323 GTX- The Refresh-ening!

Behold! one of the last unmodified 323 GTX's:

recently acquired for a steal from someone who did nt want to sell the car. Unfortunately for him, he was leaving the country for the foreseeable future. Unfortunately for me, i didn't get to know him before he left. I could tell he was an awesome guy and we would've gotten along extremely well. Hopefully he comes back someday. Anyways, on to the car!

It currently sits at 41,979 miles, and is unmodified except for brake pads (hawk street pads i think) and stainless brake lines. Yes, the brake feel is amazing.

The PO was in the process of fixing up things here and there that inevitably go wrong with near 30 year old cars, but the body is rust free, all the parts are there, and much of it looks like new (or no worse than any well maintained 40k mile car).

Here's the plan: The car survived this long stock, it's going to stay that way if at all possible. It has a couple mechanical issues like air in the clutch line and a hood release cable that is jammed or broken. The paint looks good aside from the front bumper (you can see it in the first pic if you look hard) but could use some polishing, and it could certainly use a cleaning. it looks fine in pics, but it's pretty dirty in person. Those pics are actually from when the PO picked the car up a few years back, but that was only 1k miles ago, and it's raining here so i can't get any updated ones. Besides, it doesn't look any different except for a AAA sticker in the window.

I want to fix anything that needs fixing first, then general tune up/maintenance things in case any were missed by the PO, then a whole bunch of detailing.

So on to the fixing stuff!

DON'T break the transmission!!!

This will be fun to watch. I love 80s car restorations and survivors, so this should be the best of both worlds.

Problem #1: i present you with the fuse box

Looks normal enough, but look inside:

The guy putting the battery in it when i was going to pick it up tried doing it backwards. POP went the fuse. unable to get the fuse out or find a replacement at that time, he twisted the sides together (after getting the battery in right this time).

pop open the sides, unscrew the fuse, clean up the connections a little (one looked like a spider got in there) and put the new one in:

Fixed!

Now onto the clutch. The line must have air in it. It can be driven, but it feels off. Pumping on the pedal fixes the problem briefly. Here's the engine shot again:

on the right side (from your perspective, drivers side i mean), you see the intake and the insanely restrictive flapper style airflow sensor. the transmission is under that, as is the bleed valve. Removing it was fairly easy:

unplug 3 things, remove like 3 nuts and a bolt, and it comes out. The air intake on the right of that comes off with 1 nut and is only attached to the air cleaner box, but it has to be disconnected to get the whole contraption out easily. Up to this point, the only tool i used was a 10mm socket. That's it. one of the nuts was mildly hard to remove without dropping because it's in a tight spot, other than that, it's easy street so far. nothing even stuck together. Some of the rubber washers and stuff look pretty cracked, but none are crusty or falling apart.

Under the intake, i found this:

Some dirt, a zip tie, some maple seeds, an acorn, and a dead monarch butterfly. Vacuuming and a little wiping up and it got a little better:

Still dirty, but no acorns. i'm not to the detailing stage yet, just trying to get the thing driving without problems. i'll come back to it later.

Bleeder valve is now very easily accessible. Enough to get a DSLR camera down in there for a detail shot:

The underside of this thing doesn't look quite as good at the outside, eh? Some wetness, maybe something is leaking. i hope there isn't a problem with any of these parts so far, but nothing was actively oozing, so that's a good sign i guess.

I don't have any pics of bleeding, my hands got a bit dirty and i didn't grab the camera. A few tiny TINY bubbles came out. It went together again as easily as it came apart.

Kinda. That one nut i talked about being hard to remove, well it's hard to put back on without dropping it. Since this thing has metal skid plates under the engine, i dropped it, heard the CLANK, and had to remove the intake again to find it. Yeah, metal. the black thing on the bottom of the bleeder valve pic isn't plastic, it's steel.

I then took an extended test run and it appears those little TINY bubbles were all it took to ruin clutch feel. it's fine now, the problem didn't come back over the course of my test run, which included perusing the mazda dealer lot to look for new miatas (none found :( ) and stopping at a butcher shop for what became dinner. Saw a real nice 944 turbo there, too.

I also put a license plate frame on the front using the existing bumper holes, shortened the screws so they wouldn't hit the bumper, and put the plate on, but that didn't warrant a 'fix' so i didn't take any pics.

NGTD wrote: DON'T break the transmission!!!

That's what i hear! This one is fine so far, and i don't plan on adding power or doing any racing, so i hope it stays that way! from what i hear, a transmission now is pretty much only replaced with an insane amount of luck (which i think i used up finding this car) or heaps of burning money to make custom parts.

Rufledt wrote:

NGTD wrote: DON'T break the transmission!!!

That's what i hear! This one is fine so far, and i don't plan on adding power or doing any racing, so i hope it stays that way! from what i hear, a transmission now is pretty much replaced with an insane amount of luck (which i think i used up finding this car) or heaps of burning money to make custom parts.

They are made of glass and unobtanium. I am willing to bet that there a few GTX rally cars parked due to the fact that they simply cannot find a used transmission. Treat it gently and enjoy.

Super neat find!

