The Silver nb8a of Jean-Paul

japester · Postby **japester** » Mon Oct 03, 2011 9:33 pm

1999 nb8, stock everything at the moment. Photos coming shortly, as I record the services, repairs and enhancements that will be performed.

I have had her for almost two years now, having decided earlier that I needed a car that was as far from practical as possible.

Until now, services have been done by professionals, though having just done my first service on her, and discovering what work that should have been done, I'm hesitant to use the word 'professional' ever again in reference to their work. She's all mine now, and I have a long list of enhancements that I plan on doing as time and money allow.

IMG_9360.jpg

tobias · Postby **tobias** » Mon Oct 03, 2011 9:50 pm

Looks good! Goodluck with the modding, it's easy to make an mx5 none practical, just slam it on it's guts haha

japester · Postby **japester** » Mon Oct 03, 2011 10:00 pm

(Keeping notes for myself, as a bit of a service history)
Odo: 186,000

Done :
- Flushed and replaced radiator fluid (10L of Repco goop)
- Flushed and replaced engine oil (Shell Helix HX7 AJ 10W-30)
Black as sin. Not much gunk on drain plug.
- Replaced gearbox oil (Castrol VMX 80)
Gigantic piles of filings and sludge on the drain plug.
- Replaced diff oil.
Fill plug was freakin' stiff. Got it off with some WD40 and a lot of elbow grease.
Small amount of filings
- Replaced both fan belts
Repco gave me the wrong P/S&aircon belt. Idjits.
Got rid of the idle squeak.
- Replaced air and oil filters
Oil spilled, I see why the remote oil filter mounting kit is so useful.
- Replaced spark plugs (NGK Iridium, heat 5)
- Polished yellow headlights

One expects to find crud on the oil drain plugs. I didn't expect to find quite this much crud on the gearbox one. Looks like she's been needing a change for some time now.

Something was odd with the spark plugs too. Although the firing ends look okay, with no oddities on the tips, the bodies look a little baked. They have been in the car for ~15,000km, which is not a long time. *shrug* Will be keeping an eye on them ...

emexv · Postby **emexv** » Mon Oct 03, 2011 10:06 pm

Interesting,,,,,,,,,Repco did the same to me :evil:

hks_kansei · Postby **hks_kansei** » Mon Oct 03, 2011 10:25 pm

Hi Jean Paul, Nik here, we met at garage cafe (mine was the blue NB with rollbar)

the gearbox drain looks ok, mine was quite similar.
If you get the filing between your fingers and rub they should just disintegrate into powder.

The plugs are interesting, the white tip indicates running a bit lean or maybe fuel with too low octane.

The browned ceramic though is odd, I haven't had that on mine ever.

japester · Postby **japester** » Mon Oct 03, 2011 11:11 pm

hks_kansei wrote:Hi Jean Paul, Nik here, we met at garage cafe (mine was the blue NB with rollbar)

the gearbox drain looks ok, mine was quite similar.
If you get the filing between your fingers and rub they should just disintegrate into powder.

The plugs are interesting, the white tip indicates running a bit lean or maybe fuel with too low octane.

The browned ceramic though is odd, I haven't had that on mine ever.

Low octane? I only run her on 98!!!!
Thanks for the vote of confidence about the pile of sludge. it's good to hear that it's normal. Though, I'd be happier with less

::waves::

de Bounce · Postby **de Bounce** » Tue Oct 04, 2011 7:29 am

Replacement belts are a simple trap for most new players!
Reason they gave you the wrong belts is their reference book lists the incorrect belts!
It is always worth the effort to record the number from the old belt and ensure the new one is the same length (assuming it is the right one to start with)
The last 4 numbers indicate the length 4PK0925 or 4PK0855
(These are for a NB8B with P/s)

Couple of things to add to your list of maintenance:
Replace the fluid in the brakes and clutch system.
Replace the fluid in the power steering.

taminga16 · Postby **taminga16** » Tue Oct 04, 2011 9:33 am

It is possible that the baked on look of the ceramics on the plugs was bought about by moisture left in the plug wells after the engine was cleaned.
Greg.

japester · Postby **japester** » Tue Oct 04, 2011 11:16 am

de Bounce wrote:Replacement belts are a simple trap for most new players!
Reason they gave you the wrong belts is their reference book lists the incorrect belts!
It is always worth the effort to record the number from the old belt and ensure the new one is the same length (assuming it is the right one to start with)
The last 4 numbers indicate the length 4PK0925 or 4PK0855
(These are for a NB8B with P/s)

Couple of things to add to your list of maintenance:
Replace the fluid in the brakes and clutch system.
Replace the fluid in the power steering.

