Mark's Exocet MK3 build

[markwill]

So, on 22nd August I put a bid in on the Copart auctions and won this:-



The plan was to build an Exocet using an NC mx5 as the donor.

A purchase of a wing for £70 from fleabay has now got me to this:-



A fully functioning mx5 on the road for a total cost to date of £821.29 all in, including all the Copart fees and Delivery.

A week later I paid a visit to Stuart at MEV and spent a good couple of hours chatting about the Exocet. I'd seen the pricing options on the website for the NC version of the Exocet and watched the videos Stuart had previously sent to me. What I didn't know was that the development of the NC version was still incomplete and that because of the differences between NA/NB v NC this had opened up a lot of development opportunities for Stuart for the NC chassis. 

As a result in the wheelbase differences, the suspension setup and the fuel tank location the NC Exocet Chassis and bodywork will be somewhat different to the earlier versions. How different I do not know. Stuart has SPAX looking at suspension options.

Anyway, in for a Penny in for a pound, A week after the visit to Stuart I paid my deposit and now have the long wait for the first ever customer NC Exocet chassis and body. Stuart has promised me it will be chassis number 1 as his development mule will never go to IVA.

The thought of buying something unseen and unfinished both terrifies me and excites me equally. There will be no build manual or an army of those who have done it before to fall back on but I like the challenge.

The plan now is to start the strip down and clean of the donor sometime after the MOT runs out in October in readiness for the NC chassis hopefully sometime early next year. I've downloaded the NC engine manual, the body workshop manual and various other NC related service information. I now need the electrical wiring manual as the NC now uses CANBUS for the primary control module. I'd like to try and retain the DSC, TC and ABS to avoid upsetting the control module (even the throttle is fly by wire on CANBUS).

I've put the car on the road for now so I can shake it down. It all seems good with a strong engine and good brakes but there is a slight whine coming from the back of the car that sounds like a straight cut gearbox type of whine. That's the only bit I think needs investigating. No error codes, no warning lights. Can't believe I got the car before any fees for £350. The only drawback is that there doesn't seem to be a big market yet for used NC bits. My recoup of costs from parts sales may be quite low.

That's all for now. I'll post more when I start the strip down

[avi]

Fantastic someone has put there money where their mouth is on an NCI chatted with Stuart about this, but at the time there were no cheap N.C. donors around. Looking forward to this build !

[markwill]

Time for an update.



After the MOT expired on the donor on 18th October I began the process of stripping the car. All the usual stuff was removed and with the car being relatively new I had very few issues with seized nuts or bolts.



I got the rear hub bolts undone reasonably easily after first knocking out the detent in the nut. I had to stand on the torque wrench as the nuts are done to 255nm I believe. Luckily I have a 300nm wrench. All the interior came out without any pain just the dashboard was a little tricky as the haynes manual is wrong. It says the top cover just lifts off when in fact it doesn't. It is fastened to the heater matrix by bolts that are inaccessible until you remove the whole dash support beam, dash top cover and heater as one unit but first you have to unplug all of the wiring as a lot of the dash wiring runs behind the dash support beam and is again inaccessible until it's all removed.



I was left with this


On the engine bay side after removal of the wings, bumper, bonnet and lights came the air filter housing. There is a MAF sensor attached on the housing so not sure how I'm going to incorporate this into the Exocet yet. The battery and it's tray, the power steering bottle, the washer bottle and the ABS pump. The engine loom plugs into the main ecu which is bolted to a body cross member underneath the airfilter housing and is attached with security bolts that need to be drilled out. On the ECU there are two plugs, one for the engine and gearbox harness and another back into the interior along with the main engine bay fuse and relay box. I left the engine harness all still connected  and just unplugged the interior side before feeding all of the engine bay wiring from the interior through the grommet on the passenger side for removal. The wiring (excluding the engine harness) comes into three pieces, the main interior harness, the dash harness and the interior to engine bay harness. All are connected using multi plugs down by the passenger fuseboard.

That left me with this:-


Rather than chop brake lines and disconnect fuel lines I instead unclipped all of the brake and fuel lines from the body and all engine wiring where it was also clipped to the body. More on this later.

I removed the two main nuts securing the front of the body to the PPF on each side of the engine cradle, one long bolt on each side of the lower control arms through to the body, all the underside bracing and shields, the rear diff cradle to body supports and the two nuts on each side of the diff cradle. I also removed the rear suspension top nuts but later found this wasn't necessary.

