San Jose Build - Chassis 155.

[SeanW]

Aug 11, 2016 14:33:35 GMT steadfast said:

Do you need all of those sensors? Why not delete the EGR valve and get rid of that stuff?

Actually, that gets me to something I'd wanted to ask you about.  You went with MS before you took your Exocet to the BAR?  Did you also delete the front charcoal can and EGR beforehand? I do plan on running MS and doing EGR delete eventually but wasn't sure about keeping everything completely stock or not before inspection.

[steadfast]

The BAR cares nothing about that stuff, except for the PCV. You don't need the EGR or the canisters.

[SeanW]

Aug 11, 2016 17:14:23 GMT steadfast said:

The BAR cares nothing about that stuff, except for the PCV. You don't need the EGR or the canisters.

That's going to make things much simpler.

[SeanW]

Okay, had a little free time after work this evening so I made getting the mounts for the fuse block and expansion tank my goal.

First, installing the sight tube on the expansion tank. Pretty straight forward, photos basically say it all. Measure .5 inches up from the lower and upper rims, mark, and drill to 1/2 inch. (I started with a 1/8th bit to make pilot holes, finished to with a stepped bit.)







Then I turned the stepped bit lose making holes to rivet the brackets in place before mouthing everything up. Annoyingly the catch can uses 1/4-20, since I don't have a set of ratcheting SAE box-end bolt the can to the bracket was a small pain.



My dog, Jayne, was throughly bored with me messing around with the car rather than taking he for walking immediately after getting home from work.

[SeanW]

Didn't do a lot last night but after getting home from a movie (Suicide Squad) I spent 45 minutes or so fabbing a basic bracket to keep the intake from flopping around the bay. Will do until turbo time.





Also, I am coffee trash.

[SeanW]

Over the weekend I really didn't get a lot done on Exocet specifically but I did spend a fair chunk of time in the garage cleaning (desperately needed) and organizing things. Later on Sunday I started to put more work into wiring the car up, stripping a lot of the crap off the wiring harness to make it a little easier to work with, mocking out wire runs, etc. I also put a 32" TV in the garage on Sunday morning which is probably one of the best investments I've made in my shop setup so far. Nice to be able to throw wiring diagrams onto a large screen and streaming movies while I worked melted away the time.

[SeanW]

This feels like such a terrible mess right now just to get the car to a point that I can I can turn it over. I can't wait to begin stripping out everything from the loom that I won't need.

Thankfully I have a color version of the 97 wiring diagram from the factory service manual, which has been helping a lot. Unfortunately there are a couple of places where it tells terrible lies.

Still, making progress!

[steadfast]

How about a start up video!

[SeanW]

Aug 17, 2016 2:04:21 GMT steadfast said:

How about a start up video!

Soon! Can't get too deep into the project this week because I'm pulling an on-call rotation. The past couple of days have been a bit busy fielding afternoon/evening calls.

[SeanW]

So, I'm scratching my head at two mystery connectors in my engine bay. Some how they didn't get labeled in the tear down.

First is this guy:





My FSM wiring diagram suggest that it could be the engine coolant temp sensor (based on the wire colors) but I can't for the life of me find anywhere it might plug into. Anybody known anything about this connector on 97 1.8l Miata?

Then there's this little dude:






The manual suggest that thing (single wire, blue/yellow stripe) is the power steering pressure switch. My donor didn't have power steering.

Any info at all would be hugely appreciated!

[SeanW]

I'm also trying to figure out the best way to run wires for the secondary O2 sensor Right now I'm thinking it'll probably be easiest/best to extend the leads and run it down the tunnel rather than drilling out a hole in the tunnel for the O2 sensor's pig-tail/grommet. (Similar to the stock miata)

[zeitgeist]

That is the Power steering switch for the single wire. Harnesses are not specific and often have options that aren't used included which sounds like the case for your P/S. I ran my second O2 sensor wire down the tunnel and zip tied it to the PPF to keep it away from the driveshaft. Works well and less visible wires from the top.

[SeanW]

So today I did a thing or two...

















So. Close.

[steadfast]

There is your problem, that twist tie was grounding out the circuit! I bet you'll have it started by tomorrow.

Fuel?
Spark?
Grounds (all of them)?

[SeanW]

Aug 21, 2016 3:09:55 GMT steadfast said:

There is your problem, that twist tie was grounding out the circuit! I bet you'll have it started by tomorrow.

Fuel?
Spark?
Grounds (all of them)?

Fuel. As in I had none in the tank. Really wanted to check to see if would crank, which it does! I'll put some gas in the tank tomorrow morning and see it'll turn over and idle.