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Pandemonium: 1985 Savanna RX-7 GT turbo "banana"


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presenting the "banana" - my 1985 Series 3 Savanna RX-7 turbo in Mazda Dover White

But wait a minute, it's not yellow, so why call it a banana? The name is a throwback to a remark I made about a tiny photo of a canary yellow Series 1 in an old issue of some random performance car magazine I had lying around. at a glance the shape and the trademark black bumper caps made it resemble a banana, and because the photo was so small you really had to look closely to realize it was actually a car :lol:

here are a couple photos of it back in 2008, waiting to be loaded on the slow boat to NZ.

Yes 2008, kinda hard to believe i've had it sitting around for nearly TWO years now :doubt:

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Top tip: Always read the auction grade sheet carefully. Sometimes there will be a tiny R next to the grade which 99.9% of people will miss. in this case, the grade was 3.5, but it had been in a crash and repaired for insurance purposes and thus the appearance of the R. This information was not disclosed to me until the car had arrived in NZ and undergone entry certification... however the first suspicion I had that anything was amiss was when it got loaded on the transporter at the auction yard in Japan to be taken to the wharf, and the tow truck guys ratcheted it down via the front right steering/control arm by mistake.

When the car arrived in NZ the entry certifiers immediately noticed something was up with the front right suspension and so the car was required to undergo a further inspection by a repair certifier :?

at the time, we assumed the damage they'd found was related to the earlier 'transporter malfunction', but as it turned out, things were slightly more serious than that...

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So anyway. Three weeks on the car carrier saw the RX-7 being dropped off at my mate's car yard in early september 2008. it'd been at the yard barely half a day and someone attempted to steal the MAZDA badge off the front valance. They failed miserably, but ended up breaking it so that it only read "IAZDA" - see photos below :evil:

it was reasonably tidy in the metal but had some minor niggling/broken things here and there (mostly to do with the interior) - apart from that it showed all the signs of being an authentic 88,000km vehicle (mint headlining, gearstick knob, pedals etc).

I guess at that stage it still hadn't fully sunk in that i'd actually bought one after years and years of lusting after the damn things :)

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first thing I did was to fix the non-functional dash backlighting, eventually traced this back to a faulty dimmer switch. Amusingly enough, the previous Japanese owner's solution to the problem was to fit a couple of funny blue spotlights to light up the dash... :oops:

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and that ugly faux wood handbrake surround got thrown in the bin pretty much straightaway. I've since spent the last 2 years hunting for a factory charcoal grey replacement :(

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Have plans to wrap and store the front seats to preserve their condition. A pair of Recaro LXs are waiting to go in, just need the corresponding rails from Japan.

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12A churbo EGI engine, a veritable nightmare of vacuum hoses, solenoids, and things that fail after 25 years :oops:

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now that I had a banana in my possession the next step was to get it all road-legal and stuff so i could go out and score rota hoes.

Or something. But I actually spent the last few months of 2008 werking on the TX3 restoration build, so the RX-7 chilled under a cover for a while :lol:

my importer had a mate who ran a reputable compliance centre in Kingsland and this was where I'd taken squid to be complied back in late 2006. They did an awesome job with less than a fortnight's turnaround so I figured why not use them again. So I booked the banana in and dropped it off for the initial inspection in January 2009. at the time we all thought it would be as straightforward as squid had been, but little did anyone know that i'd just opened up a very messy can of worms :shock:

As mentioned earlier, the car already had a warning flag in the system due to the entry certifiers noticing a fault with the front right suspension, and so the repair certifier was called in while the car was at compliance to have a look at this. The driver's door, front guards, and clip had to be removed and the space in the driver's footwell to be cleared for a proper chassis rail inspection.

So the week before the repair certifier arrived i spent a couple of late nights removing and clearing everything that I needed to, then a few hours taking the driver's side front wheel off and scraping away the underseal/paint to get to the welds underneath.

Then it was D-day, and that was when the shit really hit the fan. Repair certifier came in and did all his tests, it turns out the weirdly bent front suspension was the symptom of a rather nasty knock to the front right of the car which resulted in a crabbed chassis.

