[DEFUNCT] The College-Budget P5

o.g.sk8er said:

As far as reaching that top bolt, this is what I have always used and works great. Might work for you as well.

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I didn't know they made extensions that short.

I have a set of deep sockets that I use if I need a bit more reach.
They work well on nuts that are threaded on a long ways like on the strut mounts. The thread fits inside the socket.

I reached up there and broke the welds on the nut. Made bolting the sway bar up super easy. Break them off with a wrench.

Sooner or later, I'm going to have to go back out there and fix the mess I made, so thanks guys for the guidance!

I'm still miffed about how I wasted all that money, though. Perhaps this next weekend, I'll set aside time to really dig in there and uninstall everything.

One concern of mine is that I have the Energy Suspension 20mm bushings + brackets, and they may not line up so well. To add on to this, I'm also waiting for the CR3 brackets to come into production again (soon!), as I contacted them and got put on a waitlist a week or so ago. Yet, I already bent my 20mm brackets, which will render them useless with the CR3 brackets. Frankly, my only legitimate option is to wait for the brackets and to buy another pair of Energy Suspension brackets + bushings.

I think my best option is roll around without my swaybar for a bit, no pun intended. Maybe, in the meantime, I can hit up a pal of mine and re-thread the AWR brackets with his tap and die kit to see if I can salvage them? I do know that I'm going to have to the actual size of bushing/bracket I'll need for the CR3 relocation brackets. I think it's still 19mm, since I tried to install both 20mm bushings/horseshoe brackets on this car with the AWR brackets, but they didn't line up well.

Either way...I'm glad I have my backup Compton-mobile mini-van for times like these. No style, but gets you there, and even has a bit of pick-up with that 3.5L DOHC V6! You can keep up with some quicker cars if you turn off O/D, start in L, shift to 3rd, and then to Drive.

VTCS Removal: Part 1

Alright lads, as I wait for an optimal time to fix my rear suspension fiasco, I'll begin setting up the IM upper half DP sent me.

I began with just a removal of surface dust and dirt, and then began hosing the thing down with water and dish soap. Well, it's a little cleaner now, but it still looks crusty.



I then went ahead and pulled out the butterfly valves, the vacuum valve actuator piece, and that rod holding in all the valves itself. The screws were annoying, as half of them were glued in place thanks to the carbon buildup, but thankfully they drilled out just fine. That's the last of the removal process, so now I'm on to filling in those holes.

Frankly, I'm a little nervous about filling in those holes with epoxy, so I may try to find some stud-like objects to tap into them first. That way, I minimize the amount of epoxy I use, and have something much more solid fill it in. Then again, that may be too much work. Ah whatever...



Bad image aside, how do I get it really looking clean? Do I need to sand the thing down past this point, or is there some more scrubbing I can do? It's not the best job I could've done, but that's because I didn't know if I was wasting my time or not. Also, any ideas on how to get the interior of the IM really clean? I just about wasted an entire can of carb cleaner on it, and I didn't get a whole lot of gunk out. It's a little nasty in there, and it would be preferable to install a clean part.

I can't wait to nail the rear suspension issue, install this VTCS-less IM, and drop in the MP3 ECU.

That MP3 ECU is gonna surprise you man! I wish I had a use for it again lol brightens the car's attitude right up

Riot_Polizei said:

Alright lads, as I wait for an optimal time to fix my rear suspension fiasco, I'll begin setting up the IM upper half DP sent me.

I began with just a removal of surface dust and dirt, and then began hosing the thing down with water and dish soap. Well, it's a little cleaner now, but it still looks crusty.

I then went ahead and pulled out the butterfly valves, the vacuum valve actuator piece, and that rod holding in all the valves itself. The screws were annoying, as half of them were glued in place thanks to the carbon buildup, but thankfully they drilled out just fine. That's the last of the removal process, so now I'm on to filling in those holes.

Frankly, I'm a little nervous about filling in those holes with epoxy, so I may try to find some stud-like objects to tap into them first. That way, I minimize the amount of epoxy I use, and have something much more solid fill it in. Then again, that may be too much work. Ah whatever...

