The miraculous story of Lazarus being brought back to life by Jesus is why I decided to name this project Lazarus. This right hand drive mazda rx7 started its life in Japan. It was always very well taken care of and eventually was imported by a soldier on base in washington state. Sadly lazarus met his fate shortly after arriving and was crashed, totaled and left for dead.

Which brings us to the story of the resurrection of lazarus.

Here are a few pictures of the car when it was first imported into the united states

 

Now to the tragedy of lazarus...









I never did get a full explanation as to how he crashed and I did not really press for that because it was kind of a miracle he walked away without being seriously injured.

 

And this is the condition that I had found the car. He ended up putting up a for sale ad on craigslist. He was 1st looking to just part it out. However I was very interested in the entire car and the possibility of restoring it. He stated his opinion that that was not a possibility and the car was too far beyond salvage, however I thought I could save it. So we made a deal!

 

Unfortunately there is a problem when I picked it up... The shop that he had all the work done at and was storing the car at ended up selling the rims despite the deal we had made. When I mentioned that I had purchased the rims they only laughed at me. And said I don't care you don't understand their value, We sold them for fifteen hundred dollars immediately. I stated that I had a contract and they were already sold to me and then I needed to get them back, However their reply to that was that I could not have the car at all and to just leave... I ended up having to call the police and the gentleman that I purchased the car from to let them know parts have been taken off after payment was made. To avoid any more conflict and to be able to walk away with the car. We ended up making a deal where I got a few hundred back and I did not get the rims. So hats off to whoever is in washington state with those rims of mine, and a simple warning to anyone who is going to use the shop in the pictures.

However in the end I ended up getting the car!

 

So as soon as I got it home I started working on it! Here is a little video of the roof restoration and I think a very appropriate song for the job.

 

First thing I did was bring it inside and start the teardown. I had no idea how bad it was. The a pillars were bent in, roof was destroyed, doors were toast, fenders gone, hood ruined, bumpers trashed, qtrs destroyed and the interior plastics had not survived well. Oh and the driver seat was bent in towards the center console.

Bottom line, the guy is incredibly lucky to be alive... But the car is completely destroyed, and it is going to be a miracle thing to bring it back from the dead.

The first thing I started on was stripping out the interior and taking out the front window. I pulled the dash and all of the interior and took invitory of what was salvagable. The dash and the seats could be reused however all of the plastics were destroyed. The door panels were still an incredible condition and just needed cleaning.

The seats cleaned up very nice


With the help of hydraulics of geometry, I was able to get the a pillars back into position. The roof skin was far too gone. It's the metal brace that ran in between the a pillars and under the roof skin was too far damaged as well and needed replaced.




Now time to remove the roof!

 

First off i want to apologize for these first batch of pics being so terrible. go pro footage as i was awaiting my new phone. Hero3 silver. Old school 😆

So the first thing i did was remove the paint and prep to drill out tack welds


Loooots of pinch welds to remove

Done!

There are multiple skins in the front, its a real pain to get them out.

Done!


No more roof, doors are on and they line up perfect!

Oh yeah i should mention the wiring on this is the worst hack job ever. Viper security, remote start, power locks with keyless entry, bad stereo job and a riped out stand alone with a hacked up fuel set up, cut out headlight and turn signal relays and lastly a cut main loom.

 

Had to use a couple parts cars to bring this guy back to life.

Picked up this 91 gxl for 400 bucks. Had a blown motor and was in a flood. Looked great, smelled awful 😖 lots of good parts though👍


Also had to use this rhd parts car. Had no floor boards left, the previous owner used it as a race car. But it has a great roof!





Getting ready to take the parts car roof off, all of this with my trusty milwaukee drill 😆

Prepping the new roof skin

Marking whete to drill out the welds


Drilling out the welds

Cutting at the seam

 

The roof skin came apart easier than the crashed one but not by much.

I needed the section that went across the windshield but not the a pillar.

💥 👍

Liam helping me set it on

It was a perfect fit!

Not everyone has a tool brand with their name on it 😉

Now to the fine details of bodywork and the dirty fun

About ready to sand snd weld


The worst corner is now brand new!

 

Welding time!


Block sanding for days

Done! It turned out perfect, no one would ever know if i didnt have these picture's!