It’s taken a while, I know, but we’re ALMOST there. Here’s what’s been fixed or replaced since day 1!

External Bits

The tinted tail-lights had to be replaced, and the headlights needed to be de-fogged.

Whilst this wasn’t relevant to the roadworthy, the carbon-fibre sticker over the third party fuel flap looked terrible, AND it was jamming against the body. This turns out to be because it didn’t actually suit the car – it looks like the one that was fitted was meant to be for a car with the fuel filler cap on the other side.

The only way to get it to align properly was to mount it upside down to the way it was originally fitted. But that meant that the internal bit that had the carbon fibre sticker on it no longer aligned with all the mounting holes. I’m putting that on the ‘todo’ list for the moment – at least it’s secure and doesn’t look terrible any more!

Mazda supplied new taillights ($380 each – ouch!) and defogged the headlights ($85 – much better).

Internal parts

I discovered that I am totally useless without a car kit for my phone, and Android Auto in my car. So that was one of the first things that happened. (Where it now says ‘MyRX8.com.au’ it used to display the CD number, Track number, and time. Who uses CDs any more??)

I also discovered that this car USED to have a factory navigation system in it, that had been removed (possibly because it was broken?), as all the cabling was there – I consider myself AMAZINGLY LUCKY, as only a couple of hundred S1’s in Australia were sold with OEM Navigation! I managed to dig up a replacement plastic and screen to go here, and that’s on my list of things to put back in place. I also added a front and rear camera – the front because this car is so low, I’m afraid of hitting parking bollards!

Mazda came to the party on replacing the passenger side airbag cover. It was really badly cracked after they replaced the passenger airbag due to the recall, and they replaced it under warranty.

Keys

Something that worried me was that the car only came with one key. To add ANOTHER key, you need two working keys, or, you need to prove you own the car to Mazda, and they will add it, or (and guess which one I picked?) you need to hack on your cars ECU. I ordered a basic transponder key from eBay ($8 or so), and had it cut at the local locksmith. They offered to program it to the car, but me being the nerd I am, I used FORScan to remove all the old keys (there were 4 registered to the car!) and add it and the flip key I was given with the car to the ECU, so now there’s only 2, and the old owner(s) can’t drive away in it!

Mechanical

The other problem was the P2295 error. I had one go, hoping it was just a bad connection, but no luck. The CEL came back on.

This was fixed by me spending a saturday replacing ALL the solenoids at the back of the Upper Intake Manifold

Now, hopefully, I’m FINALLY ready to get that magic bit of paper! Once the car is transferred, I’m going to move the G33K plates from the Van, and then I’ll start mapping out all the cool FOSS things that can be done to cars these days!