Day Six

I forgot to mention in my last post about the mysterious object we found bolted under panel in the passenger footwell, right next to the ECU. There's no two ways about it. It was an orange. Thats right, a 17 year old orange. A man from mazda probably lost that from his lunch and never knew what happened to it. Well now we do, it was in my car :)

 

 Anyways, onto this week. The engine bay looks quite empty because myself and my dad took off the airbox which is a great big plastic thing going from one side of the bay to the other. We also removed the cover for the exhaust manifolds, so now you can see them. The whole exhaust has got to be replaced anyway so it had to be removed at some point. Well I say removed. One bolt was attached to a thin metal bracket, and it was so rusty that it just bent when I tried to turn the ratchet. So I just yanked it off :) Also part of the electrics for the starter motor came off, along with a cylindrical thing that I have no idea what it is, so best keep it for now.

End result is pleasing:

As you can see its just the brake and clutch hydralics and some fuses on the left that need to go now.  To that end yesterday I ordered a bleeding kit which will allow me to remove the hydraulic fluid. Then the only thing in there will be the engine, which with luck will fit snugly throught that there hole.

The steering rack has been half dealt with. The two ball joints have been disconnected, but the rack is still clamped in the middle with immovable bolts. Next time I go down I hope to get them off using my extendable wheel brace bar, should give me a bit more leverage.

At the other end the bumper came off with the application of some force, also I've started to disconnect the fuel lines from the bottom of the chassis, as I need to keep those.