Here's that photo of the car up on the hoist again... see that kink in the seam, just rearward of the front wheel? Yeah.

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further digging uncovered the auction documents with the little R noted in the comments. Ah, fuck.

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(wall of text update)

The chassis damage was serious enough for the car to require a certain amount of intimacy with the car-o-liner, so I talked to my panelbeater Tony about fitting it into his already hectic schedule... no dice, he was booked solid for the next nine months repairing other pieces of junk and his chassis machine would be in use almost non-stop :( So it was out of there and into deep storage down in Hamilton while I plotted my next move.

And then I kinda ended up putting a Link in my TX3 and finishing off the restoration on that, so the RX-7 sat in storage for the better part of a year. oops :oops::rolleyes:

Meanwhile the manager of the compliance shop (whom I deal with personally) kept ringing me every few months asking if I'd found a panelbeater willing to fix the car, and if not, he knew a couple of places I could take it for quick turnaround. It wasn't until February this year that I decided to take him up on his offer, after talking to some other panel shops and getting quoted hideous amounts for what was actually supposed to be a very straightforward repair :evil:

so the RX-7 entered the panelshop in March for six weeks of intensive tugging - initial measurements found the FR corner was 11mm forward of where it was meant to be and the RL corner to be 8mm rearward, resulting in the chassis taking on an interesting 'trapezoidal' shape :shock: The foreman of the shop was very helpful in walking me through all the repairs that had taken place in Japan, his verdict was that while they'd been completed to an incredibly high standard, the Japs simply hadn't bothered straightening the chassis as it wasn't a "compulsory" requirement of re-inspection over there.

the scary thing is a LOT of cars end up that way in Japan, especially the collectable ones - I'm lucky I never had any serious problems with my Skylines...

I got the call that the car was ready and the repairs signed off in early May, so make the arrangements to have it delivered to the compliance shop. However, as some of you may remember, a lowly employee decided to make everyone's day turn to custard when he abruptly sent the transporter with the RX-7 on it back across town to the panelbeaters TWICE due to not knowing it was supposed to be booked back in (everything had been arranged between the managers of the respective companies). Cue a lot of cursing and swearing on my part, playing phone tag and talking with oblivious drones trying to get the car re-delivered.

anyway it finally got dropped off to begin re-compliance BUT partway through the process the guy who does the seatbelts decided to have some sort of crisis and not turn up to werk for a week.

The shop got another seatbelt guy in to finish the job, but this second guy was a bit of a harsh bugger, and immediately failed the car due to an insane theory that it required REAR BELTS, even though it was originally vinned as a TWO-SEATER. It was about this time that the shop manager decided to go back to the Philippines on holiday and left the place in the hands of one of his assistants.

as a result, nothing ended up getting done on the RX-7 until the end of June, during which time the car went through two vin rechecks by two different inspectors and they both found different faults on the car. The manager of the shop returned from holiday and promptly blew a brain valve when he saw the car was still there, called me up and apologized profusely. As he explained, his assistant didn't know what to do about the seatbelt mess and decided to leave it until he returned. uhh... good one :evil:

We ended up getting cletus (our resident OS LVV certifier) to have a look (thanks heaps man!), and he reported that since the car had been vinned as a legitimate two-seater, the only thing that needed to be done was to replace the front belts, remove the rear seats and cover ALL the bolt holes and mounting points in the back. This was confirmed by Gareth, one of the VTNZ inspectors from Henderson who ended up doing the final inspection on the car.

So after doing all that plus the werk required to rectify the faults found in the two inspection rechecks, here we are today with the car FINALLY road legal.

There's still a bit of pissing around left to be done though, so stay tuned for MOAR TALES OF INTEREST

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time to take some photos. problem with Auckland is that there aren't very many picturesque spots you can go to without some nosey bugger coming up to you and asking pointed questions about what you're doing and/or your car (and not just the security guard types either). In that regard, Wellington was a lot better. I tried a few places and made unabashed exits from all of them due to strangers invading my privacy, so had to make do with these impromptu shots on the Onehunga foreshore :|

the jury is still out on the guard gap question... do I stick to the mantra of keeping it completely stock in the height department or give in and buy some lowering springs?

