mangos' SE

mangos · Postby **mangos** » Sun Jul 27, 2014 11:45 pm

Hey everyone! My name is Arthur and I have been a long time MX5 fan (and lurker on this forum). I've always wanted one. Before I had enough funds to buy another car, I was looking at 10AEs for a while. After convincing my girlfriend (at the time) to buy a NB8A and spending a fair bit of time driving it, I decided that an MX5 with that bit of extra power would be perfect!

I started looking into SPs and SEs and did some research. I had a list of things that I would do to an SE to make it an awesome package in my mind. I saw it as a car with a great deal of potential, given that Mazda sealed off a lot of it! However, the S2000 also came into my mind and I was torn 50/50 between the two cars. It came down to whichever car had a good example for sale first.

I live in VIC and whilst browsing this forum one day, I saw Tom's SE thread and his EOI post. I was immediately attracted to the car and the list of mods (most of which was on my list too!). I immediately contacted Tom... a plane ticket to QLD, a lovely day with Tom (thank you so much again for helping me out on the day!), a $1000 tow from QLD to VIC later... and the car is mine, safe and sound at home!

I haven't had many cars before the SE. In fact I've only really had one street car since obtaining my licence. It's a 1989 Honda Prelude. This one is especially sentimental to me as I have re-shelled it which taught me many many things about cars. I wrote the first one off 1 month after obtaining my licence (invaluable lesson learnt!) and re-shelling was probably the cheapest and best option for me at the time. I added coilovers, fatter swaybars, sloted rotors and Hawk HPSs, STBs, Recaro SR3s and a Kakimoto catback to make it a very enjoyable car to drive.

His name is Junior and I intend to keep him for as long as I can.

My stepdad and I also have an ongoing project. It's a Series 4 FC RX7. We entered it into the 2013 WTAC but unfortunately, the car wasn't running very well at all with constantly overflowing catch-cans, missing when coming onto boost and other little problems. At the moment, it is making 395kW at the rear wheels on E85 with 20psi. It's definitely a handful (for me anyway!). Just a few little things to do before we drive it again!

So, onto the SE! I have owned the car for over a month now and I am thoroughly enjoying it! I have started tinkering and doing little things that I had planned for it to make it a car that suits my liking even more.

During the long journey here (credits to Victa (Umbrella Towing), highly recommend him if anyone needs a vehicle transported interstate)

I noticed that the doors weren't aligned with the striker plates at all, made me cringe every time I went to open or close the doors :cry:

so... one of the first things I did was align both doors!

and a little detail...

I also noticed that the rear tyres had very slight marks from rubbing against the lip on the rear guards, so out comes my guard roller!

I like to maintain the untouched look from the outside so I 'curled' the lip up rather than fold it flat. I don't believe in rolling/pumping guards more than you need to. Here's what they ended up looking like.

A good friend of mine recently purchased a Mariner Blue NA6. He was in the market for new wheels and was digging the look of mine. Although the bronze 6ULs looked great on the SE, I think they would suit his Blue NA a lot more!... So I ordered some 15x8 +32 Buddyclub P1 SFs. Yep, literally 'overnight parts' from NSW haha!

I intend to track this car sometime soon and, conveniently, Yokohama is doing a buy 3 get 4th free deal on all their tyres! (it ends at the end of this month!) My friend and I both ordered a fresh set of AD08Rs in 205/50/15. The I got the KU36s taken off the 6ULs to go on the Prelude.

I wasn't 100% sure about the choice of finish on the wheels but it is definitely growing on me rapidly.

I also had a Velo GP90 bolted in the driver's side of the Prelude and absolutely love it so I ordered some GarageStar rails to get it in the SE. The Prelude is now back to twin Recaro SR3s

Made sure I wasn't mounting the rails on top of the carpet!

Boy was it a tight fit! The seat cannot move anywhere right now, it is touching the floor, the centre tunnel and the door card! I even had to file down the rear bolts for the rails so that the seat can slide back.

But luckily, the position that it is in is perfect for me (Pipi seems happy too!).

I'll definitely have some more bits and pieces to add to this thread soon! Although I am trying to resist spending too much money on this car, I think the bug has definitely bitten me pretty hard!

Thanks for reading and I hope to speak to some other fellow mx5cartalk'ers soon!

Cheers,
Arthur

Postby **Okibi** » Mon Jul 28, 2014 12:42 am

Looks great, RX7 is pretty impressive too.

Welcome.

ManiacLachy · Postby **ManiacLachy** » Mon Jul 28, 2014 9:03 am

Great buy my friend :wink:

I breifly considered this car around the same time as you, however VR wasn't for me. Ironicly I ended up buying an SE down in Victoria and driving it back to Brisbane.

You've made some nice changes to an already pretty sorted car, the MX-5s and SEs in particular, IMO, have so many options to individualise the car and make it your own, and unique to all the others. I think you're going to be very happy. Those wheels look great.

