History:
I am new to the miata community, but not new to cars. I had a couple cars, but the most notable was my previous fun car. A 2002 subaru WRX which I bought when I turned 18 and I sold it the beginning of my sophmore year of college for money reasons. It was pretty well built, stage 3 turbo setup with a bunch of goodies, built suspension/brakes and race rubber. This is the first car I have raced and definitely missed:
I then bought a protege5 from my uncle for a great price. I threw some springs on it, made it flush and drove it for two years as an "ultimate daily driver vehicle," which never became close to ultimate:
The Start:
Well, I missed racing way to much and gave the protege5 to my little sister for her to use in college. The miata, I bought the in real rough exterior shape with 180k miles but absolutely rust free. I actually took a suspension bolt off the chassis and it came off with metal flakes on it from the initial time it was put in! The paint was badly faded, softtop was torn, taillight busted, front bumper was improperly repainted with flaking clearcoat and the back bumper had a gouge in it. I didn`t even take a picture because of how crappy it looked but looking back, I should have.
Well I started off buffing the car and it came back pretty well. The single stage paint is fantastic although the original owner def. didn`t know how to buff because around the cracks, it was burned through before I started. I then shaved all the emblems, painted the mirrors, front bumper, back bumper and rear finish panel because of the horrible fading. Had to replace a bunch of misc. little stuff and maintenance. Here are some pictures after a couple initial mods and I could finally happily say this is my car:
I thought it cleaned up pretty well. It is now definitely a great start for a track/autoX toy. It is not going to be built like a showcar, but it will still be somewhat clean.
Up to Date Stuff:
Modifications:
- Flat black hardtop (will be painted red in springtime)
- Touge Run front lip
- TSIs
- Moss Motors Rear Antenna
- Voodoo Shift Knob
- Wiggy`s Shiftie
- HDHCM2HDDD Rollbar with SFI padding
- Custom Hardtop Brackets
- Custom Sturdy as hell License Plate Bracket
- Free intake I made from parts lying around
- RyokuRob`s front tow hook in red
Weight Reduction:
- Rear Carpet Removed
- Soft-top Removed
- Power Steering Removed
- A/C Removed
Modifications waiting to go in:
- Cheap ebay Steering Wheel with hub and quick disconnect
- 27mm adjustable front sway-bar
- 19mm adjustable rear sway-bar
- 949 Racing End-links
- Energy Suspension Control Arm Bushings
Near Future:
- Wheels/Tires
- Seats
- Harnesses
- Coilovers
- Paint Hardtop Red
- Become a better driver
Distant Future: Full out track car
- Full LSX Swap (going to learn to be a muchhhh better driver first)
- Remove as much as I can
- Ridiculous list of things I want to do
Most up to date photo:
The car in winter mode:
I`ll keep this updated, but mainly wanted to be able to keep track of it somewhere and like sharing things.
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(getting close!)
Originally Posted by XCLR8TN
