2006 Mazda MX-5 NC 2.0 Sport
Discussion
Only a few things to update. I recently sat in the car, turned the ignition, and was then greeted by a completely dead car. I popped the bonnet to find that the positive terminal had lifted off entirely. Very odd. I've tightened it as much as I can without sheering the head of the bolt, but it's not as tight as I'd like it to be. Going to have to find another way of tightening that terminal.
One of my xenon bulbs has stopped igniting, which is slightly annoying. It ignites after about 30 attempts of on/off switching, which isn't healthy to the working bulb. I think it's the ballast, so we shall see.
Aside from that, it's had a good was and gained some new tattoos. Tegiwa messed up an order a while back, but the customer service was great in all fairness. They sent through a decal sheet as an apology, so thought I'd make good use of them. Because stickers.
And a tiny moustache
Both of our cars had gotten a clean by the end of the evening
In time for a spectacular sky
I've realised that it's been a year since servicing the car, and it's had three track days since too. I won't be driving it much until I change the fluids, though I'm not sure what fluids to change.
The oil with its filter will of course be changed, but that could be it. The air filter is a cleanable foam filter and the sparks are iridium. In terms of fluids, I'm not sure whether I need to change the gearbox oil, LSD oil or brake fluid, having done three track days on them.
Should I?
One of my xenon bulbs has stopped igniting, which is slightly annoying. It ignites after about 30 attempts of on/off switching, which isn't healthy to the working bulb. I think it's the ballast, so we shall see.
Aside from that, it's had a good was and gained some new tattoos. Tegiwa messed up an order a while back, but the customer service was great in all fairness. They sent through a decal sheet as an apology, so thought I'd make good use of them. Because stickers.
And a tiny moustache
Both of our cars had gotten a clean by the end of the evening
In time for a spectacular sky
I've realised that it's been a year since servicing the car, and it's had three track days since too. I won't be driving it much until I change the fluids, though I'm not sure what fluids to change.
The oil with its filter will of course be changed, but that could be it. The air filter is a cleanable foam filter and the sparks are iridium. In terms of fluids, I'm not sure whether I need to change the gearbox oil, LSD oil or brake fluid, having done three track days on them.
Should I?
rfn said:
Love this thread.
What Xenon bulbs do you have and would you recommend them? The existing headlights on my Sport Black are like candles and feel like I'd like to fix that before the next winter...
These exact ones:What Xenon bulbs do you have and would you recommend them? The existing headlights on my Sport Black are like candles and feel like I'd like to fix that before the next winter...
https://www.hids4u.co.uk/H7-HIDS4U-Stealth-35W-Xen...
In 6000k. Build quality is far superior to any other bulb/ballast I've bought. Ebay are cheap chinese kits, and HIDs-Direct are a re-seller for cheap chinese rubbish. Endless problems with them, but HIDs4U have been outstanding. I'm on the same kit 5 years running.
And as if by magic, one of my bulbs failed!
I've bought some replacement 6000k bulbs from the same company, so all is back to normal. But while I was shopping, I thought I'd try something a little different (for me).
3000k bulbs, yellow in colour. I've been inspired by watching the WEC lately, so forgive me if I've been 'that guy' and bought yellow bulbs.
I'll be honest, I quite like them. The good thing is that I have a spare set of 6000k's to go back to normal if I get sick of them, and these were only £9.99.
I've not had a chance to test them in the night as one of the bulbs had arrived faulty, flickering constantly. They're sending out a new set, but I suppose you get what you pay for.
Working on a nice flat driveway makes such a big difference from the gravel drive of our old house, that's for sure!
I've bought some replacement 6000k bulbs from the same company, so all is back to normal. But while I was shopping, I thought I'd try something a little different (for me).
3000k bulbs, yellow in colour. I've been inspired by watching the WEC lately, so forgive me if I've been 'that guy' and bought yellow bulbs.
I'll be honest, I quite like them. The good thing is that I have a spare set of 6000k's to go back to normal if I get sick of them, and these were only £9.99.
