**UPDATED** 1991 Rev 1 (Beastly V6 1MZ-FE VVTI) **UPDATED**

[juliankv73]

Hey Karl,

I must say they look better on your MR2 than they did my old Rev5!

Maybe due to my old Rev5 being black, and the highlighted parts are grey on the shades, ..but anyways, glad you like them and that Royal Mail didnt lose these and they now proudly adorn your car, rather than sitting in a padded envelope in the corner of my study for the last 5 years!

Nice thread, your 2 looks cool!

[blue2]

When you wax oiled your car did you wire brush the surface first or just spray it on? Thinking of doing the same with mine but not sure how to go about it.

[KarlBristol]

When you wax oiled your car did you wire brush the surface first or just spray it on? Thinking of doing the same with mine but not sure how to go about it.

Hi mate,

You need to wire brush the surface first in order to clean off debris and any rust, etc... Otherwise you are just trapping it under the surface of the waxoil

I use both a spray waxoil and a brush on version. I prefer the thicker paint on version but it does take longer than the spray. I think there's a good medium to be found if using both of them - the spray is good for hard to reach places

Any issues just give me a shout
It's relatively easy to use and is very effective

[KarlBristol]

Hey Karl,

I must say they look better on your MR2 than they did my old Rev5!

Maybe due to my old Rev5 being black, and the highlighted parts are grey on the shades, ..but anyways, glad you like them and that Royal Mail didnt lose these and they now proudly adorn your car, rather than sitting in a padded envelope in the corner of my study for the last 5 years!

Nice thread, your 2 looks cool!

Thak you very much mate; the car is nearer to its goal now
Sure theres plenty more to do ... Watch this space

[blue2]

Cheeers Karl, I'll give it a go over the weekend

[KarlBristol]

Well I've dragged myself outside once more to work on the car before I go back to work tomorrow

I had this delivered from magicbeans (there is still one more item I'm buying from him - watch this space )

Anyways; here is the item unpacked:





Both sides are fitted with what looks like new SPAL fans



So ... I dragged it all outside and then trecked down to the garage in order to set about fitting it to the car

Heres the old/original engine lid tray



I quickly set about removing it from the car - the only issue this left me with was trying to prop the engine lid up (I got around that by using the handle for my trolley jack, lol)



I then set about screwing the new one in place (this took some time to make sure I didn't destroy the threads in the holes)

Here it is part way through:



I screwed it all back and took a pic



I then set about fitting the gas ram and associated bracket. This should have been a relativley easy job, although one nut on the top mount just would not crack off gggrrr, lol. After some excessive swearing I managed to sort it.

I rubbed back the bracket, sprayed it up to match the car and fitted it. It looks original



Heres the gas ram doing its job properly:



Its got a lovely smooth action to it, and is so much more convenient than having to lift it all the way up and prop it up, lol.

I then cleaned the car very very quickly, and thought it would be rude not to take some photos of how ridiculously perfect the new paint is





Thats everything for this weekend as both of my rest days have now gone and I'm knackered! lol. Im off for a nap and to ponder what else to do to the car

[Magic Beans]

They look new because I stripped the whole thing and cleaned the hell out of it when I got it

They look great fitted, especially the sprayed bracket for the ram

[craig]

Good stuff Karl

Looks like someone has finally found a boot mat

[riot68]

great stuff as usual chap...

[wilki]

indeed ridiculously perfect new paint, looking nice fella

[KarlBristol]

Thanks for all of the kind comments - I'm well chuffed with the car, and the paint is lovely. Its slowly being transformed into the car I want it to be.

Roll on winter time when I can afford to have the rear resprayed aswell - that will be a full respray finished then Don't worry there will still be updates in the mean time

I have done a bit more to it since the last update, and also finally met up with Phil aka Magic Beans

All in all its been a great weekend so far with some good modifications, and some much needed drinks with Phil, lol


As previously eluded to I have found a Toyota boot mat in great condition:



And placed in the car:





My wheel nuts had been looking a bit sickly of late and so they needed to be replaced with new ones. As if out of no where, some nice new shiney ones got delivered:



The front wheels came off. At this stage I checked all of the bolts etc... in order to ensure that they were holding up properly since the front suspension swap. This also gave me a chance to check for leaks on the suspension and brake lines.



Everything was holding up perfectly. I then checked the frunk and found that I'd left loads of tools loose in there - hence the knocking from the front. lol

New nuts vs old nuts



New ones installed



The rears have been overtightened by the garage when I had the new rear tyres put on I managed to destroy my entire socket set trying to crack even one nut off with no joy! Thats clearly going to be left for another day lol

Phil arrived on Friday afternoon with a parcel or two for me and EOR there aren't even enough photos as I got distracted chatting, lol

It started with a set of new seats. So the old ones had to come out, I started with the drivers side:



It was amazingly dirty for my car and therefore the car vacuum came out, and some cleaning took place

The drivers seat got installed with minimal swearing and head scratching. IMO its looks so much better thatn the originals and I am very pleased with how it looks; a good combination of OEM and sports. OEM+ some might say





The other seat then came out, and they both got placed in the garage ready to be sold:



I then set about installing the passenger seat. This proved more difficult as two of the bolts (both on the same side) sheared off

The passenger seat got fixed in as best as possible whilst I thought about the best way to secure it in place the following day. Anyway here are how both of the seats look installed:









More than overjoyed with the seats. They are brilliantly comfortable and I know how much time and effort Phil put into making the custom brackets/frames. I can only thank him for selling them to me

Anyway that was everything on the car front for yesterday

Today I managed to convince the better half to let me buy a tap and die set in order to rectify the x2 seat bolts and their respective holes:



They were well and truly chewed before:



After some coaxing I managed to sort out all of the independant threads and fixed the seat in properly. It took some time but it was worth it as the seat now both fits securely and looks great

I also bought a set a diamond audio tweeters in rev3+ tweeter covers. These are some properly decent £150+ speakers, so I couldn't wait to start installing them. I thought it would be a case of pulling off the original wires and putting them on the new speakers, although nothing is ever easy with EOR! lol.

