Flier's 94 R'
 

I found the car on craigslist for dirt cheap, at first glance at the car I just dis-regarded it. Then I thought to myself "wait, was that a spoiler and rear lip?!" I promptly called the owner, it was a female, I asked her a few questions about the car. How many owners, she was the second. Did she have any records on the car, she said yes all of them since it was new and in fact has the window-sticker from the dealer. This car was $19k new back in 94! My last question was "What color are the shocks?". Her response "Where are the shocks?". So after her boyfriend looked at them she tells me "Yellow." I respond "I'll be there tomorrow to get the car"

When I brought the car home:
https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....&pictureid=558

I had a buddy's dad that has been doing paint and body for 30 years do the cosmetic work for me. He cut me an awesome deal since he was hurting for business at the time. Cut out the rust, welded on new metal, and smoothed it over. He mentioned this was his first miata and the body was actually pretty difficult because there really isn't any straight lines. I never noticed that until he told me, NA miata's got dem' curves as he put it, lol

The way it sits now:
https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....2&pictureid=59

The interior is surprisingly clean for an older car with 150k+ miles...
https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....&pictureid=557


I've DD'd the car for quite some time, initially planning to continue modding my black 97 with my dad. After that plan fell through I decided to lightly mod my 94. Make it fun for trips to the Dragon and competitive enough, locally, in STR.

I gradually started to add things, mostly things that broke. Swapped over my 15x7s with 205 G-force sports. They have ok grip, usually last about 40k miles. Next, I added a Racing Beat front-sway, "race" with the thicker .188 wall. After one too many beatings my passengers side end-link popped out, it handled funky to say the least. Replaced the stock ones with some adjustable Racing-Beat end-links. I wanted 949's spherical, but they were out of stock :(.

I've drooled over the next item ever since they came out, 15x9 6ULs! I wanted the nickel, but none were in stock. I settled on silver and I'm glad I did, they shine a lot more than I thought. I went with the standard street tire of choice for the 9s, 225/45/15 RS3s. The grip was unbelievable, seems to handle better on the 9s than a set of old r888s on 15x7s I ran a few times.

I dumped up the timing to 14* and added a little cone filter. Dropped maybe 1-2lbs,opened up some space, and made it sound better. Got new wires and plugs, the car came alive.....comparatively!

My stock radiator cracked right below the fill cap, pretty standard on older plastic miata radiators. Did the same thing in my 97. I swapped over my 52mm Mishimoto that was in the 97.

Somewhere during this process I bought Hawk HPS pads front & rear. Front passenger had a bent bolt, the bottom one that connects the caliper to the bracket, eekkkk :ohnoes:. Looking at the old pads you could definitely tell it had been that way awhile, pad was worn more sidewayz than hustler's....... Got a new bolt, put in pads in, bed them in, tested them a week later, no odd pull while under the brakes.

Went to the rear calipers and noticed the e-brake adjuster screw was stripped. I have not replaced the rear calipers yet, although it will be soon. I plan to run HP+ pads in the rear with new rotors and calipers.

Other near-future plans include new shocks & springs! The stock R-package Bilsteins have just under 190k miles now and they're still.......... connected and there! I will most likely end up with revalved Bilsteins, FCM bumps, tophats, and isolators, GC sleeves with #550/350 springs. Hoping to keep my stock R-package rear bar.

I plan to keep it simple the rest of the year after I get done with shocks & springs, I'll have the car aligned and corner-balanced. Hoping to keep up with the NCs and s2ks in STR. A fresh set of tires is on the list at the beginning of summer as well. I also plan to swap in the complete ES poly-bushing kit. I'm sure my stock bushings are worn out pretty badly now.

Wanting to source an inexpensive roll-bar and get some other safety items, 5pt or 6pt harness especially. Another big ticket item this year will be seats. I get thrown around in my stock seats now, it's become annoying.Having to brace myself and get distracted from driving. Hoping to source something local and not too expensive. Opting for something with harness slots, for next year's plan....