I've not had a chance to test them in the night as one of the bulbs had arrived faulty, flickering constantly. They're sending out a new set, but I suppose you get what you pay for.
Working on a nice flat driveway makes such a big difference from the gravel drive of our old house, that's for sure!
I'm now realising how little I've done to this car. The last post was mid-2022, and it's now March 2023!
In all honesty, I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. It's great that I haven't needed to spend anything on it, but there's been little time or chance to do anything else. I still drive it every week though.
The yellow bulbs have been swapped out with the 5000k xenon's once again (I enjoyed pretending I was a WEC endurance racer for all of 2 weeks). I've also removed the stickers from the bumper so that it's back to a clean look again.
I spent the rest of the summer enjoying the car for what it was, went to the odd meet or two, but honestly 2022 has been a crazy busy year (for some amazing reasons), so there just hasn't been much time to work on the car.
A quick meet with Felix and his C6 last year made me realise how hilariously small my car is.
One modification I wanted to make were spacers. Unfortunately, there's a minimum width of 25mm that you have to use if you are to use the standard NC wheels. With no gaps in the back of the wheel for the original studs to protrude into, you'll need a spacer that creates a flush face for the wheel to sit on, hence the 25mm minimum width. Ideally I'd go for 15mm or 20mm, but I'll re-visit this in the future. For now, I was happy to try 25mm.
Ian (the blue MX-5 track car thread) was kind enough to sell me his Eibach 25mm spacers due to his wider tyres rubbing on the arches. I'm running the standard 205/45/17 tyres here, so shouldn't have an issue. I did worry about them on the track, but with the negative camber I'm running I've heard it would be fine. Time will tell...
It's worth noting that the suspension needed time to settle, so the camber and height are a little off. After a day or two, the car now sits like this:
I must admit, I think the look of that is great. It seems to suit the fenders of the NC that much better.
Now then. One of the biggest N/A performance modifications you can do to these cars is to replace the manifold. The NC has two catalytic converters, one in its usual place underneath the car, and another that's on the exhaust manifold itself. Not only is this additional cat quite restrictive, it's horrendously designed in regards to airflow.
You can clearly see from the photo how restrictive this is in regards to airflow, with all four pipes being pinched into the size of a postage stamp before they enter the catalytic converter.
De-cat manifolds for the NC can be quite expensive, so I spent months searching for a good used one, right up until I found a brand new one on Ebay for £250:
I messaged the seller to find out more information about this manifold. The seller was lovely and went out of his way to post the item, even to their own expense. They mentioned:
"They're British made, a company that was in Oxford/Bicester that used to make exhaust systems for all sort of race cars, F1, custom stuff etc. They've since ceased trading I learned. They're nicely made items, the welding is all tig. Its a 'Chris Tullet' unit. It seems they are now 'CTE advanced technologies'."
A brand new de-cat manifold for £250 by a company that's made exhaust systems for F1 in previous years... yup, looks like that's the find of the century.
It arrived a few days later, and the build quality is outstanding.
Replacing this with a de-cat manifold makes a huge difference. Coupled with a remap (needed to code out the O2 sensor), it brings the car from 157bhp to around 190bhp, which shows how restrictive that catalytic converter is. Regarding the MOT, it's technically illegal. Having spoke to my local garage, they mentioned that if a cat was present and it's now removed, it's a fail. However, the car still passes its emissions test without the manifold cat, and there's already one underneath the car where the tester would expect one. This means that, unless the tester is aware that there should be one on the manifold, it would pass. With the heat shields back in place it's almost invisible, so I have no concern of it passing an MOT.
I'm just waiting for warmer weather and longer days to fit this. I've heard it'll be a little tricky, so I'd rather take my time when it's warm. I also need a re-map shortly after as I won't be using one of the original O2 sensors (to check if the cat was working on the original unit), so that needs to be programmed out, as well as to re-tune the ECU with more airflow in mind. Very much looking forward to this.
Speaking of waiting for warmer weather; I haven't been using the car much flately or obvious reasons. These cars don't take kindly to road salt and water, and I'm not a huge fan of the swiss cheese approach to sub frames.