Here are the originals:



Here are the new ones:



I started by stripping out the original ones:



The cables were soldered onto the old speakers, so I simply snipped off the cables from the old speakers, with a view of making new clean ends and soldering them to the new speaker units.

Here is the old unit removed:



At this stage I pulled the cables up a bit in order to clean up the ends and give me some more slack to work with:



I pulled a little bit more to find that it wasn't attached to anything
I always thought the tweeters didn't work properly or were of increadibly poor sound quality, lol.

God only knows what the last owner was doing with my car, as I've sorted out some serious bodges! lol.

Whilst the cable was out of the car I decided it would be easiest to solder it to the speaker now (scrappy soldering I know, but it was quick! lol):





I have no idea why it wasn't connected up. Anyway, I obviously had to remove the door cards in order to rectify this situation. When I took the door card off I found that the previous owner had disconnected the tweeter cable connector and covered the end in red tape for some unknown reason. Its not even like they took it off and forgot to put it back - they must have done this for some reason but I have no idea why! lol



Anyway I put it back together, and connected it all up and it works brilliantly. Its amazing how much difference it makes up to having no sound coming out of them!





When I moved over to the other side though my heart sank. The previous owner had butchered one of the screws



I managed to snap the speaker out in order to remove it, and then I drilled the screw out after:





Here is a quick photo I took of both of the tweeters when I had them soldered up



I found the same blanked off connector on the passenger side:



Sorted out, and job done:





That was it for today, and so I took a quick chance to photowhore again as I fell in love with the seats:







Another great MR2 day
My thanks got to Phil for the parts

Pondering what else to get now lol

[ashley]

Good effort

[lemonyfresh]

That rain tray........ You keeping hold of it........?
Drop me a pm if you would consider selling, as my rev 5 could do with a nice new one.......

[Magic Beans]

Good to meet you on Friday buddy. The car looks great in the flesh, especially with those seats

A nice immaculate rev tubby lump would nice in there now

[craig]

Great stuff Karl, love this thread

[KarlBristol]

Thanks for all of the kind comments

As most of you know I've been having a long hard think about weather I sell EOR whilst saving for a cobra or tuscan. Or weather I keep her during the long hard save.

Whilst I'm still thinking about it ... potentially it looks like I might keep the car and drop a more powerful engine in there. Only problem is that I have to save for that aswell! lol. If anyone wants to donate a v6 engine to the cause then feel free, lol.

Anyway since my last update I seem to have been working solidly so I haven't had much time to do more to the car. Luck had it that I have today off though and its a cracking day out

It would therefore be rude not to do a bit more to it, lol

I started by having a raft of JDM MR2 documents delivered. Its an interesting and different read







I was particularly amused by the little sketches and drawings they include in the manual



I then spent 5 hours giving the car a damn good clean, polish and wax. I ensured that I properly cleaned the wheels

Following a thorough clean I tried out the ramps that I bought a while ago in an attempt to finish the underbody sealing:













Still not 100% on the front number plate. I wish we didn't have to have one on the front in the UK - its just such an eye sore! lol

Anyway... Here is how the underside started earlier today:







After a couple of hours, a steady hand and a very painful neck it ended up like this









A vast improvement that will keep the car kicking for a while yet

I also had this delivered in the post today, as there seems to be a complete lack of any decent drinks holders in the car





The drill is charging up as we speak and then its going to be fitted to the inside of the centre console unit between the seats

[jack-p]

Nice update, I think your documenting skills are far better than mine, after I looked at the photos I'd taken of undersealing the underneath of my car I realised they were all half finished photos!

I'm really interested to see how the drinks holder works in practice too, I'll be bringing a up to test it if we're still on for sunday Wether you realised or not, this does mean that anything you store in the cubby box will fall out if you decide to put a drink in the holder or not... well it should in theory anyway!

[Magic Beans]

Really pleased to hear you're keeping EOR, I think it's the right choice.

Drinks in the car though

[KarlBristol]

Really pleased to hear you're keeping EOR, I think it's the right choice.

Drinks in the car though

Thanks bud - I think it's the right thing to do. If I've come this far I may as well drop a new engine in and go the whole hog! Lol.

I'm thinking in case my passenger is so headstrong that they bring drinks in the car, lol. It's a safe means of transporting said drink to another area where it can be finished! Lol You should know I'd never allow drinking in eor! Lol

There should be lots of progress on the car tomorrow if the weather holds out

Now off to do some research in twobrutal

[StuRobinson88]

Now off to do some research in twobrutal

i may end up breaking my rev 3 V6 if i can't sell it, when i decide to.