My son & I learned so much from our Talon 2G AWD TSi project, it seemed a shame to not apply that knowledge to refurb a cool DD. Started looking at Spyders, and then found this car in Florida with 135k on it. Although the owner had replaced the alternator, he was selling it cheap because even his mechanics couldn’t find what was causing a fast electrical drain and very strange electrical behavior, and the auto transmission wouldn’t go into reverse.


The sun had baked off a lot of the paint. It’s hard to see here, but it looked like it had a bullet hole in the front bumper. Rockin’ Infinity wheels.




The interior was a tired, crispy cloth, with water stains all over the seats.




The engine ran and looked good.





Journal Layout:


1. Necessary Repairs
A. Preparing for the drive home.
B. Electrical Repairs
C. Mechanical Repairs

2. Appearance
D. Exterior Paint
E. Interior Cosmetics

3. Transmission Disassembly and Rebuild

4. Engine Disassembly and Rebuild

5. Convertible Top Replacement & Linkage Repair

6. Quarter Window Roller Replacement

7. Rear Sway Bar, Adjustable Rear Links, and Koni Adjustable Sport Shocks

8. Lighting Center Section Taillight

9. Rear Mitsubishi Logo

10. Custom Exhaust

11. Battery Conversion To Side Post

12. Water Proofing the Roof

Link to Finding Spyder Leaks article

13. Roof Bow Mod

14. Full Interior Sound Deadening

15. Upgrade to GSX 4-Wheel Disc Brakes

16. ForcedFour & Manumatic Shifter
A. Dash Gear Indicator
B. Manuatic Shifter Install
C. Wiring The ForcedFour
D. Daily Driving With ForcedFour

17. AC system Replaced
Front Suspension Replaced

18. 2,000 Mile Road Trip (Link)

19. TPS & ISC Replacement (Link)

20. 2023 M.O.M. Show Kissimmee Florida (Link)

21. Rollover Switch

22. Rotor Warp

23. New Custom Header


Necessary Repairs

A. Trip Prep: My son and a buddy volunteered to make the 1200-mile drive home in January. I had the oil changed and all other fluids checked.

To make sure there were no tire issues on the road, I put on a brand new set of Lancer wheels and Yokohama tires I got from a friend. It gives it a more dsm look.

Then I bought a second identical transmission and sent it along with the car to a local trans shop. Had them pull both apart and use the best pieces out of each, along with new snap rings, clutch pack, and seals. Replaced both drive axles while we were at it.

The electrical drain would have to wait. If they stopped for overnight, the guys would have to pull the battery cable.

They stayed extra time to enjoy the beautiful Florida weather before heading north.













The trip went almost without incident until Kentucky, when the power steering line broke and pumped out most of the rack fluid. It was leaking so fast, you could not pour more fluid in fast enough to last very long, so, manual steering for the rest of the trip!




The weather was good until Wisconsin, which had a raging ice and snow storm in progress. I was proud of how the guys made the little fwd car follow the ruts in the highway, made by trucks, while other cars spun out into the ditch.






Made it to Minnesota – finally!

B. Electrical Repairs: I did some tests, then inspected and traced the wiring harnesses. "The problem" turned out to be three problems: 1) A partially-fried ecu because someone had previously hooked up the battery cables backwards 2) Missing ground straps on the exhaust and an intermittent short in the battery ground cable from corrosion, and 3) A bad Fuel Pump Relay Module that went crazy after it heated up (see our Write-Up on bypassing this in the Tech Section: Electrical). It shifted fairly well, but put in another ’99 Spyder tcu just in case this one had been zapped along with the ecu. Shifts great now.

That's all the photos it will let me load for now. I'll continue as soon as I find out how to load the rest.

congrats!! were in Florida did you take those pics ?

Thanks. The pictures are from the Clearwater area. It's hard to take bad pictures when you get sunsets like that.

I knew it!!! That's on the Courtney camble causeway! Wow all the way to Fl for a DSM that's dedication. Look toward to seeing more!