A day or two after the snow cleared, I took the car to the shops. A slow start naturally, but taking the long way to the store would help. Unfortunately, the battery decided to give up the ghost at a store car park with the freezing weather we've been having. No zoom zoom's anymore with this battery.
I picked up a Yuasa 5000 Silver battery that was in my local Halfords, dropped it in the next morning and all is well.
Ish. Since swapping the battery, whenever I come off the throttle and let the revs drop to idle, they drop a little too low, and the car feels like it wants to stall before it finds its natural idling RPM again. Aside from this, the car drives fine. I've driven it about a week now to see if it needed to re-learn air/fuel ratios, but it's no different.
Some investigation is needed...
In all honesty, I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. It's great that I haven't needed to spend anything on it, but there's been little time or chance to do anything else. I still drive it every week though.
The yellow bulbs have been swapped out with the 5000k xenon's once again (I enjoyed pretending I was a WEC endurance racer for all of 2 weeks). I've also removed the stickers from the bumper so that it's back to a clean look again.
I spent the rest of the summer enjoying the car for what it was, went to the odd meet or two, but honestly 2022 has been a crazy busy year (for some amazing reasons), so there just hasn't been much time to work on the car.
A quick meet with Felix and his C6 last year made me realise how hilariously small my car is.
One modification I wanted to make were spacers. Unfortunately, there's a minimum width of 25mm that you have to use if you are to use the standard NC wheels. With no gaps in the back of the wheel for the original studs to protrude into, you'll need a spacer that creates a flush face for the wheel to sit on, hence the 25mm minimum width. Ideally I'd go for 15mm or 20mm, but I'll re-visit this in the future. For now, I was happy to try 25mm.
Ian (the blue MX-5 track car thread) was kind enough to sell me his Eibach 25mm spacers due to his wider tyres rubbing on the arches. I'm running the standard 205/45/17 tyres here, so shouldn't have an issue. I did worry about them on the track, but with the negative camber I'm running I've heard it would be fine. Time will tell...
It's worth noting that the suspension needed time to settle, so the camber and height are a little off. After a day or two, the car now sits like this:
I must admit, I think the look of that is great. It seems to suit the fenders of the NC that much better.
Now then. One of the biggest N/A performance modifications you can do to these cars is to replace the manifold. The NC has two catalytic converters, one in its usual place underneath the car, and another that's on the exhaust manifold itself. Not only is this additional cat quite restrictive, it's horrendously designed in regards to airflow.
You can clearly see from the photo how restrictive this is in regards to airflow, with all four pipes being pinched into the size of a postage stamp before they enter the catalytic converter.
De-cat manifolds for the NC can be quite expensive, so I spent months searching for a good used one, right up until I found a brand new one on Ebay for £250:
I messaged the seller to find out more information about this manifold. The seller was lovely and went out of his way to post the item, even to their own expense. They mentioned:
"They're British made, a company that was in Oxford/Bicester that used to make exhaust systems for all sort of race cars, F1, custom stuff etc. They've since ceased trading I learned. They're nicely made items, the welding is all tig. Its a 'Chris Tullet' unit. It seems they are now 'CTE advanced technologies'."
A brand new de-cat manifold for £250 by a company that's made exhaust systems for F1 in previous years... yup, looks like that's the find of the century.
It arrived a few days later, and the build quality is outstanding.
Replacing this with a de-cat manifold makes a huge difference. Coupled with a remap (needed to code out the O2 sensor), it brings the car from 157bhp to around 190bhp, which shows how restrictive that catalytic converter is. Regarding the MOT, it's technically illegal. Having spoke to my local garage, they mentioned that if a cat was present and it's now removed, it's a fail. However, the car still passes its emissions test without the manifold cat, and there's already one underneath the car where the tester would expect one. This means that, unless the tester is aware that there should be one on the manifold, it would pass. With the heat shields back in place it's almost invisible, so I have no concern of it passing an MOT.