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some of you may already have noticed that the RX-7 is rolling on different rims than when it first arrived in NZ. The BBS mesh copies it came with had always been earmarked for the dustbin, as they plain don't float my boat at all. (Anyone want to buy them?)

the original plan was to hunt down some 15" SSR Mark-IIIs but after weeks of fruitless searching on YAJ I more or less gave up (there simply wasn't anything within budget and in the correct diameter/offset). However I chanced across these brand new old stock WedsSport Professor Fins in 15x6.5 +20 offset, and even though I wasn't really sure how they'd look on the banana I decided to stick a bid on and managed to snap them up for a very sharp price.

how sharp, you may ask?

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the RX-7 is no exception to the uncanny rule that every single car I own has to accumulate multiple sets of wheels over its lifetime; thus in addition to a set of standard Series 3 rims I also possess this set of flat-faced 1980s turbofan style 14x6.0 +35s, I think they're WindMuhle copies but can't be sure. They're in dire need of a blast and repaint, but if I ever feel the urge to toss the Profs for any reason these will be the replacements of choice :D

The dish is indeed a bit much, no?

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anyway, getting back to the original topic... namely, "how does the RX-7 look on the Professors?"

The answer is "bloody nice" actually. Bring a finned wheel some people don't like them all that much, and they may not have gigantic amounts of dish, but I personally reckon they suit the period-spec 'old man with a touch of class' nature of the car down to a tee. And besides, what other wheels are there which haven't already been done to death on a RX-7?

the weather was so mint today, I couldn't resist snapping a few moar photagonals of the savanna banana.

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Next update: the beginnings of an audio install?

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over the weekend I fitted my spare CD headunit to the banana in anticipation of the roadtrip to Taupo/Palmy early next month. I thought about installing my spare amp and sub also, but decided it wasn't worth doing as I'll just be ripping it all out again later on down the track.

by some stroke of luck the vehicle happened to come with vintage Pioneer speakers already installed. Which suits me fine as I'm a bit of a Pioneer nutter :lol: Plus it made the next step of the planned audio install even more relevant.

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note the tweeter angle adjustment ("Tilt Axial Two-Way"), these puppies are the epitome of 80s tech. Now 10W nominal power is nothing compared to the speakers of today, but it doesn't matter because I have a cunning plan.

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with the help of Ewan @ hayatonka I picked up some early 80s Pioneer Lonesome Car-boy audio gear off Yahoo.

first up, a couple of cassette decks, an EQ, and a spare GM-4 amp. The decks have broken motors but are fine otherwise.

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And a third cassette deck that was ridiculously cheap, the seller had no idea if it went or not. Bonus if it does!

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Rounding it off with a GM-D8 bad boy main amp. This was top of the line back in the early 80s, with a hearty 30W+30W of continuous power (40W MAX).

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The aim is to open one of the non-functional decks (in the first photo) and somehow figure out a way of tapping a standard auxiliary cable into the pre-amp channels; this way I can attach an external music player and still have treble/bass, volume and fader controls.

here's hoping this isn't too ambitious a task :rolleyes:

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Moar problems. I've noticed that if you drive the car after a while the clutch goes extremely hard and gearchanges also become more difficult. The clutch will 'soften' up overnight and/or after periods of sitting of more than a few hours.

there are a few theories as to why this could be happening, ranging from air in the lines to a faulty throwout bearing. However following the advice of Unclejake I tested the operation of the clutch with the car sitting in the garage and the engine off. After about ten minutes the pedal did not go hard; likewise after repeating the process with the engine running the same outcome was observed. It seems that it only happens as the car is moving.

not sure what this indicates, but either way I need to get it sorted. The fact that I'm taking it on a roadtrip to Taupo this weekend kinda worries me a bit :doubt:

may as well start by replacing and bleeding the hydraulic system.