C. Mechanical Repairs: For added insurance, I had a friend replace the timing belt and tensioner, spark plugs, wires, and fuel filter.


Time to replace the leaking steering rack:





And broken motor mount:




Appearance

D. Exterior Paint: Time to strip the car down and get it ready for paint!


Interior first:







Body next:







Repairing dents and prepping the surface:








Next: Into the paint booth for blocking and sanding and primer

Love me a good Spyder thread! Keep up the good work!

Picked out a custom color that is a little more blue than the original Emerald Pearl, but not so different that I had to have the jambs shot too:





And finally, shooting the paint!




Three coats color and two coats clear. Turned out great!






Now, exterior reassembly, with the help of a good friend:





The interior upgrade is shown next.

Love the color , looking Foward to seeing it bake under the sun to see his the color pops.

That is looking great, I cant wait to see how you do the interior.

Thanks. The color turned out a little darker than I was expecting, but, once it was outside, the blue component really came through.

I'll post the interior portion of the build very shortly. I wasn't too worried about how the outside was going to pull together, but with the interior, I had accumulated a lot of pieces from a lot of different places, and I was just hoping I would turn out looking like it all belonged together.

E. Interior had some issues. Here are the ‘before’ pictures:









The carpet and belts could be removed and scrubbed, but the seats and visors were beyond help, so I got busy contacting members of this forum and local dsm guys. I bought visors in perfect condition and leather seats.

I had also seen another dsm that painted the interior dash and console pieces a contrasting color, so I picked up the tan color and used that as an accent. It was an experiment, but so far it is working to paint the center armrest with the same vinyl paint.

Here are the ‘after’ pictures:






All back together!

Wow I love how that color came out!

And now for the real surprise: I presented it to my wife for our 25th wedding anniversary! We both enjoying driving it. The 2.4 n/a is a great engine for this car. Enough torque and power to keep it fun.


When it goes into storage this winter, I will pull the engine to rebuild it just to make sure everything I can’t see, is also in excellent shape.

HATS OFF TO YOU!

Thanks guys. As in every build, you get in the middle of it and wonder whether it will ever get done, and will I be happy with the results? In this case I had the added pressure of a definite deadline date (our anniversary) and the question of would my wife like it. I made the deadline with about 45 minutes to spare, and both of us like the way it turned out.

We're having even more fun entering it in local car shows and meeting other Mitsu owners.

nice story, great revival

liking the body work, I'm teaching myself how to do more body repair. It might look good overall but I always find the little flaws in my work and just makes me want to do it better.

that color, those rims, no wing or bumpers shot, if it had a flat hood would look like a sebring , no offense please dsmers.

just stock rebuild?

No offense taken. The Talon gets plenty of attention, sometimes too much, so it is nice to have the Spyder to go places without having to tell the whole "DSM story".

Mitsu used the thinnest metal on these bodies! I stopped trying to get every little ding because the tiny ones are best pushed out by the paintless dent guys.

Good luck on the body repair process -- it takes patience. Get a long sander board so you don't get ripples.

As far as the engine goes, I'm sure I'll have to warm it up a little, but I haven't decided anything as of yet.

Transmission Rebuild

This last winter, before the Spyder went into storage, we pulled the engine and trans to rebuild them both, top to bottom.

You can see that the clutch packs were in pretty good shape. Those that were part of the end pack set, were just replaced. But they all got replaced anyway.




Although it was working apparently correctly, the solenoid harness was pretty cooked form the heat and years of service




Even the clutch basket and pawls were looking pretty good




...until a closer look



You can see that the spline teeth were ramped, wearing heavily on the driven side. This is a very common failure point on the Mitsu auto trannys since they were not always properly hardened.

More bad news: The main planetary gear set looks like a carrier fragment got into the gears and damaged them before being ground up.



I don't have any pictures of the rebuild process itself. At this point, we enlisted the help of an local pro transmission shop Hage-Kobany. They also found that the torque convertor overrun clutch was getting weak, so to do it right, we had them replace that too.