With everything undone i was able to lift the front of the body by hand and separate it from the PPF




The drivers side locating peg is longer than all the others at the front but the front is now sat resting on the engine bay cradle by just that one peg.

The back took a little wiggling but i was also able to lift that by hand until the pegs were clear of the PPF




Just to be safe I've placed supports along the sill on both sides to ensure that the body doesn't accidentally drop back onto the PPF.  With the body now resting on the PPF by its locating pins I now had enough room to get access to all of the bolts securing the fuel tank to the body, the remaining pipe clips and all of the handbrake cable linkage (without disconnecting it from the brake calipers.

This is the clearance between PPF and body at the  rear 


As per the mention earlier, as a result of doing things this way I now have a body ready to be fully separated from the PPF with nothing still attached. All of the original brake and fuel lines are still in their original clips with the fuel lines still connected between tank and engine. When the body comes off I can then remove all of the lines for reuse where possible and see how they were originally run front to back. 

I've also sold some of the main body items like wings, lights and bumpers to a garage in Greece the income from which means the car has to date cost me nothing and I'm currently in profit. All of the other bits are stored in the garage loft until I decide to sell them or reuse where i can.

Just need an update from Stuart now as to how the NC chassis and bodywork is progressing.

[jason82]

Well done. Hopefully everything will be in a good condition, & you won't need to replace bushes & bearings etc like us NA boys ! Should be a nice quick build lol

[markwill]

Spoiler Alert!!!

Fresh in from Stuart at MEV

Welcome to the Exocet MK3

[blacksweeper]

Good Luck

[hammy3601]

be interesting to see what the body panels look like

[markwill]

Nov 10, 2018 13:07:32 GMT hammy3601 said:

be interesting to see what the body panels look like

From Stuart

"Patterns for the body are now complete, very similar to the G-type but slightly taller on the centre of the bonnet and slightly longer on the tank cover

The rear is very similar to the G-type but the lights on the rear cover are slightly more streamlined.
G-type side panels can be used if trimmed slightly."

Body now separated from the PPF, onto the refurb 

[markwill]

A bit of a puzzle yesterday. I'm ready to lift the engine from the subframe but there is only one lifting eye bolted to the engine. Does anybody know how you're meant to lift the engine with only one lifting point available? I was thinking of creating a second lift point on the offside rear of the engine using one of the exhaust manifold studs but I'm not sure if this is strong enough to take the weight of the engine. I don't want to end up damaging the cylinder head.

Thoughts?

[avi]

Not familiar with the NC engine to suggest where to lift it , but I did recall that Mazda's never designed the engine to be lifted out of an nc, only dropped .

[markwill]

AVI, Thanks for that. I've checked out the parts catalogue for the Duratec and that does show two engine hangers so I've ordered one of those for the job. Hopefully it should do the job seeing as they're the same engine (nearly)

[markwill]

So the Ford engine hanger arrived, part numbers captured for reference. Question is, does it fit?



Yes it does



Subframe now separated from the engine. Time to get the engine on the stand and the front subframe stripped and off to the powder coaters

[markwill]

I popped down to see Stuart before Christmas to finalise the colour scheme for my car. I promised Stuart I would give him an answer within a few days. I didn't realise how long it takes to choose a colour! I finally gave him an answer last week. RAL7024 for the body, chassis unpainted. 

While there i had a good look around the development car

[markwill]

So i've been getting on with the refurb of the PPF after it's strip down

Here's how it looks currently


I've stripped and cleaned/repainted the rear end with new rear bearings and powerflex black bushes


Busted one of the ABS sensors when removing it so had to replace that as well.
Stripped and cleaned the diff and then put it all back together





and started stripping the engine. 
Here is the cylinder head before a quick dip in the ultrasonic cleaner



and after a quick bath




next is a soda blast for the head and then a final wash in the ultrasonic cleaner

Block is also going to get a soda blast but i don't really want to strip down the crank and disturb the bearings. The torque sequence for re-install seems a bit odd with ranges of torque quoted at each stage! Something i've not seen before

[sheffjohn]

Extremely jealous of how good the whole subframe / arms setup looks compared to a mk1 !

Looking forward to seeing your progress.