I'm just waiting for warmer weather and longer days to fit this. I've heard it'll be a little tricky, so I'd rather take my time when it's warm. I also need a re-map shortly after as I won't be using one of the original O2 sensors (to check if the cat was working on the original unit), so that needs to be programmed out, as well as to re-tune the ECU with more airflow in mind. Very much looking forward to this.
Speaking of waiting for warmer weather; I haven't been using the car much flately or obvious reasons. These cars don't take kindly to road salt and water, and I'm not a huge fan of the swiss cheese approach to sub frames.
A day or two after the snow cleared, I took the car to the shops. A slow start naturally, but taking the long way to the store would help. Unfortunately, the battery decided to give up the ghost at a store car park with the freezing weather we've been having. No zoom zoom's anymore with this battery.
I picked up a Yuasa 5000 Silver battery that was in my local Halfords, dropped it in the next morning and all is well.
Ish. Since swapping the battery, whenever I come off the throttle and let the revs drop to idle, they drop a little too low, and the car feels like it wants to stall before it finds its natural idling RPM again. Aside from this, the car drives fine. I've driven it about a week now to see if it needed to re-learn air/fuel ratios, but it's no different.
Some investigation is needed...
That manifold looks very nice. I'd be interested to hear the difference it makes. I've got a few bits if like to do to mine now that it is mine (for the last 9 or so years it was my wife's daily, including during the time since our first child was born, alas no good with 2 kids, so we bought my grans Jazz off her and the 5 now lives in the garage!). I need to do coilovers of some description, that is a genuine NEED! One of the rear shocks had an advisory for dampness, so coilovers at half the price of OE is a no brainer. After that I am considering a bit more power, but nothing too much, just a bit more pep and willingness.
I've had a few dead batteries in the 5 over the years, and just driving it does take a surprisingly long time so sort the idling fuelling out. It needs a decent amount of time at idle, which it doesn't really get when driving normally. The last time mine was doing it I left it running in my works carpark for 30 mins and that pretty much got it. Obviously not ideal if it's not parked somewhere secure though.
I've had a few dead batteries in the 5 over the years, and just driving it does take a surprisingly long time so sort the idling fuelling out. It needs a decent amount of time at idle, which it doesn't really get when driving normally. The last time mine was doing it I left it running in my works carpark for 30 mins and that pretty much got it. Obviously not ideal if it's not parked somewhere secure though.
gazzarose said:
That manifold looks very nice. I'd be interested to hear the difference it makes. I've got a few bits if like to do to mine now that it is mine (for the last 9 or so years it was my wife's daily, including during the time since our first child was born, alas no good with 2 kids, so we bought my grans Jazz off her and the 5 now lives in the garage!). I need to do coilovers of some description, that is a genuine NEED! One of the rear shocks had an advisory for dampness, so coilovers at half the price of OE is a no brainer. After that I am considering a bit more power, but nothing too much, just a bit more pep and willingness.
I've had a few dead batteries in the 5 over the years, and just driving it does take a surprisingly long time so sort the idling fuelling out. It needs a decent amount of time at idle, which it doesn't really get when driving normally. The last time mine was doing it I left it running in my works carpark for 30 mins and that pretty much got it. Obviously not ideal if it's not parked somewhere secure though.
I'll hopefully have it fitted in the next few weeks. It should make a notable difference by itself, but with the future remap it would hopefully release a lot more power out of it.I've had a few dead batteries in the 5 over the years, and just driving it does take a surprisingly long time so sort the idling fuelling out. It needs a decent amount of time at idle, which it doesn't really get when driving normally. The last time mine was doing it I left it running in my works carpark for 30 mins and that pretty much got it. Obviously not ideal if it's not parked somewhere secure though.
That's a fair shout with the coilovers. I'd have gone down the same route, but as all of my shocks were brand new when I bought the car, it seemed a shame to remove them. I loved the damping of the original shocks, but wanted a little less roll and a little less ride height. Hence, the springs and ARB's.
Thanks for the tip with the battery, I'll give it a long idle later today and I'll see how it goes!
Cambs_Stuart said:
The welding on that manifold does look really good. And that's a really nice jump in power for a re-map and some exhaust work on a N/A car. How much more power can you make before you're into uprated cams, forced induction or MOT failing cat removal?
