Progress Thread 92RSQ As the name implies...

New to the site and hope to get pretty active. A short summary for me would be;

Bought a 1992 manual Fox body hatchback to rescue (92RSQ) from a Florida man who seemed to be hell bent on ruining the car. I bought the car to have fun with until my son is old enough to work on it with me so when he gets to driving age, he will have a cool old car to drive that he put work into. For the full details I will post a progress thread in time. She has already come a pretty long way from where I got her. Definitely has a lot of issues I am still working through but that is just part of the fun.

Here are a few pics showing a little of how she looked when I first got her.

AeroCoupe said:

I have to ask. What is the last picture? Some kind of water bound transport?

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Spot on, I work in the maritime industry so I was able to get the car on board my ship when we changed ports. This ship is specifically an EPF.

General karthief said:

FLORIDA MAN strikes again!!!!
i wonder about that last pic too.....'old school' anti theft device?
Anyway, wonder about that steering wheel, 92 had airbags, that's not an airbag wheel those airbag wheels are fugley anyway, but I would be looking into decoding the vin and checking how that column was installed......just say'n.
The ride looks promising anyway.

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Na, not anti theft... Just deck tie downs so the car doesn't roll away on accident lol.

And yea, I have already changed out the steering column as well. I like airbags

So, I figure that I will log this as step by step what has been done already per post to keep my thread organized with continuity. While I don't have pictures of everything that has been done here is a small list of everything that was accomplished while I was down in Alabama/Florida area.
-Power Steering Pump replaced
-Replaced the sunroof and seal
-Refurbished the alternator
-Put new locks in
-Fixed the breaks

Next, I got the car to Virginia where my ship is currently homeported. I have a friend here who knows a guy that used to work in an auto body shop, so I had him do some body work on RSQ. He did proper fitment of doors, panels, hood, fender, bumper, headlights, and a new driver seat so the car could be driven again.

After he was done with the exterior, I had the car taken over to a transmission shop because the T5 that was in the car was almost impossible to get into first gear and absolutely would not go into 5th. I was told by the PO that his buddy rebuilt the transmission, and it ran perfectly.



I ended up buying a newly rebuilt T5 Worldclass manual transmission and had it installed by a shop as I can't do that in a hotel parking lot.

Once that was done, I could finally get to work on the car (in the hotel parking lot). Most of my work was just making her look prettier and more user friendly. These details will be in the next post.

The first update photos I have still saved show that I basically cleaned the inside of the car and found more things wrong that I didn't know about and the PO neglected to disclose.

The most frustrating of that is pictures 1 and 2 that I have attached. The PO decided that when the windshield wiper motor wasn't working, they would put in the wrong fuse... AND THEN... solder it into place. This also led me to believe this was why a lot of electronics in the car would not work. You can see the melting of the plastic and burning. I ended up buying a functioning fuse box off Ebay (this will be coming up again later as I can running into problems with the newer one).

Also, after further inspection of the windshield wiper motor, I found that it was simply rusted into place, so they ruined the fuse box for no reason .

All in all, the interior isn't the worst that I would have expected from living its life in Alabama and Florida. At some point I will definitely need to replace the floor pans, but it will do for now. There is still a lot of body work that needs to be done as well.

I bought the low-profile brackets for my front seats but unfortunately, they didn't fit with my seats very well, so I fabricated some brackets to make them fit together. You can also see in the photo I started putting in carpet and trim in the car at this time.

Other items that I fixed during this period were;
-High and surging idle. This was due to an old and worn TPS. I replaced it and got it in the correct position.
-Replaced the windshield since it had a crack running all the way across it.
-Replaced the corroding gas cap.
-Found a mustang pick and pull near me that turned out to be very useful.

And this post will get me up to date on restoring her to at least looking like a car fit for use.

What I managed to get done this time;
-Installed the new fuse box (will get to this in the next post.)
-Installed a radio
-Installed new speakers
-Installed a new driver door wiring harness
-Installed new window controls
-Installed new windshield wiper motor and wiper blades
-Improved some of the dents in the cowl area
-Installed rear seats
-Installed rear carpet and cut a wood support for the spare tire well
-Installed more trim
-Installed new dash vents for air-con


After all these updates were said and done these are the problems I am left with to get her to daily driver capability;
-Headlights do not work (worked before wiring in new fuse box)
-Fog lights do not work (worked before wiring in new fuse box)
-Dash lighting does not work (not sure if it worked before wiring in new fuse box)
-I don't think the speedometer is reading accurately. I have a work around for now using my phone.

Now I am sure there is much more that is in need of repair or tuning, but I am not really worried about them until I get the car back home and can really tear her apart in the comfort of my garage with all of my tools.

Other small things I am just keeping track of that would be nice to get straightened out but aren't necessary to get RSQ to be a daily driver;
-Radio does not work (not sure if it worked before wiring in new fuse box as there was no radio installed when I bought it)
-Windshield washer doesn't have any spray power, but some liquid comes out (that's what she said)
-New front tires/rims to match the rears (tires leak very very slowly)
-Dents and dings all over the car

For now, she runs really well, shifts really well, and drives decently for her age so I will use her as a day time cruiser.

Now this post is the current issue I am trying to solve. I am pretty sure the reason a lot of my issues with the electronics is from me not wiring the fuse panel correctly. In my head I thought, "Oh I can do this. I have done basic wiring before and know how to crimp and what not. At least enough to get the car in a better place until I can get home and do it more professionally. All you have to do is match the colors!"

I was wrong... at least partially. The first thing I tried after installing the newer fuse box was just installing all new fuses but that didn't do the trick.

For the most part it is matching the wiring from the fuse box to the corresponding wire coming from the car. However! My old fuse box is slightly different from the new fuse box even though I verified that the fuse box that I bought was designed for the years 1991-1993 as I learned that the fuse boxes from other years are different.

This is the old fuse box wiring. I have circle two of my confused wires. The one on the left is tan and white striped. The other circled one is a single red and white striped wire. If I compare this fuse box to my new one the red and white striped wire is two red and white striped wires coming off the same terminal. For now I have one of the red and white striped wires not connected to anything and the other connected to the red and white striped wire coming from the car.



Any thoughts? I have seen and saved all the wiring diagrams that have been posted before but I have a hard time following the diagram for what I am supposed to connect to what.

Found this just nowwhile working on my wiring issue. Turned on the car and heard an electrical buzzing sound under the hood. Burned right through the rubber.

Also verified that turn signals work and hazards work. So it's just my head lights and fog lights that are inoperable.

2000xp8 said:

Those front wheels look like real 4 lug speedlines from the Saleen catalog.

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They very well might be. They came with the vehicle when I bought it and I haven't look into the wheels. I'll consider myself lucky if they are.