Hi all! Long-time lurker here. Been an OC member for only the latest couple of years of my ownership, but been pretty active on Nutz & the FB groups.
Selling my Supercharged mk2.5 mx5. 1.8VVT with Salon motorsport/BOFI M45 kit.
This car’s had my heart, soul and sweat poured into it over 6 years with obsessive caring, maintenance, modifications (nice ones!) and I thoroughly love the thing, sad to think of it going – Just selling because I’ve somewhat fallen out of love with it since upgrading to something else and it won’t get the care and usage it deserves. I’m also spending a lot of money renovating a house and could do with this cash for other things.
Has colour matching hardtop (with bag), and lots of extras and spares including the 4x 16”euphonic wheels with tyres if the price is right. (2 wheels sand-blasted back, all tyres OFF the wheels - will need the refurb finishing off - I ran out of time)
I’m not in a rush for the sale so won’t accept silly offers. I may end up keeping it if selling it doesn’t go well. I don’t see it losing too much value.
109k miles. All main/concerning engine & running gear maintenance has been upkept and done throughout its life with me. Good/expected condition. OEM/Subtle looking modifications.
MOT until April 2022.
Looking for around £4750 which of course included the hardtop etc. I’m open to reasonable offers.
Location is in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire.
Modifications/Extras - I’ve possibly missed some here so may add or clarify things if needed.
Mechanical/performance
Engine Bay:
M45 Supercharger with Kavs reduction pulley, with full Salon motorsport fitting kit. ME221 ECU tuned by Dale at Bailey Motorsport. 196whp. EGR blocked off. VVT tuned too. All fit and tuned in Q1 2020 just before COVID. He said I’d done a v. good job with all the fitting and installing 
OEM rx8 denso yellow injectors. Checked and tested/cleaned by blink motorsport.
NGK BKR7e spark plugs (or whatever the code is for the ones everyone used on forced induction engines!)
Mini bypass valve (the standard one everyone uses!) Vac lines neatly ran round the back. All operates perfectly and as expected. The power comes in quite abruptly but apparently that’s the way it is with these bypass valve/blowoff valve kits.
Twin-spring forge motorsport blow-to-atmosphere valve (for those special noises) - installed right next to the throttle body for efficient and quick release of pressure where it’s needed the most.
RAMair PRORAM big air intake. Hosed down to front area as seen in photos.
Toyosport thicker alloy radiator about 1 year old. Low mounted by remounting OEM lower brackets and then making/welding my own top brackets.
eBay top-entry/exit FMIC intercooler (very hard to find now!) with my own custom rails/brackets made across the front to keep it all solid and in-place. All bolts I used were high grade ones and I’m seeing minimal surface rust on anything after 18months.
Toyosport 2.25” piping kit cut and adjusted for my needs. With an assortment of required step up/down silicon joiners from the usual trusted suppliers. IAT right by throttle body using one of the push-through adapters from Merlin. Works perfectly. No silicon bends, all the bends are with solid piping. It’s a very snug and very solid fit without much room for any wiggling around or movement at all. Nothing rubs/scuffs and there’s no touching of any metal parts among the route so no worries of swarf or anything from vibrations.
My choice or radiator/FMIC meant I was about 1inch short on space for the OEM radiator fan to be kept so I had to replace that one with one from eBay – aimed for classic cars. The fitting kit worked a treat and it’s been great. No heat or cooling issues whatsoever, and I’ve been on a lot of long quick drives in this in the beginning of summer. Gets up to temperature nicely too and the blowers get hot very quickly like we’re all used to.
I took a lot of care, time, and attention with installing this so I did things solid, neat, and as ‘OEM’ feeling/looking as was possible (you can only do so much when adding a supercharger to an engine though eh?!). I also put fresh supercharger oil in the SC when I installed it, and gave it a nice coat of paint to match the engine!
Charcoal Canister is deleted too, but the loom kept and plugged in too keep sensors happy – Me221 maybe wouldn’t care anyway.
Cobalt Bonnet Lifting kit.
Headers/manifold is stock – the 4-2-1 on these is pretty good apparently and the clearance on the SC is fine. It’s got a ‘sports cat’ from an ebay seller, used, so can’t 100% vouch for that but it’s been fine. That joins to a straight pipe with no silencer (eBay seller, forget the name), then onto the cobalt single exit backbox. It sounds pretty nice I’ll admit. Can keep it quiet when you need to but makes a glorious noise when you want it to.