4 into 1 manifold and a remap is always around 175-180hp crank on these. Crucially you get full throttle opening in 1-3rd gear too. They feel substantially quicker than stock.
The manifold adds the character, the remap makes the power.
I've been modding my other MX-5. Added the stripes so that it matches the real thing. Yes, I'm sad.
Anyway. I've noticed that my oil temperature isn't getting up to running temp at all lately. Even after some hard driving, it doesn't get over low 70's. This is the oil temperature read-out after 40 minutes driving:
The water temperature gauge is somewhat normal, although I have seen it dip below half now and again.
Knowing that the water gauge spits out as much truth as Trump, I thought I'd order another thermostat and replace it for peace of mind.
£16(!!) later for a brand new unit.
Interesting to see the logo buffed off. These are normally around £50, so I'm not surprised.
While draining the coolant, I noticed these small black marks which I think is rubber.
I'm guessing a hose is deteriorating somewhere? From the outside they all look fine. Haven't got much of a choice but to continue until one fails, though hopefully that doesn't happen.
Removal of the pipe work to access the throttle body is dead easy. I'm quite surprised to see how clean this is.
It's a little dirtier on the other side, so a quick clean is always a good idea at this stage.
After 20 minutes of yoga, I managed to get into position to remove all three bolts from the thermostat, and off it popped. The only issue with the whole job is the tight access to the bolts, not that it's hard to reach, but they're hard to catch when removing (and hold when screwing back in) in case you drop them, so an extendable magnet here is a must.
New left, old right. The longer thermostats are the uprated versions, apparently.
The old one looked fine. I've never quite understood how these fail...
I didn't have any FL22 coolant on me, and wanted to head to North Wales the next day in the car, so I decided to filter the rubber bits out of the coolant and re-use it.
I hand-pumped the majority of it back into the car, avoiding the bits, then filtered the rest.
After 30 minutes of driving, this was the read-out:
Lovely. Looks like it was indeed a bad thermostat.
The car was cleaned up, ready for a drive to North Wales the next day.
If anyone's driven these roads (mainly A470, but diverting off now and again for some fun), you'll know how good this journey is.
The weather was beautiful, so it's a perfect day for it!
I stopped off at Betws-y-Coed; a beautiful little town with some seriously gorgeous scenery.
It's definitely a car I look back twice at.
I really love those proportions. The arches wrapped around the wheels, and how stumpy that ass is.
Stopped off to say hi to my parents, who were staying in North Wales at the time.
I keep looking at how 'busy' the numberplates on this car are. Ignore the filth from the drive.
Borders, slogans, badges, etc. I'd rather have something quite clean and simple.
Like these!
That should look better.
Some double sided tape was applied that had more power than god.
Far, far cleaner.
The drive to North Wales and back got me thinking about what I'd like next on the car. I'll be fitting the manifold tomorrow, but the drive made me realise that safety really needs to be the next thing. I had one hell of a time on those roads, but having a creative brain, am always thinking about the 'what if' side of things.
With that justification and man maths, I placed an order for this:
A GCFabrications NC GC2 roll bar. Accelebrate has one on his, and the build quality seems second to none. I did a little bit of research and these seem to be a great option. They have a video of an MX-5 being dropped from 10m onto its roof multiple times, and the bar doesn't move an inch. The car actually bends slightly around the bar, with no deformation of the cockpit area at all. Having saw the video, I gave them a call as they stated 'On Backorder' on their website.
Lovely guy, super happy to help and to answer any questions. He's mentioned that they have a few coming in next week, so the turn around of this should be pretty fast. If it's before July, I'm happy, as that may be an Anglesey track day!
Anyway. I've noticed that my oil temperature isn't getting up to running temp at all lately. Even after some hard driving, it doesn't get over low 70's. This is the oil temperature read-out after 40 minutes driving:
The water temperature gauge is somewhat normal, although I have seen it dip below half now and again.
Knowing that the water gauge spits out as much truth as Trump, I thought I'd order another thermostat and replace it for peace of mind.
