Long time lurker, stupid project I am excited to work on!
 

Hey everyone im Chris. I have been using this site for years and its been a wealth of knowledge in keeping up with my cars.

I own 2 Rx-8's both are 2004's

one is a sunlight silver Gt 6 speed. its had a reman engine swap done at the dealer at 73,000km the car now has 113,000KM The car is mostly stock aside from a typhoon intake by K&N, i doubt it makes any extra power but it sounds great and the filter is easy to swap and maintain.

the second car is a parts car. It is a 2004 Gt (?) automatic with the red and black leather interior. Ive stripped all the parts I could potentially use on my car and plan on putting the rest of the car on the for sale section here. If i dont get a decent offer I have an idea....

since this one was bought for 1,700.00 and ive pulled a good chunk of parts off of it, and its beyond repair I have been considering turning it into an offroad-esque car!

I dont expect this thing to be a baja truck by any means, but I figure if I slapped some really small rims with some meaty smaller tires I could have some fun.

there are some key issues, such as I dont know if the thing even runs!!!
I bought it salvage, no key. the car was rolled on its side and written off. I have almost no other info. the interior and most other components were in GREAT shape so I have hope

this is kinda the game plan


Weight reduction:
[/LIST]

• Strip interior
• Remove trunk
• Remove sunroof
• Remove air conditioning

Mechanical issues
[/LIST]

• solve the key issue, I dont want to have to pay the dealer to re-key it. I wouild like to just be able to wire a switch in.
• increase suspension clearance (I have a massive mechanical shop and welder I was just gonna add some sort of blocking to increase the height. I understand I may need to do some modifications to the a-arms to allow this....well explore this later
• exhaust....its fine and in great shape visibly. since I would be bombing this thing through fields with stubble and brush and I dont want to burn any fields down. I was considfering just dumping the exhaust straight up.....but back pressure etc. so this might just turn me into puting some sort of skid plate on
• roll cage. I own a business people count on me to pay there mortgage I want to refrain from death. Since I am also a moron the suggestion of being "smart" wont be applicable

Optional[/LIST]

• A bunch of L.E.D lights
• Replace glass with meshing on side windows
• Replace windshield and back window with lexan (back window will be flat and might not be the prettiest)
• hilarious decals and badges. (something along the lines of what Top Gear does in making it so when the doors are open it says something funny)

Getting it to start without a key is going to be a massive issue.

+1^
Don't even try, unless you enjoy wasting time.
Trying to turn an 8 into an off road vehicle makes no sense.
It will be a huge timesuck with no payoff.
You should keep the spare parts you think you might need and scrap it or part out the rest of it.

It would be a fun project and I think he should go for it, but you won't be able to keep any of the stock electronics if it isn't rekeyed. Also since it's a rotary it will inevitably get very expensive very quickly.

I totally understand that its basically a big waste of time, but I don't care its for fun!

BigCajun- I wasn't really seeking validation in the project. In my post I even mention that I will be putting it in the for sale section and if that doesn't pan out its project time.

I have come to the realization about the key, going to call the dealer tuesday. I didn't want to spend the money but meh its only $400.00 and its the simple fix

Im at the point in my career where the cost of items doesn't really factor in if I know I am going to have a lot of fun in the process. I know the cost on Rx-8's and rotary's in general can be expensive I have been an owner for 10 years, I bought my first one in 2004 when I was 18 and learned the hard way.

it actually started my love of mechanics, from changing oil, coils, plugs, clutches, diff's, brakes everything I learned from encountering not warrantable issues. I always had to the option of paying someone to fix it but to me with the huge wealth of information on the internet and a huge shop with tools that would rival any big city mechanical shop that seemed to be a waste. I have no wife or kids so I gotta do something!

I have 5,000 acres+ of owned land to bomb around on dirt roads and gravel. Plus 50KM in every direction of open land and people who are very friendly to recreational vehicles ripping around as long as we dont go in the fields while the crops are in


its not going to be a rock crawler, or mud machine by any means. I am thinking more or less a go-kart, Once it craps out Ill probably just pull the motor and use it as a table base and send the rest of the car to a scrap yard. OR cut the car in half and turn it into some sort of desk.Maybe both!

I can just imagine me ripping around the gravel and using it to run back and forth to the field and house in harvest in place of my quads. Where my farm house is there are plenty of nicely banked gravel corners and long dips. The roads are really wide and the ditches are not steep so when I do crash I should not die too badly.

this thing sounds fun!