My FD Project

[green-lantern]

Good to see you updating this thread again. Great work!

[ReddVR4]

Nice work!

[rlacasse1]

Good to see you updating this thread again. Great work!

Nice work!

Thanks guys, I appreciate the compliments.

I was able to spend a little bit of time on the car today, and now she's black again..................... The camera captured a lot in the 2nd pic that I can't see when I'm looking at it, regardless, the car isn't going to be a show car, so I'm ok with a certain margin of error. But overall, it came out looking great for rattle cans.

[rlacasse1]

This thread has gone much too long without an update. Life's been busy, but I've been able to focus on the RX-7 a little bit more now. Nothing major, but finished up some powder coating for it.

It's hard to capture a good picture of the blue I'll be using in the engine bay, it's a dark sparkly blue. There will be some blue accents, the majority of what's under the hood will be powder coated wrinkle black.

The first pic is the blue pre-baking, after that are a couple shots to try and get the finished product. It shows really sparkly due to the flash, but it's not that sparkly. Final pic is the black that will be used.











Hopefully over the next month I'll finish up the body harness.

[rlacasse1]

On the topic of the body harness.

I am going to be attempting a mild tuck and rewrapping the harness. I already have it dissected. We'll see how it goes........ lol

[j2k4]

You go, Ray!

[rlacasse1]

I've not accomplished much over the winter, been cold as shit and I've been dedicating my time to fixing/selling other cars as a hobby (currently have three for sale, lol). But, I finally got out and put some random stuff back on the car. Threw the coilovers back on and the subframe. However, the top plate on the right side coilover is falling apart, so I will have to pull it back off and replace it.

Pics....



Damage to top plate of the coilover.



The biggest part of yesterday is that I finally started scoping out where I would like to place the three large fuse/relay assemblies. I'm not going for a full tuck, but I would like those boxes out of the engine bay.

The following pics are my current version of where they will be placed. The two boxes under the fenders will clear the fenders (just barely on the left side) and the fender liners, and I believe will be away from the elements rather well. Additionally, after thinking about heat issues in those areas, I believe they will be safe as long as I make sure the seals between the fender liner and fenders are good.

Tentative locations. Right side first, left side second.





The relay box that is up front is going to be relocated as well. The following picture shows its location.



It clears the front bumper, crash bar, and hood latch/release fairly easily. However, it will be buried rather deep. The following pic shows how inaccessible it will be.



Since removing the front bumper just to do any work with the relays would be a pain in the ass, I have a plan to solve that. As of right now, the plan is to trim the metal bumper support just slightly for some clearance and then create an angled bracket that will set the relay box at an angle. So when opened, the top will rotate slightly to the rear to clear the bumper (I can take a pic for clarification if requested). At that point, all that will have to happen to open the relay box is the three bolts holding the release/latch will have to come out and then the release/latch will be set aside. Fairly simple solution I believe. We'll see how it goes.

Also, I would like to say, the reason I've chosen these places for the relay/fuse boxes is that I haven't found a good thread where anyone really details how they did their tuck or where they placed them. I've also been through quite a few build threads, and nobody ever seems to point out where they're putting these boxes.

So this is just where I'm at as of right now.

Standby for more updates........ someday! (Soon I hope)

[mehrshadvr4]

So you'll have to pull the fender to replace fues

[rlacasse1]

Yes, which sucks.

The plan as of now is to have everything replaced with new and have the car up and running before the fenders go on. Hopefully that will help negate having to pull the fenders too much.

[rlacasse1]

Too add onto my previous post... the RX-7 has an extremely cramped engine bay. There is basically nowhere to relocate anything unless it's removed from the engine bay entirely. That's why I'm looking at placing them under the fenders.