Bad image aside, how do I get it really looking clean? Do I need to sand the thing down past this point, or is there some more scrubbing I can do? It's not the best job I could've done, but that's because I didn't know if I was wasting my time or not. Also, any ideas on how to get the interior of the IM really clean? I just about wasted an entire can of carb cleaner on it, and I didn't get a whole lot of gunk out. It's a little nasty in there, and it would be preferable to install a clean part.

I can't wait to nail the rear suspension issue, install this VTCS-less IM, and drop in the MP3 ECU.

Click to expand...

https://youtu.be/xIijYgvxW0g not sure how effective this is but it looks way funner than any other method[emoji23]

STudMUffin1177 said:

https://youtu.be/xIijYgvxW0g not sure how effective this is but it looks way funner than any other method[emoji23]

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That's cool !!
I hope my intake is all dirty, then I get to clean it !!

STudMUffin1177 said:

not sure how effective this is but it looks way funner than any other method[emoji23]

Click to expand...

Oh man, that would be fun! Only thing is, I doubt the malleable butterfly valves would survive!

I'm instead opting for the Oven Cleaner method here in a little bit. All you gotta do is smother the thing in oven cleaner, and powerwash it off. Check it out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PAPtYv8_zA

EDIT: Or maybe not...forgot that Ammonia corrodes Aluminum, so I may need to keep investigating. Oh well, at least that video was entertaining.

Take it to a coating shop and have them sand blast it. Itll be clean and shouldnt cost much

Swaybar, Part 2 | Intense Rattling

Yeah, the swaybar wasn't "in for good".

As I mentioned a couple posts back, I made a total mess out of a simple re-greasing job. I destroyed the threads in my AWR relocation brackets, which left me with an inoperable rear swaybar.

Today, I remedied that with the parts I had on hand. Sk8er's post gave me hope, so with the weather as nice as it was (for the first half of the day...), I got under the car and started unbolting things.



The Energy Suspension brackets that I bent myself had a bit of a hard time squeezing into the subframe bolts, so I broke out the dremel with a ceramic bit to widen them slightly. They slid in quite easily after that. The sacrificial zinc plating around the threads are done for, so I applied a bit of white lithium grease to them to keep the rust at a surface level. Hopefully, those CR3 relocation brackets will go up for sale soon. At least I'm on their waitlist!



I had a mini-heart attack when I saw the endlinks bolted in, since they were on the very inside of the brake mounting bracket...



...but that was with the car raised, which allowed the rear suspension geometry to slump forward. Upon lowering it back down to the ground, the endlinks moved towards the rear of the bumper, thus giving the brakes some space. Looks like I'm fine!

I'm quite surprised at how well everything fits in without any brackets. I don't know how long this'll last this way, but everything fit with just a tiny bit of dremeling! EDIT: I took the thing for a ride to listen for clunking or creaking from the rear, and I heard nothing at all [from the rear].

So let it be known:

Racing Beat RSB on a P5; Parts Needed:

• ES Endlinks
• Energy Suspension 20mm Bushings + Brackets (pre-bent if you want)
• Dremel (to remove a little bit of material from the inside of the loops)

Until it breaks again!

---

Speaking of "breaking again", I'm getting all sorts of crazy front-end noises. It's a couple of noises all at once: a somewhat gentle chirping (not the clutch slave cylinder, could be a belt), a creaking/groaning that could perhaps be my front swaybar bushings, some vibration from my shift linkage(?), the dreaded heatshield. I got to elaborate a little bit on that heatshield...my goodness and stars above, I've never heard such a wretched rattling from a car before!!! It's one of the most ear-raping discord of noises you'd ever hear, and it's so dang loud!

I mentioned way back that my weld nuts that secure the heatshield broke off, and that I attempted to loosen the bolts in vain. Well, that heatshield is dangling a little bit, and when driving, it flaps up and down so hard and so fast that you'd swear there was a motorcycle engine underneath your car. The windier it is, the worse it gets...

Anyone know how to access the weld nuts that secure the heatshield from the top? I'm gonna cut off all the old crap.

