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Well I had intended to wait until I started my ZE swap to start a log, but ive been doing more to the car then anticipated So i'll start with a bit of a recap of what ive done/had to do with the car since ive had it, bare with me if you have already seen some of this, its more for the time line of the car

So I lost my last car do to the careless driving of another, 89 probe gt turbo, was a great car and fast off the line, not so great in the corners lol
before...

after...



So the hunt was on for a new project and after giving up on finding another 89 gt, I started looking for a MX-3 in the best condition I could find one in. After only 2 weeks of looking I sourced out a 93 white GS with only 208k and a bunch of goodies, no rust, and a milk crate of receipts of maintenance from day 1 of the cars life.








Happy with my find, subs and amp where promptly installed as I NEED my bass... lol



2x12" Polk Audio DB 1222's, Clarion 800w amp, 500k cap

Roughly a week after driving the car, a rattle started coming from the engine, fearing it may be the throwout bearing I get the car home only to find my power steering pump has developed a bit of cannibalism and has eaten both its teeth and the pulley's teeth...





After replacing the P/S pump and pulley, roughly a week later, a new problem develops, a loud banging noise from the driver side rear suspension, after jacking the car up, I discover that the upper strut mount had rusted completely through





after replacing both rear upper mounts, everything seemed to be going well, I decided to tackle an eyesore on the hatch, the previous owner had placed a bumper sticker by the key hole, when removing the sticker, it took some paint with it





Happy with my handy work on the hatch, not much happened with the car for a few weeks. On a trip to the junk yard for some parts for the honda, I found a RS raised wing on one of the MX-3's there, after giving it a new paint job to match the car and picking up a garnish with all the tabs intact from one of the forum members I promptly installed it




few pics of the car all cleaned up for a show and shine (pre - RS wing install) also made my own eyelids out of some di-NOC I had laying around

So at the start of the week, I started stalling out when the car was at idle, first thing that jumped in my head was to check all the sensors, began pulling apart the intake to clean out the MAF and the throttle body... once I got to the rubber boot that go's from the TB to the MAF, I discovered 2 rips in the boot between the ribs...




time for new intake!

managed to find a cold air intake on Kijiji that was installed on a 92 honda accord, cost was $40 CAD
was able to find 2"[to]2" and 2"[to]3" couplers at home depot, cost for these was $8/$9 each (sure beats the $35 for 1 2"[to]3" coupler that mopac wanted)
I gave the intake a good cleaning and sanding since it was in fairly rough shape visually, once it was clean, I broke out the dremel and started cutting the piping getting it ready for the intake



got the MAF mounted, vacuum line attached, couplers on nice and secure...




once I was happy with the fitment, I worked on relocating my overflow...



(used an extra garnish mounting bolt to secure it to the bracket)

got the filter installed, pipe attached to the MAF, everything fit like a glove





I plan on giving the pipe a blast of paint in the next day or two, for the time being I just wanted to get everything installed and make sure that all was well.

did some cleanup on my intake that i just put in, had some high temp red paint, put a few coats on both pipes and some diNOC on the MAF just to dress it up a bit, not functional by any means but i thought they looked good, and it made for a nice little project over the afternoon.

Excellent work, I love your liberal use of pictures. You might as well start looking for a KLZE now as I see that in your near future.

good project, like what you've done so far. You've addressed issues and didn't go crazy with body kits/rims

You've done some of the 100% normal "just bought my MX-3" maintenance. Suspension rusted to death, intake leaking... next you'll do a timing belt and distributor. Exhaust will start to leak at the midpipe before the cat, the EGR will plug, the rocker will rust out below the fender.... Looks good so far

yeah im not a big one on body kits, GS lip and some euro sides are all i really have planned for the body. and yes im aware that i haven't done anything out of the norm so far with the car, ive mainly been in the planning phase for what i want to do power plant wise, i realize that the ZE swap is the most common and bang for the buck swap, but, i have been doing alot of research on the frankenstein KL build possibilities (de/g4/ze) so once winter rolls in i should have a fun time with my build

i like the stock rims, tho, i have been eyeballing a set of drag rims that a friend of mine can bring in for a decent price (about 700 for all 4 rims with skins) if i decide to stay with my current rims then a coat of paint may be in the works, we'll see.



im mainly trying to stay red, white and black for the car, the only thing shying me away from those rims is the crome lip, im not a huge fan of crome, brushed aluminum looks far sexier imo

just got home from PnP, scored a complete front GS lip. Only a few cracks that can easily be repaired, was missing a few pieces of the hardware but that wasn't a major concern.



also found a blue hood emblem and a silver/gold v6 badge, the mazda and mx-3 badges where already stripped =(



few other pieces aswell but more just spare parts then anything. should have the lip fixed and repainted by the weekend.

edit, and the best part, my little trip was less then $14... <3 PnP (when they have stuff i want)

Sweet find. If you want an mx3 badge PM me your address and I'll send one your way.

AaronTietje wrote:Sweet find. If you want an mx3 badge PM me your address and I'll send one your way.

i have 2-3 mx3 badges, i meant the silver/gold mx3 badge to match the v6 badge that i found

Nice work! Should look nice with that front lip painted & installed! Awesome find... Where I am, nobody even knows what the car is, let alone have parts for it...
Nice respray job, too - you make it seem so easy! haha!
Lol at your boot space after sub, etc! That's the main thing that's kept me from putting a sub, amp, etc. in my car... must be good bass though
I'm with you on the rims, too - I kinda like chrome, but not for exteriors - especially rims. They just weather & age too easily, and, like you say, brushed aluminium is SO much sexier!

Great and cool article man...thanx for the great post...keep on posting such articles...
Cat Back Exhaust

^ bot?

anyways, another visit to PnP netted me another new addition to the car, picked up a set of 2" Top Speed Pro1 Performance headers & Y pipe for the car, and a full 3" mandrel bent single resonator exhaust for the car, it had a cherry bomb turbo muffler but i turfed it as it was smashed up pretty good and i fortunately already have a brand new muffler sitting in the locker for my car







it all came off super easy, i have a feeling it wasn't on the MX3 i pulled it off of very long as all the rubber hangers where brand new and all the bolts are rust free and came off with ease, should be going on the car in the next week or two

edit: looks like this is the set i picked up http://www.topspeedauto.com/ProductCart ... oduct=2340

ethand wrote:Nice work! Should look nice with that front lip painted & installed! Awesome find... Where I am, nobody even knows what the car is, let alone have parts for it...
Nice respray job, too - you make it seem so easy! haha!
Lol at your boot space after sub, etc! That's the main thing that's kept me from putting a sub, amp, etc. in my car... must be good bass though
I'm with you on the rims, too - I kinda like chrome, but not for exteriors - especially rims. They just weather & age too easily, and, like you say, brushed aluminium is SO much sexier!

thanks man, yeah i occasionally get asked what it is, which is odd since these cars where everywhere when i was in highschool. as for the bass, its wild, some tracks almost hurt when i crank it for "lols" but i have been thinking about dropping down to a either a single 12 or a single 10 because of the weight of my current setup

Haha yeah, i imagine that setup would add more than a few KGs Doesn't surprise me the bass sometimes hurts haha