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  • 1 month later...

Turns out I didn't even get a chance to bleed the clutch system on the RX-7 after all, as the master cylinder conveniently decided to explode one hour before I was scheduled to leave town for the weekend :shock: Managed to limp the car to my friend's garage where he took the cylinder apart, quickly freshened up the bore and made a shim out of a little piece of plastic. Just like MacGyver!

after a quick bleed and top-up this was deemed satisfactory as a temp fix, so I set off on my journey south. Shifting was a bit notchy over 4000rpm so I took it easy all of the way... but it's kinda hard to stay in this mindset when the end destination happens to be the racetrack :lol:

Luckily everything held together and I was able to take the car for a few laps around the track and then back home again that same weekend. I think the weather may have played a big part in helping the car stay in one piece - was a bit reluctant to go all-out in the extremely wet conditions. Now I'm just waiting for some free time (i.e. when I'm not playing around with le squid) to fit the new clutch parts.

after the little stint on the track, I'm tempted to open up the exhaust (it's still running the factory heavily restricted and catalyzed system) as there's a very sharp dropoff of power after 4500rpm, but I guess some of this could be attributed to the characteristics of the standard turbo. However the voice of reason in my head tells me I'm better off keeping it standard, otherwise I'll never stop tinkering...

what use is an update without pictures? :)

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  • 10 months later...

if you thought my pace on the Skyline was glacial, the task of converting my RX-7 to a pure two seater is proving to be a few orders of magnitude worse. At the rate this is going, I don’t see it being back on the road this year, unless I fly over to the States and hand pick the parts myself.

The first piece of the puzzle has now arrived in the form of a complete rear carpet section (in the correct colour and trim). Discovered it going for cheap on eBay partway through February, so I promptly bought and had it shipped to NZ – and the goddamn freight ended up costing more than the item.

At least it only took 14 days to get here.

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the search continues in the form of a daily trawl of eBay; a listing for a pair of rear trim panels has now appeared, but the seller claims that shipping to NZ is going to be phenomenal – easily over $100US. Fun times. Even with the strong dollar it's still a bit much to pay.

Some days I wonder if it would’ve just been easier all along to have the rear pillars re-engineered, the interior hacked to pieces, and an extra $3000 handed over JUST for the privilege of having a pair of seatbelts in the back. (we all know how useless a back seat in a RX-7 is)

this is what the two seater rear section looks like

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::edit:: discussion - viewtopic.php?f=18&t=23433

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  • 3 months later...

Starter crapped itself, or so I thought. Over time the engine became more and more difficult to turn over and eventually began making a THACK-THACK-THACK noise instead of engaging as normal.

Final straw came when the starter wouldn't even do anything at all with the key held to START. Ended up pulling it out at 9pm on a Sunday night in pitch black darkness with the help of a friend (thank the gods for the flashlight on my trusty HTC Desire Z)

Sent it off to get bench tested by a sparky friend, prognosis came back that it was the mintest RX-7 starter he'd ever seen and no fault could be found. Advised I should try running a juicier cable from the starter ground to the chassis, and/or cleaning the contacts.

Refitted starter today, followed his advice - hey presto, it engages mint! And the car no longer sounds like it has zero compression when turning over anymore. Celebrated by doing a skid/taking it for a drive for the first time in ages.

Next on the list is to replace the clutch master cylinder, which has been MacGyvering along with a plastic shim for the last year or so.

Trawl the eBay errday for the rear interior parts, still nada, zip, zilch. Actually, a rear carpet hold-down clamp just got listed (it's the thin metal rail that runs along the ridge behind the storage boxes, see last post above) but it's useless without the section that contains the boxes; will still buy it anyway if the seller quotes shipping to lil' ol' NZ and it's not phenomenally expensive.

Xmas is coming, perhaps it's time to get some new shoes? Banana still looks choice on the 15" Profs, but the tyres are eventually going to be swapped onto the Buddyclubs that are going on the AW11, so looking to downsize to 14s (if I can find some ok tyres).

