover, a Steeda Billet strut brace, a BMR lower brace, a MAC stainless steel fuse cover, a MAC stainless steel radiator shroud, a Corsa X-Pipe, a pair of Corsa axle-backs, a pair of Metco lower control arms, 2 oil filters, a tube of silicone grease, a Stage 2 SPECS clutch and flywheel and a Hurst chrome shifter. Missing are a set of Powerslot rotors and Hawk pads, Earls braided brake lines and a set of Tokico D-Spec shocks.

7/8 February 2006
Welcome to bling-king hell! Start with the easiest things. Here's the engine bay before starting with just that luscious supercharger to blind you.

Firstly, the MAC fuse-box cover slips over the stock lid and is held by two strips of Velcro. 5 minutes work and it's already looking good (see below).

Next up is the MidWest plenum cover. This is just a simple question of unscrewing 4 small bolts, slipping it on and bolting back up. The quality is excellent.

Now the Steeda strut brace. Again, a simple bolt-on - undo the four top mount strut nuts, slip the billet mounts on and replace the bolts. Now adjust the ends of the adjustable rose-jointed bar evenly to fit.

I'm not quite sure why the bar needs to be rose-jointed though. Steeda say it's to allow for fine adjustment but it just allows the bar to move. Though the bar clears the plenum cover by a few millimetres, the rose-joints still allow the bar to move and it can sort of flop onto the cover. So I kept some of the foam wrap the bar came in and wrapped it round the centre section so the bar won't contact the plenum and scratch it.

To finish off the Plenum Cover, I bought a pair of Pony emblems from www.fordemblem.com and used one of them to fill the blank area at the front. Almost made to measure.

Finally, I attempted to fit the MAC stainless steel radiator shroud. Problem! The Vortech installation moves the steering fluid reservoir onto the front crossmember and it isn't flush. The new shroud is much wider than the stock plastic item (it attaches using the two bolts above the painted bridge either side of the grille). In short, it didn't fit.

I made a thin card template of the side that didn't fit by taping card to the underside of the new shroud and cutting it to shape, including all the mounting holes which serve as a good reference. I then attached the card to the car, securing it with the push pins, and then cut round the steering fluid reservoir, straightening and radiusing the edges to a neat shape. Then I taped the pattern back onto the underside of the new shroud and used duct tape to mark off the area to be cut so the saw wouldn't slip.

I then used a jigsaw (tungsten carbide blade)to cut away the section and then finished it off to shape using some abrasive discs on my Dremel.

I think the finished piece looks like it was made that way.

And this is the result:

Finally, I have fitted the Redline Tuning hydraulic hood struts. Sure makes a big difference to access and no more prop rod!Sadly, this site seems to have put a 2MB limit in place for photos and they're all a little bigger than that.