Cool ride. Yours has all the cojones that my autotragic 323 from highschool was missing. I remember getting let go from a speeding ticket as the policeman was so amused I had gotten the car to the rate of speed he pulled me over for...

Wow, it's crazy how clean that thing is.

You can't even find parts for the transmissions anymore; the 323gtx mailing list is full of guys with a bunch of parts cars all lacking the unshattered transmission they so desperately need.

ssswitch wrote: Wow, it's crazy how clean that thing is. You can't even find parts for the transmissions anymore; the 323gtx mailing list is full of guys with a bunch of parts cars all lacking the unshattered transmission they so desperately need.

I hope sombody someday will start making transmission parts for these. Granted the market will be very small, probably doesnt make sense financially to make parts for the handful that could still be drivable.

Very nice,up here if you'd pull'd the air meter you'd be able to see your feet instead of nice painted metal.

Mazda still has no idea how to build a car for the rust belt,even now mazda 3's last maybe 3 winters before the damage is done and the cars on a quick path to the bone yard.

Not sure if that is a time bomb or not with normal driving, but I absolutely love it!

Is this an aisin trans? If so, I recommend idemitsu fluid. We went through a ton of trans in our rx7 before going to this fluid. It is awesome!

Sweet ride! I bet it feels like you are more of a caretaker at this point than an owner.

323 GTXs are pretty cool cars. Nice find. Looking forward to see where this goes.

My GTX has been sitting for a few years. Transmission was chunky going into 2nd gear as long as I owned it(since about '94. I never got around to tearing it apart when parts might have been available now I'm sure I'm screwed. Maybe I can put my limited casting and machining skills to use making syncros...

I hope this one isn't a time bomb. from what i hear, the transmissions don't like abuse and lots of extra power, but something that can handle some rallying at 250hp (what some scca pro rally people were running in them) should be able to handle cruising around town occasionally for a good many years. This is fairly powerless in stock form compared to new cars, so i doubt the transmission is under a lot of stress in normal driving. It could still wear out at some point, but it's fine at the moment and i'm not going to be driving this very much.

RossD hit the nail on the head, i feel a bit more like a caretaker at this point. If i had one of these when i originally wanted one, i probably would've done my best WRC impression all winter until the car was wrecked and/or rusted away rapidly. Now that i actually have one, i want to keep it for a long time.

It's too bad the transmission is so fragile and unique. One of these days, somebody needs to start making some parts for these (and maybe beef them up a bit) to get some of them out on the road. It's too bad they didn't have more success in the WRC, i imagine more people would be wanting to preserve/restore them if they didn't get spanked by lancias and celicas quite so much.

What was the main design problem with these things? Seems like someone with lots of time, money, and skill could make a beefed up transmission for these things and probably sell a few as well.

There's transmissions that can work with enough time and/or money.

Fantastic find unfortunate that some of the parts may be hard to find.

kevlarcorolla wrote: Very nice,up here if you'd pull'd the air meter you'd be able to see your feet instead of nice painted metal. Mazda still has no idea how to build a car for the rust belt,even now mazda 3's last maybe 3 winters before the damage is done and the cars on a quick path to the bone yard.

the weird thing is, this is a rust belt car. i'm in upstate NY, previous owner was deeper upstate, he found the car in central PA. It must have been used as a summer car for the most part or there should be way more rust. If it was driven in salt, it wasn't much, or there would be far less car left. Even 40k miles, if year round, would get these pretty rusty i hear.

Swank Force One wrote: There's transmissions that can work with enough time and/or money.

That's what I hear. Unfortunately i don't have the extra money! I guess i'll have to just take care of this one!

Very cool find, enjoy it

Rufledt wrote: Behold! one of the last unmodified 323 GTX's:

NOPE! That is photoshopped, like the picture of Elvis meeting Bill Clinton or the Loch Ness Monster in an iPhone selfie. I don't believe it, a clean, rust-free, low-mileage, stock 323GTX does not exist. Nope nope nope. No way. Impossible.

wait, you mean they made 323s without rust? When did this happen, I mean I have only seen ones with rust and assumed they came from the factory with it.

That car is sooooo clean, I now know what envy feels like.

Secretly hoping I see this thing turned into a rally car in a couple years

java230 wrote: Secretly hoping I see this thing turned into a rally car in a couple years

Not this one, but if i had a second one (and a supply of parts) you can bet I would be rallying it!

Took it in to the Mazda dealer for an inspection today. It was the first time a mechanic asked if I could stick around a few minutes and talk about a car! I'm loving the way it drives more and more. I wouldn't call it sporty at all by modern standards, but the steering is heavy, the gas pedal feels like it's actually attached to something, and the brake feel is perfect. The shifter is still loose in the left-right dimension (i haven't looked into adjusting that yet) but it goes into gear perfectly.

I did notice a rattling sound from the engine. not loud, but enough to hear in a quiet car without working speakers. I knocked around underneath with my knuckle and it sounds like the skid plate thing under the passenger side of the engine rattles. I'll have to find where it's loose and tighten it down.

Confess. You have a time machine large enough to transport a car. That thing is unbelievably clean. Very cool project.