I have a set of QFM pads on order, and will do the brake fluid when I've pulled the wheels off

Not a bad idea to do the clutch fluid at the same time.
I had quite forgot the PS fluid. Thank you for the reminder.

Regarding belts, it appears that both SuperCheap and Repco have the wrong belt listed for the P/S & A/C. Supercheap list a 4PK0845, Repco the 4PK0860, and what came off the car was a 4PK0925.

japester · Postby **japester** » Sat Oct 08, 2011 9:12 pm

Over the last week I got up to the following :

- cleaned the mulch from behind the front wheels
- replaced the pathetic horn with an air-horn. f*ck it's loud. That'll help stop those damn SUVs from trying to side-swipe me. :mrgreen:

- replaced the globe in the interior light with some LEDs.
- shoved dynamat all over the inside of the doors
- installed tweeters, crossover and speaker cabling all the way up to the door/car plug/socket.
- finished off the mdf woofer mount/spacers
- finished the mould for the speaker rain guards, and laid up the glass/resin for the first one. (here's hoping it pops off now)
(Once these are done, they'll be glued onto the mdf spacers and then speakers will be done!)
- replaced the orange reflectors on the front bumper with functional clear ones and cabled them in

Need to find the following:
- cables to patch into for the interior lights, or the door switch(es) so I can do footwell lighting
- dig under the dash to work out how to replace the speaker cabling from the head unit out to the car/door barrier.

japester · Postby **japester** » Wed Oct 12, 2011 2:29 am

Another item or two ticked off the list of enhancements.

Removed the leftover broken immobiliser cabling. That was ... irritating, especially reaching all the way up to the wiring right next to the firewall.

Installed footwell lighting (using the interior lighting kit from mx5parts.co.uk)
It's tied to the door switch, with no manual on/off switch, though, I could add one of those in somehow. I did consider trying to tie it to the interior light switch, but that'd involve disassembling the trim all the way around the windscreen. Unfun, that.
I also replaced the globes with red LEDs, so she's now got mood lighting.

japester · Postby **japester** » Thu Oct 20, 2011 1:14 am

Door speaker splash guards finally finished. Why, oh why did I decide to mould them up from scratch in fibreglass?
Photo is from a couple of days ago, before they got painted.

They are painted now as well, have speakers attached and are finally, finally in the car.

The mould was based off a 6" stainless bowl, which was wrapped in glad wrap, masking tape, papier mache, and then 4 layers of 250 gsm glass.
Mould release was paste carnuba wax (wood polish), which worked, but really needs some extra help. I daredsay that finding some PVA will help (A==alcohol, not glue)
The splash guards were done with 3 layers of 250 gsm cloth, and 1 layer of 50gsm cloth to remove the texture from the coarser cloth.
Finished in acrylic, just to waterproof the MDF.

Also put some dynamat over the top of the crossovers. The aluminium foil shows up the salt marks really well - the bottom half of the door is covered in water spots now.

Added the amplifier as well, mounted it behind the driver's seat, and routed nearly all the required cables.
It's got its own power leads running from the battery, via a circuit breaker mounted above the battery,
Audio leads from the head unit routed in,
Speaker leads routed from the amp out to the door plugs. Now just need to get those damn plugs out so I can attach the wires to them.

I'd upload more pics, but all these bits are hidden, like they should be, so there's nothing really to take pics of :wink:

Am considering whipping up a replacement wind blocker out of MDF and glass. That will mean I can have a higher wind blocker, the stock one is a little inadequate, but it does mean I'll never be able to install a roll bar. Options, options, too many options.

japester · Postby **japester** » Sun Oct 23, 2011 12:06 pm

Finished wiring up the speakers yesteday, and managed to get the wiring through the door harness.
*grumble* Irritating door plugs *grumble

It's not that hard, once the doors have been removed, the plugs do just pop out of the chassis. However, there is very little slack in the cabling looms, so I only had about 1.5" of visible cable outside the car. The left hand side has much less slack, and accessibility than the right. RH side took about 15 mins all up, LH side, about an hour. Thankfully, that was enough slack to pull the pins out, attach speaker cables to them and re-insert.

Am now running all self-installed audio cables, through the door plugs. The sound has a little more clarity, and sounds noticably better when cranked. Haven't taken it to ear bleeding levels yet. Might do on the drive down to Avalon.