Bracketry, Gauges and Exhaust

Because the hard top mounts I ordered were too thick to fit betwixt the roll cage and the body I had to make my own.  I soon found out how sub-par fabrication skills were.  I am not proud of the mounts you see below, but they should still get the job done.

I plumbed the water temp gauge and test fit the oil pressure gauge.  Looks pretty  good.  I still need to order a passenger side airbag cover and perhaps refine my radio panel cover.

Drove the car to Rivian to install the Springfield Dyno exhaust. Exciting!

One of the clay modelers decided I needed an Pterodactyl hood ornament.

Out with the old...

 In with the new...

 The exhaust clamp sent with the kit is a total p.o.s. so I wound up marking the two tubes once they were aligned on the car, then taking the whole exhaust off and welding it up.  While not quite a "stack-o-dimes" my welding is improving.

Up next will be installing new spark plugs, wires, air filter, fire bottle, SFI padding kill switch, brake lines, rotors, pads, springs, shocks, sway bars, wheel bearings, wheels and tires, but then it should be track ready.  KAAKAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!

Harn-Ace

The harness came in the mail along with some other goodies to be highlighted in subsequent posts. I had to do a little hacking to the cage in order to attach the belts in the stock seatbelt mounting locations.  I also used a small sledge hammer to clearance the transmission tunnel in order to get the seat just where I liked it.  All in all I think the harness set-up came out pretty nice.  Hopefully I will look as cool as the guy below when I am finally on track.

Paint Scheme

I had an idea for the paint scheme below as I was walking out of Lowes yesterday.  I think I could paint the car on the cheap if I taped it off myself and had someone else spray it.

More Stuff done and stuff

Hard top purchased!  Found Ol' Ned selling a hard top miata on craigslist and asked him if he would be willing to part with just the top.  He agreed and after an exciting 3-hour trek through swamp land Florida, the top was mine.  Side note, Ned's daughter was named Nedera.

The garage I have always wanted

I spent most of the day removing various A/C and power steering components. Then I went about installing my shiny new radiator.

 After I ran out of things to do on the engine side I went about making the seat mounts.  In an effort to do as little fabricating as possible I cut to length two pieces 1-1/4 X 3/16 steel strap and then bent them to align with the existing factory seat mounts.  After drilling holes and attaching the straps I placed the seat on top and firgured out where I wanted it.  Then it was just a matter of marking and drill the seat.  I should be able to shim the mounts in between the seat and the strap in order to fine tune the lay-back angle.

 I created a list of To-Do and To-Order, so now its just a matter of finishing the list. Should be easy...

The Dash is in

The dash, heater core, blower motor, gauge cluster, ECU, fuel filler assembly, window net, quick disconnect, and steering wheel are all back in the car! Yay!  The car starts! Yay!  One issue, the gauge cluster gets power, but half of the indicators aren't working.  I'm thinking I have a bad ground or blown fuse, that is next on the to-figure-out-why-no-worky list.  Messed around with a house lamp to create some interestingly-lit photos, see below.

Cage is painted

Finished painting the cage last night.  I originally wanted the interior to be orange or bright green, but I didn't want to shell out a lot of money to have it sprayed, so I went with Rustoleom Hammerite roll on direct to metal paint.  They only offer a white, black and silver for this specific grade of paint and a black interior in Florida would suck.  White is lame.  So I went with silver.  I think it turned out pretty good.   Now I am trying to figure out how to put everything back in and where it all goes.

Surf's up!

Little off topic, but I recently bought a GoPro and began recording some of my surf sessions.  Here is the first crop sans any real editing.   Also this website only allows a lower resolution, full HD shiz on the way.

Cage is done Yeeehaaaww!

The cage is finished and the car made it safely to its new home.  A couple people from work have been bugging me to name the car and I couldn't think of an appropriate name untill just recently.  The car's previous owner worked in a mine and apparently frequently plowed the miata into sand and gravel piles because every time you bump the car debris will pour out of a random/new nook and cranny... So the car is officially named Sandy! Deal with it. 

Now that we have crossed that bridge on to some pictures of the cage.  I am currently finishing up the interior paint and will be reinstalling the dash in the near future.

GRaFFiX!

Alright people below is a blank template of the car.  If you have some spare time, come up with some paint schemes and email them to me.  I am thinking one huge pterodactyl whose wingspan stretches from the hood to the rear bumper, with the head on the roof/hard top, this may look retarded.

Ze Car is at Ze Cage builders!

I took the car down to ISC Racing in Winter Haven to have the cage work done, sans ball bearings in the cross car tubes.  The Titan pulled the trailer like a beast, so thats nice.  Mike at ISC had about 12 built Miatas in his shop, so the car is in good hands.  I should have the car back in 3ish weeks.  I am so stoked, its really happening!

Driving a car without any interior parts is totally ACE!