Longchamps are cool but may be a little overdone already.

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ooorrrrrrrrr...

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/basically this?

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::edit:: discussion - viewtopic.php?f=18&t=23433

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  • 2 weeks later...

Probably not worthy of its own update, but I purchased and fitted a stock Series 3 front number plate mount.

Gives it far less of a "toothy grin" look, but I'm still not 100% sure whether I prefer it this way or not.

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versus

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It'll probably grow on me!

So basically I could buy a brand new clutch master tomorrow, install it, change the diff oil, re-gas the A/C, and drive this thing over summer... but the lack of rear storage bin componentry which hinders its ability to get a WOF is the one major setback to the plan.

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  • 1 month later...

Kicking off 2012 with an update on everyone's favourite savanna banana!

Towards the end of last year I found a listing on ebay for the rear storage compartments, and immediately hit "buy now" as I was fairly sure I wouldn't get another chance for an eternity. After some to-ing and fro-ing between myself and the seller, and a couple of long distance phone calls, I convinced him to sell me the rest of the rear interior parts, and he seemed to understand exactly which items I was after, so fingers crossed he a) actually goes thru with the deal and B) sends all the parts!

of course the next hurdle is getting all the items to NZ without spending a metric crapton on shipping!

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Got back from holiday this week and none of my friends seemed interested in hanging out, so I went down to the lockup and started readying the RX-7 for the eventual 2-seater conversion.

First, out came the rear seats (and boot floor carpet, which I didn't take a photo of). Trust me, you wouldn't want to sit in the back anyway:

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Carpet and seats out. The luggage straps come in handy. Also, look at that little space saver tyre :lol:

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then I removed the seat retaining clips. Not an option on the Stateside models.

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then the rear boot panels/wheel arch covers. Again, different from USDM spec in that they contain cutouts with a rubber gasket for the retaining clip mounts.

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It was at this point that I discovered the previous owner had screwed the speakers directly to the boot panels instead of to the mounting points on the body of the vehicle :oops: ergo, some careful cutting and re-soldering of the wiring will take place once I purchase some bullet connectors.

in this photo you can also see where the rear seat retaining clips bolt to the body.

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in the end I just decided to leave the boot panels for the nonce. Voila, one (mostly) stripped RX-7 rear interior.

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observant folks will notice the front seats aren't factory. the original driver's side requires some upholstery repair, so I found some FC3S Infini II seats for a reasonable price and installed them instead. (sample photo follows)

 

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Contrary to initial apprehension, the FC seats don't look as out of place as I feared - the colour blends in well enough with the grey vinyl, and the fabric trim pattern is generic enough to be unobtrusive :bounce:

I'd like to think my next update will be with the 2-seater interior all fitted and the car completely road-legal, but we shall see. Made some good progress with my vintage audio AUX-in project over the break, so I have a good feeling it will be ready for installation before the interior parts arrive.

say words about it here: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=23433

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  • 3 months later...
I'd like to think my next update will be with the 2-seater interior all fitted and the car completely road-legal, but we shall see. Made some good progress with my vintage audio AUX-in project over the break, so I have a good feeling it will be ready for installation before the interior parts arrive.

Well, the 2-seater parts never arrived. Turns out I was the victim of an eBay scam artist :(

Super gutted, but shit happens. The amount I lost was 'only' in the region of US$250, so it could have been far worse.

Have started emailing around various eBay stores/sellers of RX-7 parts again, in the hope that one might be able to come to the rescue so we'll see how that turns out.

Meanwhile the vintage audio build has received a boost in the form of a pair of front speakers, thereby completing the collection phase of the project. Next step will be installation if/when I can find the time, at the moment most of my free time is being swallowed up by the track car rebuild and sorting out the new shed.

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Discussion: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=23433

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OK, let's try this again.