All ABS kept, Power steering kept, alarms and all the normal stuff kept. It’s actually a fairly OEM looking thing with a lot of the OEM niceties that it came with.
Other performance upgrades
Meister ‘Zeta Pro’ coilovers.
HEL Braided brake lines all round (ABS functioning as normal)
TR lane ‘TT’ Rollbar – wanted this one to retain one-armed roof operation. It worked .
OEM ‘big brakes’ as standard on these. Stripped/Refurbished with new pistons/sliders etc 3 years ago. New grooved&dimpled discs and Brembo pads fitted a few months ago.
Ultralite F1 15” wheels with 195/50/15 rainsport 5 tyres. (I have original Euphonic wheels. 2 stripped with a blaster. All 4 tyres too, which can go with the car if I’m happy with price)
Fuji diff blew on my in the first year of ownership so I installed a type 2 Torsen 4:1. Works perfectly and locks nicely.
Exterior/Aesthetic/Other upgrades
Ultralite F1 15” wheels with 195/50/15 rainsport 5 tyres – these are in pretty much perfect condition. Not one scuff on them. Look so good when clean.
OEM spoiler mounted with small bolts and some silicon to keep moisture away.
Smoked side lights. Remove ugly license plate plinth too.
Ford windscreen jet washers
G19 engineering (I think?!) Alloy windscreen washer tank relocated into scuttle area.
Replaced the foglight plastics with proper foglights for the visual improvement. They don’t work (aren’t wired in) but they don’t need to for MOT etc. Never had a problem in 4 years.
Headlights upgraded to some great LED bulbs. Had them in the car for about 4 years and still going strong. HB4 so main beam and dipped beam in one.
Interior Upgrades
White LED lights fitted all around the interior and dash panels. Instrument cluster white LED upgrades.
New JBL GT086 speakers installed in doors. Silent mat sticky coating applied to door inside to give a better sound.
Aftermarket Sony Head-unit with Bluetooth audio, calls, usb stick reading, radio and DAB radio too. I installed the DAB radio aerial up behind the rear-view mirror and ran the cable down the trim. You can barely see it’s even there. Sounds good too and gets lots of signal.
Audio Amplifier installed behind driver seat. Bridged connections to speakers in doors and to the rear little speakers in the wind deflector – yep OEM wind deflector kept (despite the roll-bar!) and speakers kept too. Good for bit of sound detail near the ears but that’s not what this car’s for really is it – although it doesn’t sound half bad in there really!
All OEM niceties kept – heated seats work great, blowers work great, all cubbies, handles, clips and compartments operate as they should.
Delrin door guides/bushes. Did make a slight difference to the rigidity of the car.
Roof
Hardtop included. Colour matched. Looks great. Comes in the proper bag too. Always stored properly without any leaning stresses or anything warping it. Fits great and makes the car look 10x better IMO. Heated glass rear screen obvs too.
Mohair roof is in an ‘as expected’ condition. It’s not perfect but it’s not been badly ripped or torn anywhere. There was a small hole when I bought it that had a repair patch already and that’s held up fine. I’ve always looked after it keeping it clean and had a yearly treatment of FabsilGold to keep it waterproof and also a wipeout on the inside with the Milton mould killer stuff everyone uses. As you can see in one of the photos I put a soft type of duct tape around one of the horizontal bars but that was literally only because of the annoying squeaky noise it used to make!
OEM/Standard stuff
As a Euphonic edition this car had (and still has):
Factory underbody bracing.
Bigger brakes (Sports brakes)
Engine bay strut bar (kept even with SC etc.)
ABS kept and all good.
Usual central locking etc. and alarm. Immobiliser does not work (as with all ME221) but alarm 100% functions.
Maintenance/service/upkeep
For reference - I’ve had the car since 48k Miles, and it’s now on 108k miles, 6 years later.
I’ve kept on top of engine oil changes, doing more than one every year – probably more likely 10 or so in total.
Gearbox oil has been changed twice I believe. Once by me. Then topped up with diff change, then done again when I had the clutch done.
Diff oil done multiple times too. Latest redline lightweight shockproof about 3 months ago. Made it a fair bit quieter.
Also did the turret/shifter surround & boots job that everyone does. Parts from Moss if I remember right. Gearshifts feel great as expected.
