Mazda MX5 Mk2.5

[Gaz86]

The seats look brilliant. Must be a tight fit?

They are a snug fit as the bolsters are quite wide but the doors close fine and they’re a massive improvement over the tombstone seats these come with.

 

[Gaz86]

Got the car off the axle stands today. Adjusted my harnesses and tidied a few things up while the roof was off. First time I’ve had the roof off since the respray. Ohh and yeah... my car ran over both my feet Came off the chock and started to head for the pavement so I sacrificed my feet to save it lol it stopped right on top of my left foot!! Bloody painful but nothing’s broken, just a sprained ankle. Good job I had steel toe cap shoes on lol still hurts like feck though!! The suspension needs raised a touch as it’s slightly fouling the front apron on full lock.

Taps aff

And her first wash since the respray. Has been 2 months now so should be safe enough to start waxing it etc

 

[Gaz86]

Took my crappy old bonnet stay off last week to paint and whilst it and the little bracket that holds it on came up pretty well I decided to bring the car a bit more up to date. Been ogling these for a while now and took the plunge. Will update once they’re fitted

 

[Gaz86]

Despite it pissing down tonight I took to fitting my IL Motorsport bonnet lifters. Pretty straight forward but would definitely be advantageous to have someone else on hand to hold the bonnet while screwing the ball joints into place. I chose to drill and tap holes in my bonnet hinges to avoid removing the bonnet altogether. Took all of 20mins to fit Now my MX5 doesn’t quite feel so poverty stricken and will hopefully make working in the bay a more enjoyable experience! Well worth the 40ish quid

 

[Gaz86]

Pay day goodies.... Specifically designed for the Mx5 unlike the oversized bolt on Halfords rubbish.

In other news, airbag lights are off, just two new ABS sensors to fit to remedy the last of the niggles. Fingers crossed

 

[southsky sunrise]

Looking well @GazEP3 surr. Health to waft

 

[Gaz86]

Looking well @GazEP3 surr. Health to waft

Thank you. Slow progress but it’s getting there.

 

[southsky sunrise]

Thank you. Slow progress but it’s getting there.

Rome wasn’t built and all that lol I wish I’d time to get near half of what I have gs...

 

[Gaz86]

Rome wasn’t built and all that lol I wish I’d time to get near half of what I have gs...

True lol by the time I get this thing though mot it’ll be time to put it away for Winter

I will have another update either tomorrow or Saturday, may be a bit marmite but I think it’s cool..... watch this space

 

[Gaz86]

A couple of weeks back I was with my painter and discussing some hydro dipping work we was going to do for me when I spotted a cam cover sitting in the corner of the workshop. I had previously wanted to do mine the classic wrinkle red finish like the Type R's come in but when I saw this other one it made me think twice. Quite a few people had commented to me saying the car looked like a baby viper so flicking through the dozens and dozens of speed moulds he had done this one immediately took my fancy.... and here it is the finished product! May not be to everyone's taste but personally I love it!

Going to attempt to design and mould a spark plug cover for the VVT, something nobody seems to have come up with yet strangely. Plenty for the non-VVT engines though like this one

 

[j44nty]

How did you do the gold lettering as this sort of thing interests me. Looks good

 

[Gaz86]

How did you do the gold lettering as this sort of thing interests me. Looks good

My painter did it, although not very well. I’ve ordered some metallic gold enamel and a needle and syringe, best way is to inject the enamel into the recess and leave it to dry

 

[Gaz86]

Another small update. Ditched the long arm intake for a cold side short ram setup. As usual the long ram kit placed the filter over the exhaust manifold, plus I thought it looked a bit cheap and tacky. Throttle response feels a bit sharper on the short test drive I did even over the OEM airbox

I also designed myself a heat shield and had it laser cut in work. Cold air will be in plentiful supply with a monstrous 4” air duct leading to beside the filter Just needs to be powder coated before I can fit it.

Also having a custom power steering reservoir made up by @PeteMoore that will relocate the tank to beside the suspension turrets and also planning on a Davefab washer bottle a little further down the line

In not so good news when trying to replace the ABS sensors I sheared the head off one of the bolts Will attempt to extract what’s left of the stud this weekend, fingers crossed

 

[Gaz86]

Haven’t updated this in a while but a month or so ago I bought a TD04 13L from a newage Impreza WRX, only 80ish thousand miles use and no play in the shaft, it was a bit of a bargain and couldn’t resist

DaveFab were also doing a Black Friday deal on their DIY log style manifolds. All that was needed was someone to weld it all together and none better for the job than our very own @PeteMoore at Brookfab since he’s about 10mins away from me and an excellent fabricator. I’ll let the photos do the rest of the talking...

Turbo, manifold and intercooler all sorted. I’ll gather up the rest over the course of next year and in the meantime just enjoy driving it. Aiming for around 240 to 250 at the wheels ultimately, might need to get forged rods if I went any further. The 1800’s apparently have weaker rods than the 1600’s, although the standard pistons are good for 300. I’ll not be going anywhere near that far though. Will likely need a fresh clutch and while I’m at it a lightened flywheel before any of the above goes in.