Asked around a couple of forums and rang a few more rotary wreckers in the United States, none of them had anything I needed, apart from a carpet clampdown rail which I purchased for exorbitant coin (shipping cost four times as much as the part) :(

however one of the companies managed to put me on to a private collector/restorer/hoarder in Michigan who also runs his own eBay store as a side business. Hey presto:

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Have commissioned the help of Chucks Restoration Services (http://www.chucksnz.co.nz) to forward these items from the USA to Auckland in one of their regular containers - thanks to forum user andy for the recommendation!

Got an email today stating the parts are enroute from Michigan to Chucks' depot in Orange County, CA so all I can really do nowe is to wait and hope things turn out better than last time...

Discussion: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=23433

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Carpet clampdown rail arrived from Rotary Response (one of the wreckers I tried the other week).

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Turns out the one supplied is black, not grey - hopefully no one else notices the colour mismatch. Was next to impossible to locate a grey one.

Also I suppose I can't fault the exorbitant shipping cost, as the item was only sent on April 17th, five business days ago (four if you consider the USA is a day behind).

Spent some time in the shed last nite werkin' on the aux-in mod for the headunit. Suffered a small setback with preamp levels being way too loud on the deck - almost let the smoke escape from one of the amps by accident - so will be putting together a line-level circuit to bring the aux input down to reasonable levels.

It would seem only the top-end decks (i.e. like the first one I modified for squid) have line level inputs already present on the circuit board.

Oh well... 5 cent resistors from surplustronics, here I come!

Discussion: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=23433

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2-seater conversion progress continues... here is the rear carpet section and clampdown rail.

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But there's a slight problem with the latter. Can you tell what it is?

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Turns out the 1979-80 rail differs in length from the 1981-85 North American models, which is a bit infuriating/my fault for not checking it out with the seller beforehand. Time to find the correct part (which won't be easy) and figure out what to do with the wrong one. Could almost be forced to resell it on eBay as virtually no one in NZ will be needing one :(

In the meantime, the audio build is just about done. Made a passive attenuator circuit to bring the auxiliary input down to a manageable level, and assembled everything together yesterday afternoon.

Final bench test:

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Started pulling apart more of the interior today; took some measurements for stereo brackets, found a couple of hidey holes for the amps, and ensured the cabling wouldn't get in the way of anything. Also removed most of the existing stereo plugs/wiring which I will re-crimp and tidy up during the week.

Made up some brackets to hold the components in the centre console; attempted a trial fit:

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I think that'll do nicely.

Discussion: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=23433

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Another productive evening in the shed.

First up, pulled out the centre console (again) and trans tunnel cover to fit the replacement shifter w/chrome trim (swapped over my existing Series 3 gearknob). And fitted another handbrake to replace the one on the car, which came with an ugly faux wood lever grip - exactly why, I don't know :|

Much better!

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Then took the time to finalize the placement of the audio gear before re-assembling the centre console to completion.

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I realize the equalizer sticks out heaps compared to the cassette deck - there is simply no more room behind the console to have it sitting in any further :doubt:

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The mess of audio-related spaghetti coming out of the centre console and from the separate rear speaker amp. One advantage of using a tuner-less component system is that you don't need to run separate cables for constant 12V as there's no clock or memory settings to retain, nor a remote amp signal, nor aerial. Just an accessory wire with a couple of inline fuses, and a bunch of decent grounds.

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So all that's left is this tangle of wires to be cleaned up and re-crimped/soldered, which will probably be tomorrow evening's mission. Gotta thank the previous owner for making my job a hell of a lot easier by converting to ISO plugs at some point.

In the background you can see yet another cassette deck I'm converting - this one may be up for sale once finished if anyone's mildly interested.

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All this faffing about, just for one unassuming 3.5mm audio jack.

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Discussion: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=23433

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Well tonight I drillported the engine, fitted a phat rotary-shaped exhaust tip, and gave the entire car a glitter camo respray.

Just kidding.

What I really did was get the audio setup running in-car. At the moment only the front speakers are functional (they're fucked and need replacing anyway, as evidenced by the awful crackle in the video) - I won't hook up the rears until the two-seater conversion parts arrive.

Great success, complete with a few annotations:



Discuss: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=23433
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