£16(!!) later for a brand new unit.
Interesting to see the logo buffed off. These are normally around £50, so I'm not surprised.
While draining the coolant, I noticed these small black marks which I think is rubber.
I'm guessing a hose is deteriorating somewhere? From the outside they all look fine. Haven't got much of a choice but to continue until one fails, though hopefully that doesn't happen.
Removal of the pipe work to access the throttle body is dead easy. I'm quite surprised to see how clean this is.
It's a little dirtier on the other side, so a quick clean is always a good idea at this stage.
After 20 minutes of yoga, I managed to get into position to remove all three bolts from the thermostat, and off it popped. The only issue with the whole job is the tight access to the bolts, not that it's hard to reach, but they're hard to catch when removing (and hold when screwing back in) in case you drop them, so an extendable magnet here is a must.
New left, old right. The longer thermostats are the uprated versions, apparently.
The old one looked fine. I've never quite understood how these fail...
I didn't have any FL22 coolant on me, and wanted to head to North Wales the next day in the car, so I decided to filter the rubber bits out of the coolant and re-use it.
I hand-pumped the majority of it back into the car, avoiding the bits, then filtered the rest.
After 30 minutes of driving, this was the read-out:
Lovely. Looks like it was indeed a bad thermostat.
The car was cleaned up, ready for a drive to North Wales the next day.
If anyone's driven these roads (mainly A470, but diverting off now and again for some fun), you'll know how good this journey is.
The weather was beautiful, so it's a perfect day for it!
I stopped off at Betws-y-Coed; a beautiful little town with some seriously gorgeous scenery.
It's definitely a car I look back twice at.
I really love those proportions. The arches wrapped around the wheels, and how stumpy that ass is.
Stopped off to say hi to my parents, who were staying in North Wales at the time.
I keep looking at how 'busy' the numberplates on this car are. Ignore the filth from the drive.
Borders, slogans, badges, etc. I'd rather have something quite clean and simple.
Like these!
That should look better.
Some double sided tape was applied that had more power than god.
Far, far cleaner.
The drive to North Wales and back got me thinking about what I'd like next on the car. I'll be fitting the manifold tomorrow, but the drive made me realise that safety really needs to be the next thing. I had one hell of a time on those roads, but having a creative brain, am always thinking about the 'what if' side of things.
With that justification and man maths, I placed an order for this:
A GCFabrications NC GC2 roll bar. Accelebrate has one on his, and the build quality seems second to none. I did a little bit of research and these seem to be a great option. They have a video of an MX-5 being dropped from 10m onto its roof multiple times, and the bar doesn't move an inch. The car actually bends slightly around the bar, with no deformation of the cockpit area at all. Having saw the video, I gave them a call as they stated 'On Backorder' on their website.
Lovely guy, super happy to help and to answer any questions. He's mentioned that they have a few coming in next week, so the turn around of this should be pretty fast. If it's before July, I'm happy, as that may be an Anglesey track day!
Edited by geraintthomas on Saturday 8th April 01:19
Edited by geraintthomas on Saturday 8th April 01:20
Cambs_Stuart said:
That is a handsome car. I think the rollover bar is a good idea. What's involved with fitting. Do you have to drill into the body?
Surprisingly it's a simple bolt-in job that uses the same mounting points as the original. There's one or two nuts that need replacing but other than that it's not too bad. It's the seatbelt mounting that I think needs some attention as I don't think it comes with the holes.Manifold time
I've been putting this off for some time, but I finally got round to doing the job.
Underneath the five (FIVE) heat shields lies the primary cat. With the heat shield bolts being rusty (even at 56,000 miles) and the cat being quite large for the space it's in, I was expecting this to be a tricky job. I wasn't wrong.
The heat shield needed to come off, and for some bizarre reason, Mazda bolted this from the bottom, rather than from the top.
No go, the bolt is still out of reach. Luckily a 10mm flexi-head ratchet spanner is your friend here, thanks to a friend for recommending it.
