btw pardon my camera shots, from my phone and all.

 

well it was yesterday.....new pads and stop tech drilled and slotted rotors!!!

 

the car actually feel like its planted better. i haven't really pushed it too hard yet.

i have the front mazdaspeed bar, but i don't really want to put it on myself. i had taken the car to the shop friday morning, but their system showed 5+ labor hours for the installation, so the guy there suggested i rethink it. (he's never personally been under a protege, so he didn't know what was involved) next time i take it in for an oil change, he's going to actually look under the car and see what's involved.

 

its not that hard. dropping the subframe is like 5 or 6 bolts

 

well, the rear is supposed to be much easier, but it still took me all morning - fighting with 6 year old rusty bolts is NOT fun

 

^^ 5 hours is about how long it'll take, seriously. I'd say we should have a front sway bar install party but it would end with us shooting ourselves in the heads :P

here are the basics:
- remove lower crossbrace
- remove exhaust midpipe
- remove both shifter rods
- remove steering linkage
- remove both front lower control arms
- remove front wheels
- remove front endlinks, if they are seized just unbolt the strut mounts and lower it that way
- remove front crossmember (yeah, the mega piece of steel that is probably the strongest part of the entire chassis)

I don't know what was going through the engineer's minds when they positioned the brackets for the sway bar bushings where they are. Actually it isn't really that the brackets are the issue, it's just that you can't actually get any tool in there to unbolt the rear of the brackets. If the bolts were reversed, with the heads underneath the crossmember instead of on top of it, with the threaded part on the bracket, there would be NO problem. you'd still have to remove the crossmember and everything else in order to put a new sway bar in, but as it stands, you have to go through that whole darn process just to install new bushings or lube the existing ones.

 

um yeah have fun with that. it's more like.. 30+

 

^^I see one mod I won't be doing, LOL.

 

sarcasm train. choooooooooooo choooooooooooo

 

yeah, it probably won't be going on then - anyone want a front mazdaspeed sway bar, with new bushings?

 

Maybe post a full review in the 3rd gen suspension subforum after you've had some time with it?

 

where's the 'least obvious sarcasm ever' train? I apoligize in advance if I come off as cynical today.

I'm off ze pills

 

put my car up on blocks - mad tight weight reduction... who need wheels...

actually, getting my "new" tires put on

 

sure, why not - however, it might be a little biased. i already had an MP3 front strut bar and the Tokico HP handling kit (HP blues and springs). apart from that, suspension was pretty much stock.

 

I just installed an AEM dryflow filter. wow seriously I could have bought a FRAM and no one would know the difference.. the AEM has a white paper-looking filter element o_O. The paper in the box says they use gray and white, but that they aren't any different.

I bought oil and a filter (purolater pureone .. I don't have any OEM filters 'in stock' in the garage.. I wish the mazda dealer was close enough for me to stop in on my lunch break)

oh a new PCV valve too..

Installed the air filter so far.. and wowwwwww it makes my engine bay look dirty haha. It seems to have cured the random surges of power that I've been having recently. I just went on a 3 minute drive though, I'll have to do more 'testing' tomorrow. Gotta let ze oil cool down a little bit before I change that.

Since when did advance auto parts carry royal purple? I thought only pep boys did. Too bad no one carries redline oil