Next year I'm wanting to prep the car for HPDE/TT. Particularly for NASA's TTD. I'm planning on getting some more track experience this year on small HPDE's. I've already got a NB2 short-block, NB1 head shaved to I forget what. The head was warped pretty bad, so I figure close to 0.020. The head also has a slight port job, polished bowls, and a 5-angle valve job. I want piece that together with a MSM intake cam, EUDM square-top, basic I/H/E, run it on a MS2, tune for 140rwhp!

I've had a lot of fun with this car and I don't plan to stop. I even think boost is on the list for 2014 :D

https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....&pictureid=555

I love the last shot. The thing looks like something out of Forza! ARGGH! /drool

OMG. Are those wheels real life?

My friend took that one actually. It's at the overlook on "the dragon" aka deal's gap. I'm spoiled to be so close to it.

lolwut?

the wheels you had when you bought it are a bit fugly. Beautiful car man! I agree, the 15x96UL with 225s are awesome. I love mine. I too wanted nickel, but am glad I went silver.

Yeah they are extremely fugly, they made me giggle.

thats what Scott is referring to. He is implying they are so ugly he doesn't believe they exist in real life.

Here's my youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheFlier129

Mostly autox and dragon runs.

Love the build. Dibs on old wheels... JK

Making progress on the car this weekend. This stuff just slows me down.....

https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....&pictureid=587


Hopefully my XIDA clubsports will be delivered in the next couple of weeks. I'm extremely excited about them. Once I get the coilovers installed I'll be buying the ES master kit, swapping out my 190k bushings whenever I have an open weekend, lol.

you should do both together, otherwise you will have to realign the car twice (unless you are pretty quick on the bushings). what calipers are those?

Don't have the bushings yet, I'll be doing bushings in a few months anyways.

Stock rear calipers, my front ones are newer, and functional, lol.

I see, cool. bushings are great, I am happy with mine, although it seems 949 moved to prothane over ES. Probably for cost reasons.

Lookin good though, I love how easy it is to do brakes on the miata...

I hated doing my bushings. It sucked. Next time, I will burn every last one of them out.

I pretty much agree. plus jaw pullers tend to mar the bushing hole some, especially if the bushing is particularly stuck.

I didn't have too many issues with mine. Honestly was fairly easy. A little butane torch and one of those redneck setups.

I blame the great white north for my difficulties.

My car lived up North for it's whole life. Poor thing shows it too. Luckily no rust on the body. But the control arms were bad.

Hopefully now that it's in the South I won't have many more issues.

Always loved the R Miatas.

Spend the money and do the shim under bucket lifter upgrade.

Yeah, I'm not necessarily looking forward to doing the bushings. Since my car has spent most of it's life in up-state NY :(. I'll probably use a mix of burning and pressing them out.



Not legal for my Solo 2 class and I've got a whole NB1/2 engine to swap in anyways:
https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....&pictureid=588

/\ Damn the class rules. :vash:

Well it is a nice build you got thar. I like a healthy well done naturally aspirated car. I have a tendency for that route myself. :rolleyes:

Did my brakes yesterday....


Front calipers not pictured, I had to go buy them last minute, lol.
https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....&pictureid=587

Old vs New:
https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....&pictureid=591

Success!
https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....&pictureid=592


Running HPS pads in the front and HP+ in the rear. I actually had to order new HPS pads, the current have worn out over the past year I've used them. They should be in this week before my first autox event.

I can't seem to threshold brake..... can't get them to lock-up. Which I guess is a good thing for autox, but it's apparent I'll definitely need a more aggressive pad in the front for the track.

Job was fairly easy, I took my time on it all. Probably about 5-6 hours of actual work time. I was on my last caliper to bleed(drivers front) and the bleeder valve decided to snap off. So after breaking 2 different extractor bits I said 'effff it' and bought new front calipers as well.

