Rebuild of #590

livelyjay

Member
:
2014 Focus ST
The story behind #590 is a bit interesting. Here in Rochester my friend wanted my advise on a new car. He liked the WRX, but on our test drive he didn't really fit in the seat (he's a little big). I knew of the MSP so I called Burdick in Syracuse and set up a test drive. We headed out and drove the car, a week later he picked it up and drove it home. A year later he moved to DC. I then moved down to DC as his roommate.

He then moved to London and the car sat for a while until his sister drove it back to Vermont to store for him. He moves back to San Fran, sister drives the car out to him, he eventually rear ends someone just after he removed full insurance coverage. Being in San Fran, he didn't need a car, really didn't want one, didn't want to fix it, didn't want to scrap it, and didn't want to part it out. He ended up giving it to me and I paid to ship it back here to Rochester.

I tore it down, fixed some items (including broken exhaust mani bolts), had a shop fix the radiator support, coated the support and oil pan in Plastikote truck bed liner, coated all exposed edges (doors, jack points, fender lips, inner fenders) in Rustoleum truck bed liner, added HID headlights, CustomMSP SMIC, Corksport skid plate, and VIS CF Hood. All fasteners I pulled out I replaced with stainless steel. I hate rust, so I did everything I could to protect this car from rust. I'll be getting it detailed before winter hits.

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sweeet. looks really good. the projectors really give it a beautiful face lift haha. and cf looks good against the black.
 
Thanks guys. I've been driving it daily now for almost two months. The silver one is sitting in the driveway waiting for my co-worker to come up with the cash to buy it.

good job, you'll love the mini d2s, have you fitted a load unit for the high beam instrument light?
Not sure I understand what you mean about high beam instrument light? My high beams and the gauge cluster light work just fine.
I do love the D2S lights, except I have a flickering in the drivers side light, which I assume is from some bad signals in the grounding point I selected. The blubs also don't match exactly, but I can live with that.
 
the high beam gauge cluster light, on mine that stopped working with the hid install and I needed a load unit to plug into the remaining h4 plug.
 
Good stuff! Always happy to see one being revived instead of slammed to the ground, beat to hell and then parted out due to owner incompetence.
 
the high beam gauge cluster light, on mine that stopped working with the hid install and I needed a load unit to plug into the remaining h4 plug.
I checked last night while I was driving around and the high beam light in the gauge cluster works fine with the HID install. Weird.

I plan on driving this car for the next 7 years. That means I'll have driven MSPs for 15 years straight. At that time our house should be paid off and I can get into something different, or keep it running and buy a sports car or project car like the Factory Five 818.
 
I checked last night while I was driving around and the high beam light in the gauge cluster works fine with the HID install. Weird.

I plan on driving this car for the next 7 years. That means I'll have driven MSPs for 15 years straight. At that time our house should be paid off and I can get into something different, or keep it running and buy a sports car or project car like the Factory Five 818.

you're running the same harness, projectors and ballasts as me so there must be a difference between US MSP and Aussie 1.8 in the vehicle wiring. interesting.
 
Updates. eBay headlights suck balls. The lenses corroded in less than 2 years. Bought two OEM sets from a forum member and restored both. One for the HID kit and the other to swap in when I sell the car. Did some touch up work this weekend on the peeling clear coat. I also got the CF hood painted and painted the trim piece on the replacement upper grill. Front of the car looks a lot better now.

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Restored the OEM wheels as well. Didn't come out great as I got used to how the paint wetted out while I was using it. Two wheels came out a little "stripey" but the other two came out well.

Any thoughts on painting the center caps?

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For the car, I used AutomotiveTouchup.com. Their paint matching is pretty good and I bought a kit with primer, paint, and clear.

For the wheels, I used the Graphite colored wheel paint from AutoZone/AdvanceAuto. I followed this how-to. The cans come under different brands but they are pretty much identical. The spray nozzles are friggen horrible on the cans, so you can't get much angle on them when you spray. That's why I got some striping on two wheels as I was adjusting to spray. Clear coat was the same where I had two different brands but they both handled the same way. Primer was Rustoleum self etching primer. Definitely recommend the light sand after the primer dries as it leads to a smoother final finish.
 
Another update. The rubber standoffs for the skid plate disintegrated over two years and the plate was being held on by like three bolts. That would have been a very bad day if they had totally failed. Bad job on parts picking from CorkSport if you ask me. I bought some replacement rubber footers with holes through them and I'm going to buy some stainless steel bolts to pass through. With this hardware I can cut the rubber down to the size I want and tuck the plate in closer to the under side of the car.
 
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