Onto the second heat shield. Two bolts came out easily, then there was one at the rear in an awful place that decided to round off when I finally reached it with a flexi-head spanner. The bolt was rusted to the shield, but turning.
Oh fun. I had to hit it with a chisel to snap the heat shield off the bolt.
There's a heat shield underneath the manifold pipes, as you can see. Again, this put up a fight, but not half as bad as the last.
Next up is the O2 sensor removal.
The original intention was to remove this, but...
That's almost impossible to fit a ratchet to that, so that sensor has to stay on.
Should be enough room to come out now though, right?
No.
The steering column is blocking it.
Well, looks like I'll have to move the engine by unbolting the engine mount and jacking it up. Thankfully, that gave me enough room to clear the steering column.
So it can come out now, right?
No.
Thanks to another heat shield bolt that's rounded off, I can't lift the thing out without it hitting the back of the alternator.
I found it impossible to reach the bolts for the alternator (I pray that this never fails), so I removed the rear casing of it instead.
Surely it can come out now?
With the alternator cover removed and the engine tilted, it finally came out.
Quite a difference
I had to stop at this point. My back was in bits, and decided to continue the next day.
To give myself a bit of a break, I extended the pre-cat O2 sensor wiring; required to complete the job. I did consider purchasing more wire, but as I understand these can be quite picky about gauge and resistance. As I wasn't using the post-cat O2 any more, I decided to use its original wiring.
The plan is to mix these two together.
Cable ties hold back the heat proof wrapping
As clean of a soldering job as I could possibly do
You'd never guess.
The spring-loaded bolts at the bottom of the original manifold needed to be removed
I realised I was un-bolting these the wrong way, as those nuts aren't exactly supposed to move. Still, I managed to snap them off.
Thankfully there's no need to use the nuts again, as the new manifold has threaded holes
All ready to go on.
Ish
Didn't quite fit on one hole. I used a round file and quite literally only had to file for about 20 seconds before it would fit after the second attempt so nothing major here.
That looks quite spicy that.
It was a nightmare to get the alternator cover back on. You couldn't fit it before putting the manifold in, as the manifold would hit it. After the manifold was fitted, there was barely enough room to reach. And if that wasn't bad enough, the rear cover has a rubber seal, which made it impossible for it to fit back on without loosening the alternator.
Which I didn't do. I decided to file back a tiny protruding part of the engine block that was causing the cover not to fit properly. Man math.
Aluminium tape ensures that heat shouldn't be an issue here.
It's in! I wish I could keep it like this.
I decided to bolt the heat shield back on from the top this time, like a normal human being.
Barely noticeable.
Firstly, a big thanks to Accelebrate for putting up with my constant pestering, as he'd already completed the job, seemingly more straightforward than my experience. I owe you a beer or seven.
First impressions when starting the car; absolutely no difference in sound. It sounded identical to stock on start-up and idle, which isn't a bad thing at all. The sound does open up quite a bit upon driving though, with a throaty tone and the (subtle) sound of air through the pipes under wide-open throttle.
The performance was much more noticeable than the sound, though. For starts, the engine is far more eager to rev, and also to loose its revs too, making for some easy heal and toe.
The CEL is due to the post-cat O2 sensor no longer being used - I'll get it mapped out.
The torque improvement is very welcome, being more noteable between 2-4k. I found myself not having to change down as often to get moving, which was a huge flaw in the performance before. This is without the remap, so I should see some lovely gains when the car gets re-mapped.
A quick trip to my local Mazda dealer to take it for a test drive, and to buy some FL22 coolant
Is there any better colour than this..
I've been putting this off for some time, but I finally got round to doing the job.
Underneath the five (FIVE) heat shields lies the primary cat. With the heat shield bolts being rusty (even at 56,000 miles) and the cat being quite large for the space it's in, I was expecting this to be a tricky job. I wasn't wrong.
The heat shield needed to come off, and for some bizarre reason, Mazda bolted this from the bottom, rather than from the top.
No go, the bolt is still out of reach. Luckily a 10mm flexi-head ratchet spanner is your friend here, thanks to a friend for recommending it.