Riot_Polizei said:

...
Anyone know how to access the weld nuts that secure the heatshield from the top? I'm gonna cut off all the old crap.

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As far as I know the only way to access the weld nuts is to cut a hole in the frame to get a wrench in there.

There's no access so they're welded in.

You could grind the bolt heads off then push them inside the frame.

You'd have the weld nuts bouncing around your frame but that's probably not as bad as the heat shield rattling.

pcb said:

You could grind the bolt heads off then push them inside the frame.

You'd have the weld nuts bouncing around your frame but that's probably not as bad as the heat shield rattling.

Click to expand...

Man, this is quite the dilemma. Cut a hole into the frame, or experience rattling and plinking around for the rest of my time in the car?

What if I was to cut off the bolt's head, weld the threads to the hole in the frame, and leave it at that? Then I could just get a nut to tighten down the heat shield. Is this a pipedream, or something plausible?

Riot_Polizei said:

What if I was to cut off the bolt's head, weld the threads to the hole in the frame, and leave it at that?

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That sounds like a good idea.
You might have a hard time threading a nut on the remaining thread which may not be long enough.

But you could just weld them in place to hold them and drill and tap some new holes.

I think you'd have to be careful not to lose your bolts inside the frame.
They're going to be loose and maybe only a couple of threads showing after the bolt heads are ground off. If they get bumped up, they're lost inside the frame.

You might want to clamp a visegrip to the threads to weigh it down because the pressure of pushing a welding rod to it would probably be enough to push it inside.

AutoX: Drivermod

I just got back from another practice round from the Time Attack I attend, and I'm starting to put a hurting on those Honda boys now (rockon)

For two events in a row now, I've run faster times than a couple Type-S Integras and some modified Civics. This particular event though, absolutely no Hondas got better times than me. Only two guys were faster than me, and they both drove the same frigging nuts Neon that's stripped bare and loaded with seemingly infinite grip. I'm really proud of myself for how much I've improved since last year! Now I really can't wait until I get around to installing my trailing arms, IM, and MP3 ECU.

And finally, I got an almost POV-shot of a run through the course. This was after the event was over.


I got a 51.6xx there, but my best time of the day was 51.48x. I entered the last turn a little too hot, which startled me a little bit.

I cannot stress enough how good the Mazda6 "BBK" upgrade is. It's hard to tell, but before the double horseshoe section seen in the video, I was able to greatly delay my braking until the very last minute, and with my developed threshold braking skill, slow my car down from 50-60mph in about a second or so without letting the rear out. For comparison, I later drove a CR-Z around the track, and learned that the ABS on it couldn't be pushed nearly as hard as my brakes.

All in all, I had an absolute blast. I'm learning more and more, and my P5 is really beginning to assert itself as a threat in my class. Mazda represent, especially since I'm the only one!

As pictures get uploaded to the facebook group, I'll post some here.

whoa! easy buddy! that looks fun. what sort of pads did you go with on when you did the mazda6 upgrade? curious since the p5 is your daily too.

Man, you bet it was a load of fun! Even on all-seasons, these P5s rock.

As for pads, I think I just grabbed some generic Duralast ceramic pads from Autozone. They're keeping up pretty well, and haven't faded on me while racing yet.

Riot_Polizei said:

Man, you bet it was a load of fun! Even on all-seasons, these P5s rock.

As for pads, I think I just grabbed some generic Duralast ceramic pads from Autozone. They're keeping up pretty well, and haven't faded on me while racing yet.

Click to expand...

Go do a HPDE and tell me how you like your all seasons after that! haha. good info on the pads. I will eventually upgrade to mazda6 brakes. Whenever my brakes are in need of attention.

During the time attack, I went to remove the spare tire as I usually do. Problem was, the weld nut that holds in the wheel broke! I've the worst luck with weldnuts!!

I just got done clawing the thing out of its housing. It was quite the mess.



I suppose I can consider this permanent weight reduction for MaD pOwEr GaInZ, but I think I'm going to grab some fix-a-flat or whatever just in case of roadside calamity.



Yessir, that's not going to get used anymore...

it's time for some forged weld nuts lolol.