As some of you may be aware I bought a 1990 Mazda B2600i just over a year ago. It was a project that was a pain in the ass to buy (because of the seller) and ended up being more of a project than I expected once I tore into it - but that’s what you get for buying a 30 year old pickup in the rust belt.
I never ended up detailing everything about it in a post, I’m very bad at that... I have sent in a few dispatches from it in the year I’ve owned it but they are pretty uncommon particularly in 4x4, extended cab and 5 speed. The pictures below are not it in progress, but mostly her as she sits today as I’m terrible at documenting the progress of a build.
The guy I bought it from was a customer service rep at an area Mazda dealership network and he had it services there. The story he told me is that he bought it a few years ago from a Mazda mechanic who as a hobby/make money rebuilds these old trucks. It came with a stack of receipts including a new head ~20k miles ago which is already more paperwork than any vehicle I have bought to this point.
It had really sketchy brakes on the test drive and he said he would have a mechanic at the dealership bleed them to fix it and give it a state inspection for an agreed upon $1500. It felt good to me but then it took him a week to get it looked at then the tech broke off both front bleeders from the caliper. So we negotiated a new price of $1k and he’d drive it down to me. He lived an hour away so that worked but it took a week of no-shows and un-returned texts to finally get the truck.
I still liked the truck and put it up on jack stands to inspect more thoroughly and came across a host of problems so off to rockauto to order parts. At this point the truck sat a couple months as work travel picked up and I worked on other things around the house.
The interior is surprisingly good and has the captains chairs out of a much newer car and the driver is power. The center console is from some subaru and it generally looks great. The dash is pleasantly retro while still functional. The cabin is a pretty nice place to spend some time even for a big guy like myself. The A/C even works!
I fixed a few things over the Christmas break like new calipers which did a good deal to fix the brakes but there was still a long list to fix so she again sat.
In mid-March when we got sent home for the end of the world I wanted to work on the truck again. I started with simple things like cleaning the rust off wiper stalks and painting them and it helped me get motivated to finish it.
I’ll also credit ITA97 and the work he’s done with his amazing Pajero as he has inspired me a good deal to work on my own quirky 90's Japanese 4x4. While mine isn’t anywhere near as cool as his it reminds me of mine and my desired use cases.
My Sportwagen gets me to most of the places I want to go but I always have to stop before I’d like to when exploring.
This rapidly turned into larger items like a significant cold starting problem, new ball joints, terrible exhaust, bad fuel smell while driving and a ton of deferred maintenance.
Since I’ve bought the vehicle I have:
- Replaced upper and lower ball joints on both sides
- Replaced front brake calipers and pads
- Bled brakes all around
- Replacement front axle CV boots
- New exhaust pipe from header to muffler
- New O2 senor
- Cleaned MAF
- Cleaned throttle body
- Replaced valve cover gasket
- New cap/rotor/plugs/wires
- Replaced fuel filter
- Fix few wiring glitches
- Replaced several bulbs
- Oil Change
- New Air Filter
- Repainted front bumper
- Replaced passenger mirror
- Likely a bunch of other things I am forgetting as I take terrible notes on this
Luckily the hard starting/fuel smell/shitty exhaust ended up all being kind of the same problem with a bad 02 sensor, no cat, bad fuel filter, old plugs/wires/cap/rotor, filthy throttle body and a couple vacuum leaks. Essentially she needed a major tune-up and runs great now with only a little stumble on startup.
I refuse to count dollars in parts for my automotive projects as you almost always end up spend more money and time than just spending more on the initial purchase. If I had to guess I’d put my total investment at ~$22-2,500 and I’m comfortable with that as it would be hard to buy a truck like it for that here.
I have willfully ignored the rust as it’s spread too far for me to do anything about and everything is still structurally ok and it looks alright from about 20 feet. There is some rust through on panels and serious scale/rot underneath. The frame is still solid-ish with a few holes but it is mostly in one piece.
Parts are sometimes hard to find and have to be ordered as this truck wasn’t very popular and the engine was I think only used in this truck and the MPV for a few years. They are usually cheap though, I think the most expensive parts I have bought were the front calipers at ~$60 ea. I do still have a large box of parts I haven’t installed, but didn’t need as of yet. Things like front rotors that were in serviceable shape and would have required wheel bearing removal to replace or rear wheel cylinders that bled and work fine.
All in all she makes me smile when I drive it and it is a good size little truck. I have not driven it enough to have any idea about gas mileage or reliability but the plan is to get her a state safety inspection this week and hopefully not have anything left to fix. Then drive her for errands and exploring!
Like most of my posts this ended up long as hell - thanks for coming along for the ride though Oppo!