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Archetype's Pro7 Mazda RX-7 race car


Archetype

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side_skirts.jpg

Now the fun part begins, with the interior of the car and all other unnecessary external parts being removed. The factory sideskirts were gently heated up to soften the adhesive, then slowly pulled off. It's amazing how much dirt and grime has been trapped underneath them over the years.

rear_spoiler_removal.jpg

The rear spoiler proved to be quite difficult to remove as one of the studs inside the spoiler has come loose, allowing it to spin freely. Grinding the stud and bolt off seemed like the best way to get around the problem, but in the end the heat from the grinder melted the stud out, allowing the spoiler to come away. Even after a good cut and polish, the factory spoiler marks are still highly visible, so I'll come back to this area later when the car's aesthetics are addressed.

front_bumper_removed.jpg

The front bumper, spotlights and heavy impact bar are removed. The factory front bumper will be replaced with a fibreglass C-West style one, as required by the Pro7 regulations.

carpet_dash_removed.jpg

To ensure easy refitting later, the dash was removed as carefully as possible to ensure the fragile clips and plastics weren't damaged. The carpet is no longer required so this was torn out quickly, revealing the ugly rubber and sound deadening underneath.

stripped_interior.jpg

All other interior parts have now been removed as well. Now I'm ready for a task that I enjoy quite a lot - removing the sound deadening with dry ice!

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dry_ice_1.jpg?r=1336637991

I bought a few kilograms of dry ice from BOC and took it home in a chilly bin. Using gloves and towels, I spread the dry ice across sections of the RX-7's interior and let it sit for a few minutes.

dry_ice_3.jpg

The dry ice freezes the sound deadening and weakens the adhesion on the metal underneath.

dry_ice_2.jpg

The frozen sound deadening can then be hit with a hammer or rubber mallet, which breaks the sound deadening up into large, clean pieces.

sound_deadening_removed_1.jpg

This is a much quicker and cleaner way of removing the sound deadening, compared to chipping away at the normally sticky material with a hammer and chisel.

spare_wheel_well_sound_deadening.jpg

This large piece of sound deadening came off nicely...

sound_deadening_removed_2.jpg

...leaving the spare wheel well looking virtually spotless.

sound_deadening_removed_3.jpg

The almost-final result which only took a few hours, compared to what can be sometimes be a horribly messy, time-consuming job using the hammer and chisel method. Now there are just a few little areas that I need to go over with a solvent and rough rag to remove the small patches left behind.

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  • 1 month later...
Saw this thing roll into PN Automotive today filled with pre-bent cage bars - will be sweet to see the cage go into it!

Ha, good spotting! Yep, the project is finally on the move again after a few delays. How did the outside of the car look? It had a thick layer of dust on it when it left Hamilton, but hopefully the majority of it was blown off on the trip down.

What was the weather like in Palmy when you saw it? I was worried about it getting wet, as the windows were down and sunroof has been removed. :?

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I had someone lined up in Hamilton (a contact through the NIMRRA) months ago who was going to do it, but it fell through as they're too busy. The guy who is helping me with a few things on the car suggested Palmerston North Automotive after having dealt with them a lot before. Since he was heading down there to have his Pro7 engine rebuilt, the distance wasn't really an issue.

If it were just up to me, I probably would have just found someone local, even if it cost a bit more.

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put your car on our new trailer (also built by craig:- just picked up this morning) today and towed it round to get cage welded in. would have got pic for thread but don't have a decent phone to pic it with etc. will be interesting to see how well the cage all fits together etc. todd (palmerston north automotive) got an AMAZING cage built for his FD by craig, really top notch job.

craig was saying if he isn't happy with the bends or fit he will make his own and fit it in there. RX7's have such limited space you can't afford to use a bit of extra room with cage unfortunately or you won't have any space to sit/have head hitting cage etc which isn't ideal.

palmy has some real clever guys into building fast race cars if you know who to talk to. they don't have huge names (or ego's for that matter) but they really know how to make a car go fast. todd built a pro7 plus winning car and really knows how to build a special rotary engine. and craig builds amazing cages/nick who works for craig is ace at setting up racecars for wheel alignment etc.

i can guarantee you won't be dissapointed.

/ok now back to drinking piss. :D

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That's great to hear, cheers. I'll give them a call early next week to see how they're getting on. I've been sidetracked this week with other things, including picking up my new engine for my Series 1 RX-7 yesterday. I'll update my other build thread once I've taken some pics. 8)

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  • 2 weeks later...

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