Heading up to the dragon today since it's so nice out. Maybe I'll be able to lock-up the fronts up there. It'd make me feel better, to know I'm getting the full potential of the brakes, but right now my tires are over-powering or over-gripping my brakes, lol.

I definitely would not go to the track with HPS in the front. Unless you like doing brake jobs between sessions! I would also avoid running a more aggressive compound in the rear, but thats just me, although HP+ are fine back there, I would move up to the HP+ in the front (or something more aggressive really).

Ditto on brake pads. Also, I do beleive the front sways are under a fair amount of stress. That's why folks are ripping off the brackets with sticky rcomps at the track and Mazda Comp came out with a fix. Probably ok on the street, but take care at the track.

For what it's worth, I'm a CarboTech XP8 all around guy. I can lock up my 225 r1rs with them and no evil iron in them to ruin my pretty 6uls.

Yeah, Carbotech XP8 front and rear sounds like a plan for the track.

I run them also. They are great, no complaints here. They maybe expensive, but I get very consistent braking, they last a "long" time, and I have done 8 events on the same set of front/rear rotors. I think my fronts are starting to micro-crack, so they will need to be replaced soon. Easy on rotors and they are non-corrosive dust.

Just a note though, if you don't use the XP8's on the street and don't street another Carbotech pad, you'll need another set of rotors per the carbotech rotors. Or you have to clean the crap out of them. The Carbotechs deposit a thin layer on the rotors is why.

I use mine on the street.

Well I was following my buddy's turbo e30 around with the gopro and decided to try a new angle. It turned out better than I thought:



Also here's from the first autox event. Xida's will hopefully arrive next week!

Flier, tell me more about where you mounted the GP in the first vid and how you avoided any wind noise. I love that angle!

It sits on the bottom-center of the "mouth". Basically right above the front-lip. I don't know why the wind noise got cut down to much, makes me wonder how much air is actually flowing into the radiator thru that mouth, lol.

haha, that's a good point. How do you mount it there in the mouth? I think I want to start running it this way at the track. All I need is to score one of those remote starts for the go-pro.

is your radiator ducted?

I see people mounting it there, they just get out in pits on the 5 minute mark and turn it on then start the video lol.

I always forget to turn mine off. I wish I could tie it into the ignition

No it's not ducted. I put one of the mounts that came with the GoPro. It's got some 3M adhesive that doesn't let go.

Just taped it to the bumper? I gotta try this today.

Not really taped, just stuck one of those sticky 3M GoPro mounts. It's on the bottom part of the mouth, I'll have to take a pic of it this afternoon, along with some other goodies :D

Please do. I have to go dig up the Go Pro kit I got and see what other goodies had come with it that I never used. I have only mounted it to the harness bar.

Here's the mount:

https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....&pictureid=633


and..........

Giggity!
https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....&pictureid=631

gew
https://www.miataforumz.com/picture....&pictureid=632

Damn rusty bolts and nuts!

Broke off 3 top-hat nuts in the rear, the 4th is rounded off and can't decide if I want to try to get a "gator" socket on it or try to cut it off with a dremel tool. Unless you guys have any better ideas.

Also my passenger side bolt at the bottom of the shock is stuck. I got the nut off, the bolt spins around, but I can't hammer it out. I ended up mushrooming the bolt, so I'll have to replace that which I need to do anyways, lol. I tried spinning it with the impact while hammering, hammering with a punch, and trying to back it out old fashion style with a ratchet. I also jacked it up at the LCA trying to relive any tension on the bolt, but still nothing. My next step is a GD-BFH! (god-damn-big-f!cking-hammer).

Spent a good 3 hours fighting with the rust, hopefully I'll have them out by tomorrow night so I can install them on Thursday. I've also got to replace the alignment bolts, that'll be fun too, lol.

Any advice on how to deal with the rusty bolts/nuts is greatly appreciated!

What is that glorious road from the video?

And I know where I am going to mount my GoPro for Sebring at least part of the time. I really enjoyed that video. Thank you for posting it.