Onto the second heat shield. Two bolts came out easily, then there was one at the rear in an awful place that decided to round off when I finally reached it with a flexi-head spanner. The bolt was rusted to the shield, but turning.
Oh fun. I had to hit it with a chisel to snap the heat shield off the bolt.
There's a heat shield underneath the manifold pipes, as you can see. Again, this put up a fight, but not half as bad as the last.
Next up is the O2 sensor removal.
The original intention was to remove this, but...
That's almost impossible to fit a ratchet to that, so that sensor has to stay on.
Should be enough room to come out now though, right?
No.
The steering column is blocking it.
Well, looks like I'll have to move the engine by unbolting the engine mount and jacking it up. Thankfully, that gave me enough room to clear the steering column.
So it can come out now, right?
No.
Thanks to another heat shield bolt that's rounded off, I can't lift the thing out without it hitting the back of the alternator.
I found it impossible to reach the bolts for the alternator (I pray that this never fails), so I removed the rear casing of it instead.
Surely it can come out now?
With the alternator cover removed and the engine tilted, it finally came out.
Quite a difference
I had to stop at this point. My back was in bits, and decided to continue the next day.
To give myself a bit of a break, I extended the pre-cat O2 sensor wiring; required to complete the job. I did consider purchasing more wire, but as I understand these can be quite picky about gauge and resistance. As I wasn't using the post-cat O2 any more, I decided to use its original wiring.
The plan is to mix these two together.
Cable ties hold back the heat proof wrapping
As clean of a soldering job as I could possibly do
You'd never guess.
The spring-loaded bolts at the bottom of the original manifold needed to be removed
I realised I was un-bolting these the wrong way, as those nuts aren't exactly supposed to move. Still, I managed to snap them off.
Thankfully there's no need to use the nuts again, as the new manifold has threaded holes
All ready to go on.
Ish
Didn't quite fit on one hole. I used a round file and quite literally only had to file for about 20 seconds before it would fit after the second attempt so nothing major here.
That looks quite spicy that.
It was a nightmare to get the alternator cover back on. You couldn't fit it before putting the manifold in, as the manifold would hit it. After the manifold was fitted, there was barely enough room to reach. And if that wasn't bad enough, the rear cover has a rubber seal, which made it impossible for it to fit back on without loosening the alternator.
Which I didn't do. I decided to file back a tiny protruding part of the engine block that was causing the cover not to fit properly. Man math.
Aluminium tape ensures that heat shouldn't be an issue here.
It's in! I wish I could keep it like this.
I decided to bolt the heat shield back on from the top this time, like a normal human being.
Barely noticeable.
Firstly, a big thanks to Accelebrate for putting up with my constant pestering, as he'd already completed the job, seemingly more straightforward than my experience. I owe you a beer or seven.
First impressions when starting the car; absolutely no difference in sound. It sounded identical to stock on start-up and idle, which isn't a bad thing at all. The sound does open up quite a bit upon driving though, with a throaty tone and the (subtle) sound of air through the pipes under wide-open throttle.
The performance was much more noticeable than the sound, though. For starts, the engine is far more eager to rev, and also to loose its revs too, making for some easy heal and toe.
The CEL is due to the post-cat O2 sensor no longer being used - I'll get it mapped out.
The torque improvement is very welcome, being more noteable between 2-4k. I found myself not having to change down as often to get moving, which was a huge flaw in the performance before. This is without the remap, so I should see some lovely gains when the car gets re-mapped.
A quick trip to my local Mazda dealer to take it for a test drive, and to buy some FL22 coolant
Is there any better colour than this..
geraintthomas said:
Firstly, a big thanks to Accelebrate for putting up with my constant pestering, as he'd already completed the job, seemingly more straightforward than my experience. I owe you a beer or seven.
No problem at all, glad you got there in the end. I felt a bit bad for suggesting it was a relatively straightforward swap - with the bolts on my heatshields coming out relatively easily, along with the sensors I managed to get both manifolds out and in without touching the engine mounts or the alternator cover.Flex head ratcheting spanners are such a godsend for this job!
Gassing Station | Readers' Cars | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff