Sport23's MSP build thread

[Sport23]

I've finally decided to put up my own build thread. I'm going to reserve a lot of posts initially and fill them in as I get time.

On the car now...

Engine bay:
Medieval Motor mounts (all 4)
AEM CAI
Turbolife front mount intercooler and hardpipes
Protege Garage intake manifold
Outlaw engineering throttle body and IM thermal spacers
Throttle body coolant bypass
Canadian EGR
Steedspeed turbo manifold
Forge WGA
Boost Sciences RDV
Yudkib Vacuum block
Stealthmode (oil) block fitting
99-00 Protege ES 1.8L FP coil pack conversion
Beck Arnley 7mm plug wires
NGK ZFR7F-11 spark plugs
Slight wire tuck
MAF screen removal
Optima red top battery

Interior:
Autometer wideband 02, Oil pressure gauge and boost gauge
SSAFC Ver. 2 w/ wideband input
J&S Safeguard
ForceFed steering column pod
JCell Dual gauge pod
Dave B gauge rings
Escape variable wiper stalk
Ebay AUX input for Kenwood

Exterior:
VIS EVO style hood
Ebay Carbon fiber grill
Depo Headlights
Apexcone HID kit H4 high/low with motorized shields 4500K
Ebay Taillights
AAC Protege Bumper Brackets

Coming (Eventually)
Focus Adjustable Cam Gears
626 Valve cover (with cut-out)
MAF relocation
Twiggy bumpsticks
Port and polish cylinder head
Pauter rods
Arias pistons
ARP head studs
TWM shifter bushings
J&S datalogging
TPS datalogging
GHL downpipe and cat ceramic coated
Stainless steel braided clutch line
Exedy Stage 1 Clutch
WRX 440cc injectors

Isport Carbon fiber roof cap
Rear spoiler removal
RX-8 Rims
Tanabe D210 springs
AXR Clunk fix
Stainless steel braided brake lines

To buy
06-07 Mazda6 brakes
Mazda6 wiper stalk
(1) RX-8 Rim
VIS Carbon fiber trunk lid
3" Cat back exhaust
ARP Main bearing studs
Catch can
Coolant overflow bottle
Millenia PCV
Tribute windshield washer nozzles

Stock except for headlights:

Added VIS EVO style hood and a carbon fiber grill

Pic with a nice Sunlight Silver MSP

03 MSP rear lip. Ebay gunmetal altezza style tail lights. I think they'll look a bit better with a little tint to them

Optima red top, Samco hot pipe and AEM CAI

 

[Sport23]

Here is my thread for how to make an ebay aux in cable work. (Click the pic)


^^^ Click for Aux in mod

Yudkib Vacuum block (need a new pic of it installed with the Protege Garage IM)

Stealthmode block adapter. Supplies pressure to the factory oil pressure switch and to the aftermarket oil pressure gauge.

My wife came to help while I was working in the garage. Yum!

Finished soldering the connections for my SSAFC and J&S Safeguard. I stared at the wiring for two days before I had the nerve to start cutting up my harness. (The single blue wire on the left is the output from my wideband, so the SSAFC can datalog it.)

I put the SSAFC behind the left passenger kick plate; the J&S is behind the right passenger kick plate.

Here is where I installed the knock sensor for the J&S. I could not find a JIS M10 to M8 step stud so I made so with a helicoil (5/16" worked iirc.)

The USB cable for the SSAFC is tucked in this clip behind the glove box. It is easily accessible if you reach under the left side of the glove box. I keep a USB extension in my glove box so that my netbook can sit on the passenger seat.

Here are pics of my Dave B rings, dual gauge surround with oil pressure and vac/boost, and my ForceFed steering column pod with wideband. The gauges are Autometer Ultralites

Gauges and Escape/Tribute variable intermittent wiper stalk.
Note: Use the Mazda6 wiper stalk for a Protege sedan. Use the Escape/Tribute wiper stalk for a P5.

 

[Sport23]

Stock IM

Protege Garage IM

I had to use longer bolts and a stack of washers between the IM bracket and block to make up for the thickness of the Outlaw engineering thermal spacer.

Stock turbo manifold (cracked!)

SteedSpeed manifold

SteedSpeed and Forge WGA

 

[Sport23]

Medieval Motor mounts: My stock trans mount was the only one that was not torn after 60k mi. I hated how much the car vibrated the first few days, it was like sitting in a megaphone. Now that the mounts are broken in I love them! The car still vibrates noticeably on cold start and with the A/C on at idle. I do need to pull my dual gauge cluster and see what can be done to eliminate the vibration from it's left side. I need to repaint the trans mount badly! The paint and fitment on the trans mount was horrible; I would recommend keeping the stock mount.

Note: I put a 1/2" ID 2" OD fender washer on the passenger mount to keep it in place.

 

[Sport23]

Apexcone HID kit H4 high/low with motorized shields 4500K

Pulled my headlights sanded what was left of the clear off of them then used a Mequiars restore kit on them. I resealed the lenses while they were out; the previous owner changed them from chrome to black and didn't get a good seal on them.

1.8 coil pack conversion. I cut, bent and slotted the holes on a 626 coil pack bracket. This is what I came up with.

 

[Sport23]

The car has been running very well but I really do need to retune it. I haven't tuned it for my ethonal mix and it shows! My dyno last week showed horrible AFR. When my tune is fixed and it's not 107 degrees I should have some better numbers to show.

 

[Sport23]

06 Mz6 front brake upgrade, SS brake and clutch line install, Brake and clutch speed bleeders, Tanabe DF210 springs, Front 05+ Ford Escape endlinks, AXR rear clunk fix.

Ignore the date on the photos, I didn't set it.

New 06 Mazda6 Stoptech Stage III front and rear rotor and pad kit from ProParts USA
Note: Rear Mazda6 pads do not work on the MSP, you need RX-7 style pads. If you call ProParts they can set you up with everything you need (including front calipers.) Their customer service was excellent. The guy I spoke with is a fellow MSP owner!

Front Mazda6 rotor. Mazda used straight vanes on the MSP and Mazda6 front rotors. Therefore they are not side specific (even though Stoptech puts L and R stickers on them.)

Rear Stoptech Mazda6 rotor.

Mazda 6 front caliper. Mine came from car-part but I later found out that ProParts can supply you with front calipers if you call. One stop shopping FTW!

Speed bleeders. These things are amazing! They should be standard equipment on every car.
The MSP uses SB7100 on all four calipers and on the clutch slave cylinder.
Mazda6's use SB100 on it's front calipers.

Mazda6 front calipers with SS lines installed.

Mazda6 front rotor on the left, MSP front rotor on the right.

Old vs New rotor

Stock rear brakes

There's your problem! Metal on metal is bad! 68k mi is too much for the factory pads.

New Stoptech pad (top), old factory pad (bottom). The MSP's factory pads do not have wear indicators.

Front spring, strut, sway bar endlink, rotor, caliper and brake line removed. Now I have room to work!

AXR rear clunk fix. I bought a new grease gun with a flexible hose and serviced the bushings with marine grease.

Rear strut, spring, endlink, rotor, caliper and brake line removed. AXR bracket installed.

Stock Tokicos and racing beat springs. New Tanabe DF210 springs.

Front strut re-installed with new spring, brake line, rotor and caliper installed. Who knows what's missing?

Rear strut re-installed with new spring, brake line, rotor and caliper installed.

05+ Ford Escape front endlink vs. MSP factory endlink. I lowered the car and measured for my new endlinks, the 05+ Escape endlink was almost the perfect length. It does limit the down travel of the front suspension. I'm going to run it anyway and see if it causes any problems. The front endlinks were also serviced with marine grease.

Front 06 Mz6 brakes with Stoptech slotted rotors

All done!

 

[Sport23]

Finally made it to an autocross event. It was so much fun! We had an MSP, MSM, MS3, and a Gen II MS3. If we only had an MS6!!! I had a great time. The car drove great and I feel like my times were pretty respectable. I will definitely be going back!

 

[Sport23]

Reserved

 

[Sport23]

reserved.

 

[Sport23]

reserved

 

[StealthWyvern]

First!

 

[SCMP3]

^^^***.

Looking good. I'm nog really feeling the tailights but everyone has their own tastes. And what's up with the switch to the 03 rear lip? Just curious.

Looking Good though. Should have the thread moved to the msp appearance section to see more traffic.

 

[HKPRO5]

Sub!

 

[repthemazdas]

sub this s***!

 

[Sport23]

^^^***.

Looking good. I'm nog really feeling the tailights but everyone has their own tastes. And what's up with the switch to the 03 rear lip? Just curious.

Looking Good though. Should have the thread moved to the msp appearance section to see more traffic.

The tail lights and the 03 lip were put on after I was rear ended. The shop that repaired my car couldn't get an 03.5 lip at that time so they put on the 03 lip instead. I never thought the stock tail lights were sporty enough for the MSP so I decided to try out some aftermarket tail lights. Those are the best aftermarket tail lights I could find but I'm still not happy with them. When I get a carbon fiber trunk lid I'm going to darken them with some night shades and see if it helps.

Small update: I finally got to drive my car last night! I have not installed the hood, grill or front bumper yet. I'm not sure if my car needs some time to learn or if my front 02 sensor is a bit erratic but sometimes it runs fine, other times it drops to 0 or holds high @ .99v. Also, my Forge WGA is set to 9-10psi and I saw it spike to 11 once. I was shooting for 8psi but I may leave it if it holds @ 9 or 10.

The coil pack conversion and a few other items may be postponed since I need to get the car back on the road and work on some other projects. More pics and details to come...

 

[SCMP3]

sweet mang

 

[Sport23]

My car has been running awful for some time now. I was blaming it on the fact that I had changed so many parts and had not tuned the car. Luckily I decided to check my plugs before I started to tune the car. My #2 and #4 plugs were arcing under the coil packs. It was so bad that it etched small grooves in the ceramic. Has anyone ever seen or heard of this?

I put way too much anti-seize and dielectric grease on the plugs when I installed them. I also ran them for way to long without re-gapping or replacing them. However; the two plugs that had the issues were the two under the coil packs. I DO NOT think this is a coincidence! I do think this is part of the reason why people have good things to say about the FP coil pack conversion. Look at the carbon tracks on the #2 and #4 plugs below (left to right.)

I stayed up late and coverted to the FP coil packs. My tuning session went well the next day. Closed loop is tuned pretty well. WOT is/was tuned well (I think my LTFT may be off ATM.) I still have to tune part throttle/boost conditions and figure out why the SSAFC is not always commanding open loop for part throttle boost. I started a word document for my tuning method if anyone is interested in seeing it I will post it. I also put together an Excel sheet and made it crunch the numbers so I knew where and how much to alter my tune. Both files are pretty good for a first attempt but I know that I can polish them up a bit more.

Also, post #2 got some updates and more pics today! More pics to come when I have the chance. Once I have a tune that I'm happy with I will post my before and after dyno sheets.

 

[SCMP3]

Bump for said pics

 

[Sport23]

Bump for said pics

Posts 2-5 updated with more pics. Still to come... Turbolife, bumper sag fix, and wire tuck pics.

Also, I have been having some issues with my SSAFC sometimes not commanding open loop when it sees boost under part throttle (or it may be related to boost @ low rpms.) Has anyone had this issue and found a fix for it?

I am going to try changing my settings from boost or rpm to boost and rpm and see if that helps...