Clutch and all associated gaskets done and any ‘While I’m in there’ seals too, including rear main seal. Mark at Total MX5s knows my car. This was at around 95k miles IIRC.OEM exedy clutch used. Never felt any slip or anything with it.
I did slave cylinder about 2 years ago.
Brake fluids changed a couple of times. ATE type 200. Brake pads and discs changed multiple times and now has fancy ones.
All calipers have been fully taken apart and refurbished at some point over the last 4 years. No sticky pistons here.
Fuel filter changed about 2 years ago
Coolant flush-through and change a couple of times. Most recently about 18 months ago with the new rad install.
I did the timing belt, waterpump, thermostat and new pulleys at around 75k miles about 4 years ago.
Alternator is fine. No issues.
New battery last year. A bosch S5. Excellent battery and seemed to wake the car up a lot!
New droplinks when suspension was fitted.
Had a new Crank sensor 9 months ago.
Spark plugs have been done a few times in ownership too. It’s also had new coil packs on each and I have spares.
One of the first things I made sure I learnt about this car was the drain tubes and all drainage concerns. That’s been well kept on top of thoroughly.
The body/paint work in general isn’t perfect as you’d expect. It’s an old car that’s done a lot of miles but I will say it ‘scrubs up’ pretty well and I’ve always looked after it with washing properly and occasional clay/DA polishing/waxing etc. when I’ve found time. Any chips and whatnot I’ve cared for with touch-up to ensure no further corrosion etc and any light scratching would’ve been buffed out. Bodywork is structurally sound. Chassis rails were deemed fine and a non-issue on mine when I had the sills done (more on that soon), and I’ve kept on top of dinitrol ML spraying inside it to keep it that way. The paint matching on where I installed refurbished front wings (de-rusting then aerosol colour & topcoat) isn’t perfect despite having the right colour code, and the same on the rear sills/wings/arches where I sprayed – although my blending wasn’t bad at all IMO! Judge yourself from the photos but this car isn’t a show-goer, but it’s also definitely not a ‘track only’ car because of it. There’s also a small dent/ding in the front left wing. This happened while I was doing treating/spraying the new ones before fitting to the car. I didn’t want to go tugging on it myself as i’d probably make it worse - but i’m sure someone who knows what they’re doing could sort this pretty easily.
So, the rust, as I’m sure you’re all wondering.
I’ve kept on top of rust a lot more than a lot of owners. From initial ownership I’ve always had wire brushes and Kurust handy whenever I’ve been under the car and it’s most definitely been used! I had the sills done 4 years ago by Mark at Totalmx5Repair where they were cut out and re done but, as always with these cars, it creeps back (despite dinitrol ML internal spraying) - so I spent last summer sorting this as it was mostly cosmetic…replacing the front wings (after aerosol painting them to match) and also treating/sorting any emerging rust on the sills and rear arches/wells again. Lots of wire wheeling, flap discing back, hydrate80, zinc primer, red oxide primers and whatnot. etc etc. The works. A little bit of ‘fine filler’ but only where needed to make any imperfections smooth again. Weeks of work. Unfortunately about 6 weeks later little bubbles had formed again in a couple of places but then didn’t really grow or get any worse since then. I’m sure it’s not rust coming out from the inside – just don’t see how it’s possible when it was all killed/converted, re-primered and painted so recently, and it’s not gotten any worse since the initial little “screw you” bubbles emerging right on my shiny new perfect bits. Made me angry as it was VERY hard work and took weeks to do it all properly.
Also gave all the wheel-wells a big sortout too with a major APC wash, any rust getting a good seeing to with hydrate 80, and then some dinitrol ML followed by dinitrol 4941.Chassis rails had some outer surface flakes which I wirebrushed back, killed and protected as above. It’s all very protected now. I also went under the sides and reaching into visible areas with ML and 4941 (after hydrate80 on any visible surface rust, like the sheet metal bits under the boot stand out in my mind!) with it where possible but didn’t get fully underneath so I won’t say it’s been ‘fully undersealed’. I did a lot of ML into the box sections all along the car too with the Schultz gun. It was soaking in there and made a right mess of the drive.
I have photos and cringey videos I took to explain to my friends what I was doing if you’re interested. Also have photos of the initial work done by Mark at Total mx5 repair too.
Walkaround video:
PHOTOS