They sourced a hardened clutch basket to prevent the splines from wearing so badly in the future. And of course, all of the seals, gaskets and control solenoids were also replaced at the same time.

Here are a couple pictures of the finished transmission ready to go, waiting for the engine work to be finished.





Now, for that engine...

4G64 Engine Rebuild

Because the previous owner's mechanic could not find the Defective Fuel Pump Relay Module (see our write up in the Electrical section), they snipped the power lead to the maf and re-taped up the harness. The then-owner didn't know it was running in open loop full time, which was too rich and washed out the piston rings.

The goals for the rebuild were simple: Go through the block from top to bottom, stay N/A and SOHC, and reach 200whp if possible.

I discussed the goals with our engine builder, Aaron Lindeberg from Aaron's Precision Machining. He has rebuilt several engines for us over the past few years, including a few 4G63s, and he is very exacting with his work.

Based on the goals, we decided to raise the compression ratio to 10.25:1 by decking the block and milling the head. Of course we would be installing .020-over pistons. Unfortunately, no higher compression pistons are available for the 4G64. Since we would be keeping the head, he would port and polish the head passages and port the intake manifold throat to match the 62mm throttle body that will be installed. At some point, we could install a more aggressive cam if we are not satisfied with the results.

The plan also included reflashing the black box ecu to wring every last hp out of it. So to be on the safe side, I picked up a knock sensor and added the correct wiring to the car's engine harness.

The bay was pretty clean, but we'll be doing a wire tuck and some other hose re-routing to clean it up.



Every single motor mount was broken! These pics show the new vs. old.





While the engine was at Aaron's shop, we took every single piece out and off of the engine. Every bolt, bracket and part was chemically de-rusted, cleaned and painted with high-temp rust preventative spray. Yes, powder coating would have been nice, but we opted to put the money into the engine and trans upgrades instead.



THe engine bay needs a little color. The red is a nod to the DSM family.



Header paint. I know they won't stay this way, but even cooked, it beats the rust color.



The engine is back and we're starting final assembly. All new components at the same time.








The cam angle sensor was tough to get in for some reason.



The engine is complete! Now it's time to tackle prepping the engine bay.

Awesome, I waited to get my dsm till i moved down to florida, Kinda cool I live 2 mins from clearwater beach..
Will be watching this topic

Wow this looks great!! Not much of a fan of the N/Ts but you guys are doing some great work!

Engine and trans mounted. Trying to make sense of these endless wires and hoses.




90% of the way there. The sun came out, so we backed it out and took some shots that show the refinishing of the engine bay.



To fully appreciate the final result, here's a before and after pic of the engine.

Before:



After:



We did some comparisons, and it turns out that the stock filter element actually flows more air than the cone style filters. So, we removed the restrictive air snorkle from the stock air filter box, and installed a 3" flexible tube to collect fresh air from the right hand bumper opening. The intake temp is nice and cool and the airflow gets a little help at speed. The hose attaches right to the round opening of the stock air filter box. Here you can see the intake end.



The engine runs beautifully and the trans shifts consistently, two things that couldn't always be said before the rebuild. The torque increase is noticeable right off the line. The upper end horsepower is improved which you notice because the RPM wants to keep climbing. EvoFlash logging gives you confidence that everything is running the way it's supposed to.

We use Joe Gibbs high-zinc oil in all of our DSM engines: BR-30 for break-in for 500 miles, and LS-30 after that. These oils are specifically designed to protect thrust bearing surfaces by bonding to the metal, helping to protect it.

Now with 1,200 road miles on, we started playing with ECUFlash to see if the GS Black Box ECU could be read and flashed. Nope. It just outputs a lot of "Null" values. Thankfully, since I had to rewire the fuel circuit, our spare '99 GSX Black Box plugs in and is readable and flashable. We should be using this ECU anyway, since it will read the knock values from the new sensor we installed.

Tuning will have to wait until spring on the dyno. The car is headed into storage and will receive a new top in the spring.

Looking great, keep up

Thanks. We were inspired and encouraged by other build threads we watched, so we're happy to show what we've accomplished so far.