Nice looking Prelude, and that RX-7 looks mean! :twisted:

Juicy HiC · Postby **Juicy HiC** » Mon Jul 28, 2014 10:04 am

Congrats on a great buy. Nice to see another VR SE in Vic.

mangos · Postby **mangos** » Mon Jul 28, 2014 11:01 am

Thanks heaps guys!

ManiacLachy wrote:Great buy my friend I breifly considered this car around the same time as you, however VR wasn't for me. Ironicly I ended up buying an SE down in Victoria and driving it back to Brisbane.

You've made some nice changes to an already pretty sorted car, the MX-5s and SEs in particular, IMO, have so many options to individualise the car and make it your own, and unique to all the others. I think you're going to be very happy. Those wheels look great.

Nice looking Prelude, and that RX-7 looks mean!

Oh wow! One of us could have totally done the up and back trip, different cars each way haha! Yeah I was initially set on a Titanium one but the VR grew on me very quickly after seeing it in the sun! I see that you chose a Silver one, looks great! I was very tempted to simply start driving it home on the day that I was up in QLD but I had work over the weekend and didn't think I would make it in time (went up on a Friday)

. I totally agree on individualising the car, it's really an exercise of self-restraint for me!

Postby **tomli123001** » Mon Jul 28, 2014 11:11 am

Nice writing mate. Not sure about wheels. 6ul is about 1 kg lighter each corner than buddy club. Lockiel is on these also for the weight saving

mangos · Postby **mangos** » Mon Jul 28, 2014 12:06 pm

tomli123001 wrote:Nice writing mate. Not sure about wheels. 6ul is about 1 kg lighter each corner than buddy club. Lockiel is on these also for the weight saving

Cheers Tom! Yeah I must admit that I was a little 'form over function' with the Buddyclubs, I just have a soft spot for P1 SFs and I had an online voucher to spend which tempted me even more :oops:

.

Lokiel · Postby **Lokiel** » Mon Jul 28, 2014 12:37 pm

WHATTTT!!! You swapped out those gorgeous (and light) bronze 6ULs for Bloody Cubs???

OK, now that I'm ALMOST over that (in truth, I probably never will), congratulations on the purchase. IMO, Velocity Red looks much better in real life than in photos, especially when clean and the sun's out since they almost glow.

Aligning my doors after installing the Frog Arms was something I was very anal about too, it would have annoyed me each time I shut the door so was definitely worth the time to get them perfect.

Are you going to have any issues with RWC with the exposed air filter and Victoria's "Nanny State" mod mentality?

PS: I've got that same seat - when folded out it makes sliding around under the car so much easier (I've spent more time doing that than actually driving it in the last few months

)

Postby **tomli123001** » Mon Jul 28, 2014 3:36 pm

We played trick with VIC's system.

The VIC road website policy said "if the car was already registered in the person's name and then bring the car back to VIC, then RWC is not necessary". So I guess we got away from it by registering the car into Arthur's name while in QLD. QLD only requires garage address in QLD for the transfer to happen. So I claimed the car at my place.

I think it is a loop hole

mangos · Postby **mangos** » Thu Jul 31, 2014 6:23 pm

Lokiel wrote:WHATTTT!!! You swapped out those gorgeous (and light) bronze 6ULs for Bloody Cubs???

OK, now that I'm ALMOST over that (in truth, I probably never will), congratulations on the purchase. IMO, Velocity Red looks much better in real life than in photos, especially when clean and the sun's out since they almost glow.

Aligning my doors after installing the Frog Arms was something I was very anal about too, it would have annoyed me each time I shut the door so was definitely worth the time to get them perfect.

Are you going to have any issues with RWC with the exposed air filter and Victoria's "Nanny State" mod mentality?

PS: I've got that same seat - when folded out it makes sliding around under the car so much easier (I've spent more time doing that than actually driving it in the last few months )

Thanks Lokiel

HAHA! Yeah I was umm'ing and ahh'ing a lot before I purchase the Buddyclubs :roll:

Yep as Tom said above, we managed to put the car into my name in Queensland's transport authority and therefore into the national database. I only need a quick appointment at VicRoads here to transfer the registration over to VIC, no RWC or stamp duty (paid in QLD). Handy that the state of registration for QLD is the garaged address and not necessarily the residential address (that's how I interpreted it anyway).

With regard to exposed air filters, I believe that it is OK as long as it is a 'dry' type. They are worried about oiled ones catching on fire so those have to be enclosed. However, we have a stupid rule where only 1 intake mod is allowed... so whether it be a BOV, intercooler, CAI or turbo etc, you can only pick one...

mangos · Postby **mangos** » Mon Aug 25, 2014 6:28 pm

Just some small updates!

I really dig the look of letters on tyres, however, the AD08Rs don't have big ADVANS moulded on the sidewalls... so I decided to get crafty and made some stencils.

The OEM pedal covers were too slippery for my liking since the raised edges around the holes are worn flat. I've griptaped the pedals of my other cars so I decided to do the same here. So much better!

Before

After

I wasn't a fan of the chrome gauge holder. Stood out too much for my liking. I was thinking about plastidipping it but ended up using some vinyl wrap.

Before

After

More updates to come! Thanks for looking