What did you do to your BG(part 8)

[Kitty]

are you going to be stitch welding??

Yup, poorly too.




It actually came out pretty well once I gave up on trying to do one inch beads and reverted to 1/2" spaced tacks.


Put a decent amount of sound dampening on the spaces that were lacking it from factory as well. Most of the interior is back in, seats aren't as I had to sand some rust off the rails and paint them. Also removed a decent amount of the Auto-seatbelt wiring.


I only have four or so wires going to the seatbelt computer harness now so I've removed more than half. The rest head into the main harness and I'm not touching that rubbish.

[FE3-323]

are you welding without shielding gas?

[Kitty]

It's lincoln flux-core, you can tell because of the yellow jaundice that I didn't clean off on some of them.

It had proper penetration, that's all I care about.

A similar mantra I have about the ladies.

[FE3-323]

^^^
i enjoyed that one

[atomicEGT]

finally got around to changing my oil. managed to not get any in my driveway so I'm pretty pleased with myself. replaced the stock drain plug with a Greddy magnetic jam for bonus JDM street cred or whatever and also because unlike the stock one it doesn't leak. also noticed this:



not sure if it's from the railroad crossing I couldn't slow down for (because Miami drivers) or from the speed bumps at work.

also discovered that the ramps I just bought are meant for normal cars, and I ripped the chin spoiler off when I backed off of them. time to get some boards I guess.



time to not work on it again for another 6 months.

[Kitty]

Wrapped up the spring break project yesterday.
Here are the only pictures that don't look like dog ****.



The number of panels with horrible gaps really amazed me. This was the worst but the raised seat mounting frame was **** too.


Almost fully removed autobelt harness. 4 wires left.

I converted the mounting bracket point into an additional grounding spot.

My painted seat rails came out pretty gud.




Overall impressed with what's changed car wise.

Sound deadening the exhaust tunnel seamed to of quieted my interior exhaust noise quite a bit, more so than when I filled in the shifter gaps.

The most noticeable change in the car is when pulling the parking brake up it feels heftier.
It's been a bit easier to get the back end around in a controlled fashion. Once again this is a confidence and longevity modification more than anything, but I'm positive I'm lifting the inside rear more so than I was a week ago.

I'd guess the bulk of the benefit was reinforcing the seat bracket rails that runs from driver to tunnel and tunnel to passenger. It was barely attached from the factory and had horrible spacing on non-spot welded points.



To think the seats are precariously attached by what I feel are 4 undersized bolts and half of those are attached to a piece of sheet metal attached to the car at best at 12 spot welds.
It's somewhat terrifying. But if an SUV hits me I'm dead either way so why bother fretting over it.


Here is my rough diagram if anyone wants to copy or mock it.



I unfortunately did not do all the drivers foot well due to wiring harness concerns. That will l happen if I ever pull the dash.

[FE3-323]

i stiched the rocker/door seam portions.... can't recall how much else i did. nor can i tell if it helped (caged n all)
so im interested to hear your thoughts after youhave some road time.

[Kitty]

i stiched the rocker/door seam portions.... can't recall how much else i did. nor can i tell if it helped (caged n all)
so im interested to hear your thoughts after youhave some road time.

Do you mean the door seams like this?

https://www.flyinmiata.com/tech/seamweld/453245100_a2c48fd7d4.jpg

I was debating doing that but the factory spot welds were much closer(1in) than I expected and I didn't want to add the work of grinding them down for what would be a likely marginal gain.
I suppose if I ever add support braces to the roof(due to the sunroof I'd probably do them.


I take an hour both way technical country drive every weekend that I'm very familiar with and I think that'll be a good litmus test.
I'd say this did more than foaming the rocker panels did on the BHA. But this chassis always felt less sturdy than that one. If I had the cash and a few extra days I probably would of foamed the rockers while I was doing all the other rubbish.

I plan to tack the rear strut tower area in summer when I tackle the trunk rust.

[FE3-323]

^ what foam did you use in the rockers???

i only stitched the top seam of the rockers, did not go up the doors (that I recall- i'll look eventually when I pull the dash back out again this summer)

[MATT91GT]

Finally got the wagon started. She smoked a bit but that went away. It looks like I am going to need a new radiator. Is there a difference between models? Is there a good thicker radiator that anyone has used? I was thinking about picking up an aluminum one from eBay.

[atomicEGT]

GT and LX have the same rad, might as well get an aluminum one.

[Kitty]

^ what foam did you use in the rockers???

Marine 8lb Urethane Foam.
If there is any rust in the rockers it'll make them rust out to high hell but the BHA was rust free and I sealed any entry point for water before doing it.

I'm still on the fence about doing it to the BG, Hawaii life gave it rust in some weird locations and I plan to own it for quite a while.

[worldhazard]

Ordered some parts, started cleaning away the blobs inside the intake..

[atomicEGT]

got invited to a car nerd meet thing on campus last week. a bunch of newer mustangs, some M cars, a decent GTO, a tuned C7 with a ridiculous exhaust, and some other stuff I forget. went with a friend who brought her Club Edition MX-5, and we had the only Mazda (and Mazda-related) cars there. also the slowest (and in my case, ****tiest).

[worldhazard]

And.. quite possibly the most affordable too