On a side note, I've got a couple hours tonight to play with the suspension. I'm going to take the springs off of a front and rear shock and see how I'm looking wheel-travel wise. In the front I'm actually hitting the top of the tire on the inner fender bodywork before I hit the bumpstops, so I want to see how much spacer I need to make the bump-stop functional again. This should be fairly easy since the car's already up in the air. Only hard part is getting to the upper rear shock mount bolts. And that's not really hard, it's just a bit of a pain. There's this AWESOME perfectly sized crevice around the shock tops so that when you remove the nut, if you're not really carefully, it's perfectly engineered to fall right in there to get hopelessly stuck. Fortunately, I've got a magnet on a flexy stick type deal. Wanna guess when I bought it? That's right, the first time I did the shocks when I had 3 of the 4 total rear nuts fall in that damn crevice. Durrrrr.

it sounds a lot like removing the nuts that hold the P5 rear lights on.. which is why I have a magnet on a telescoping stick (also has an LED flashlight on it.. from sears for like 14 dollars, good investment)

have fun!

CHANGE OF PLANS! Tranny's coming out tonight. w00t! Hopefully I'll still have time to run to a parts store and pick up some de-greaser to clean some of this mess off of the car. I'm probably losing more weight in the car through removing grit and grime than I have through putting lighter parts on and removing what's allowed by the rules LOL

Part 1
 

So...sorry to all the cheddah haters out there, but I don't feel like re-writing all of this hahaha.

So my friend who was supposed to be coming in town won't be here til tomorrow. What does that mean? It means I got down and dirty with some Miata drivetrain. I'm really happy with the progress I've made tonight. Made some unexpected discoveries, and got a lot done.

1. Got the transmission off! Finally!
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Found that the front trans seal is bad. There's oil all over the bellhousing. Fortunately I've got an extra trans that's in good shape :)
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Also found that the engine rear main seal is in surprisingly great condition. It looks about as new as my new one. Any better and it'd be still in the bag w/ a part number sticker on it...
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So where's the oil all over the back of the engine / transmission coming from? Looks like it's still from where the CAS O-ring went long, long ago. Only problem is that after we (ie kcbhiw lol) installed it, we never cleaned the back of the engine. So is this new oil or old? It's kinda hard to tell. Since it's a $4 part from the dealer, I'm going to go pick one up / order it tomorrow. Rick Case Mazda's like 2 miles from my house :D I'm also going to clean as much gunk as I can off of the engine so it should be pretty easy to tell when new stuff starts leaking.

2. Clutch
I don't really know what a clutch is supposed to look like, so I may be TOTALLY wrong, but it looks like it's got a really weird wear pattern. The inside is really worn out, while the outside barely has any marking.
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And the flywheel:
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Any input?

3. Tonight's intended suspension testing
As I posted earlier, I was going to look @ the suspension (fronts primarily, the rears checked out :)) to try and cure the bottoming of the wheels in the wheel wells before the shocks hit the bump stop. While it's not a huge deal, the suspension isn't really doing what it's fully designed to that way. Plus, it's rubbing my fender liner. That's kind of annoying mid corner on course lol. A slightly longer bump stop SHOULD cure that. If it doesn't, next season I'll throw some 3mm spacers in there if it's bad enough that I think I need them.

I also never realized how bad I need to shave down my sway bar bushings. I can barely move the thing by hand w/o the endlinks attached. It's supposed to swing relatively freely. Any suggestions on how to do that effectively? Exacto knife? Sand paper? Other?

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Springs?! We don need no stinking springs!
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To get full suspension travel, I just took the spring off the shock so I could easily maneuver the tire through it's full range of travel.

In the process, I ended up taking a couple of really cool pictures that demonstrate just how much camber the unequal length double wishbone suspension on the Miata picks up through compression.

I can has camber?
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For comparison on how the MacStrut and double wishbones (though there really isn't any comparison...) work differently through their range of motion:
HS Protege5
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STS2 Miata
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The clutch looks pretty well-worn on the outside as well.. it's just really worn on the inside. I can't imagine the clutch disc warping in such a way that could cause that. I'm assuming you'll be getting the flywheel machined and putting a new clutch in?

how many miles on it?

this one looks to have twice as much meat or more on it with 76500 miles:
http://picasaweb.google.com/claureta...75381804976034

but of course it's hard to compare photos at different angles.

you and your double wishbone *shakes fist*

I love twin trapezoidal link but really am not a big fan of macpherson

I've already got a machined flywheel, clutch, pressure plate, throwout and pilot bearings, etc etc. Basically, just waiting to put everything on, so that should rule out any weird variables.

As for mileage? No idea. The car's got 160k+ on it, but there are a few signs that the tranny's been off at least once (couple of small brackets missing. pain in the ass to put on when you're putting the tranny back on. Not a big deal, but if it's missing, the tranny's come off before)

you like that don't you? :101384_l:

If you're a really good boy I'll post pics of my uber sexy endlinks too :p

Yesterday was a very busy, successful, and expensive day car wise. Let's see: New brakes, springs (700#f / 450#r), spring perches (will accept lighter weight 2.25" springs), muffler (trying something new, supertrapp's probably not gone for good), upper shock hats for the rear from an NB miata (about 3/4" more rear travel), and I think a couple other things I can't remember right now lol

Last night got the clutch actuator moved to the new trans, the throwout bearing replaced, engine rear main replaced and bolted up the flywheel, clutch and pressure plate. Also did a little cleanup on the engine and shimmed the front sway bar mounts. the swaybar was binding pretty badly. That's been cured :)

The trans should be on in the next day or 2 :D

Very exciiiiite!
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