I found the cause of ABS light to be a knackered wheel bearing so I’ll get that fixed in the next month or so. To be continued...

 

[Gaz86]

Getting closer and closer to being mot ready, this should be the final hurdle After a bit of ballache with some faulty replacement wheel bearings, stuck ball joints and welded on ABS sensors I’ve now managed to replace both front wheel bearings and ABS sensors. I also trimmed and refitted the arch liners and raised the front suspension a touch. Almost everything underneath has been replaced with brand new items at this point so it better ruddy well pass lol

 

[Gaz86]

Ever since the car came back from the body shop I’ve been wanting a new set of wheels that would do the rest of the car credit. Not wanting to go the tried and tested route of Rota Grids, XXR's etc, I came across these and couldn’t settle on anything else. Today I placed an order for these in a 16x8 ET25 fitment which should mean I no longer need to run the hubcentric spacers. Went for the hyper black finish which is more of a dark shadow chrome.

If anyone wants the oem SVT wheels I’ll be selling them on in the next week or so.

 

[Gaz86]

Another small update...

While I had the hubs off to replace the bearings I decided to change the brakes from yellow/gold to Nissan Katsura Orange (a ‘15+ GTR colour). Fronts are now fitted again, just the rears to do now.

Also collected the new wheels on Thursday night. Big thanks to Performance Alloys in Antrim Great service and very helpful! Will be swapping the tyres over to the new wheels tomorrow evening

 

[warren]

Thats fantastic. Look forward to seeing it properly on these new wheels!

I bought that set of IL motorsport lifters months ago but havent been brave enough to drill holes in my bonnet yet

 

[Gaz86]

Thats fantastic. Look forward to seeing it properly on these new wheels!

I bought that set of IL motorsport lifters months ago but havent been brave enough to drill holes in my bonnet yet

Thanks Warren

I can't wait to get it down off the stands! This project has taken way longer than expected due to lack of time and limited funds. I sold my whole vinyl collection to buy the wheels lol That was a very difficult decision to make! I think they were definitely the right choice though and I have only found one other NB with these wheels online and it's in the US and somewhere (pics above) and the owner seems like a bit of a wheel whore

It's dead easy, 10-15 minutes had mine installed and part of that was waiting for the rain to ease off lol I drilled and tapped the holes instead of using nuts to secure them in place

 

[Simon998]

Definitely the best NB MX5 I've seen, that colour combo is just fantastic. What ECU are you going for?

 

[Gaz86]

Definitely the best NB MX5 I've seen, that colour combo is just fantastic. What ECU are you going for?

Thanks Simon The colour needs to be seen in person to be honest, I've yet to get a photo where it really shows it properly, always looks more red than orange lol
I'm fairly set on the Motorsport Electronics ME221, seems to be more modern and has a few more features than Megasquirt which used to be the go-to ECU for turbo'd 5's.

 

[Simon998]

Have you had a look at the ECU Masters DET3? It's a fair bit cheaper than the ME221, it isn't PnP though.

(First thread I found after a search - Det3 Vs Me221 - Forced Induction & N/A Power Mods - MX5Nutz Forum )

 

[Gaz86]

Have you had a look at the ECU Masters DET3? It's a fair bit cheaper than the ME221, it isn't PnP though.

(First thread I found after a search - Det3 Vs Me221 - Forced Induction & N/A Power Mods - MX5Nutz Forum )

Haven't even heard of the DET3 before. Most of those guy's seem to have Mk1's, would be interesting to see if it can be run on the VVT engine. I'm not part of that forum, might have to join up and ask. The plug & play install and auto-tune capabilities of the ME221 appeals to me more, there is a significant cost difference between the two though! I'm not looking to run crazy power figures in mine, around 200ish would do me.

 

[Simon998]

That's an older version of the DET3 they're discussing too, the newer versions seem to do a lot more. For low boost (7-9psi) it would be worth looking into for sure.

Ecumaster

I think the most recent version of it has self-learning to a degree and has a built in MAP sensor.

 

[Father Stack]

Haven't even heard of the DET3 before. Most of those guy's seem to have Mk1's, would be interesting to see if it can be run on the VVT engine. I'm not part of that forum, might have to join up and ask. The plug & play install and auto-tune capabilities of the ME221 appeals to me more, there is a significant cost difference between the two though! I'm not looking to run crazy power figures in mine, around 200ish would do me.

I took a non-VVT engine out of mine, then bought a VVT thinking it would be much more fun having a turbo'd VVT than non. Think that was a bad move. From doing the research (which I should have done first, rather than just taking peoples word) the VVT uses new rods which are much weaker, and people don't like to even push them as far as 220bhp. Also is going to require me to buy a new ECU at around £700 which I didn't want to do.

General consensus online seems to be if you're wanting forced induction, use a non-VVT engine.