1978 Panels needed

[Tomo]

Evening, just joined the forum as recently bought a 1978 RX7, it was looking very sorry for itself left outside in the rain needing some love.
Next thing its on my trailer & now being dismantled in my shed. The car is in a fairly sorry state, complete with alot of additional rust covered up with Sikoflex, body filler & silicone.
The history of the car, as I am told is that it was produced in 1973 being one of 300 that were sent out on test to the Japanese dealers at the time to see how the car fared, they came in Yellow or Green only. The guy I bought the car off also mentioned there were only 23 left of these pre-production cars??
The car was purchased by an American Serviceman who then after 12yrs in Japan moved to Norfolk, England with his English wife, the evidence is there for that as have military customs stickers on the screen, sadly the screen is now out as is cracked.
The car then passed to the couples cleaner after the wife passed away & the American Soldier returned to the states leaving the car in GB, from her to the Hungarian father & son who I bought the car from this week.
The chassis number is SA22C 109762.
So far need to replace the front x3 top flitches, inner needs repair & repair the tops of both A posts, passenger side floor pan, both the fronts of both cills, some boot & front bulkhead rain gutter has perished, N/S door needs replacing in its entirety, front screen, rear lights, seal rubbers throughout, rear glass dampers, dash intact but damaged. Have not got the drivers seat out so not looked at the floors that side as yet. Otherwise the car is pretty good!
Any help with finding these parts is much appreciated, as soon as I have some good pictures I will get them on the forum
Regards
Tom

[spirit r]

Welcome Tom,
interesting story, sounds your car wake up our love for pictures.

[gt_james]

Hi Tom,

Good to see you post up here!

sounds like the car has a nice history. I can't add much to the history side of things, but I was under the impression the Green colour was only found on the top spec "Limited" trim Savanna, and supposedly yours was a GT which is a lower spec.

I'm not sure what you mean by flitches, but there are not too many replacement panels around for these cars, apart from rear arches, rear sills and rear pockets, unless you find some new old stock panels somewhere. So you may have to hand fabricate the panels you need. The door might be a challenge to find a good one. windscreens, rear lights, rubbers and hatch struts are all re made and available. the interior in your car is actually the wrong one for the car and is an S2 interior.

[richrx]

Hey welcome Tomo, as has been said there's not much around body parts wise. USA and Australia must have spares but I've never come across them. However I'm not the most adept at parts shopping online.

I love your car, obviously seen it advertised, and it's got a great story, do you know why the interior was changed? It could be another addition to the already great and very individual history.

Anyone know what the original interior would have been?

What's your plans for it? That sticker would be great to save, or at worst reproduce?

Rich

[Tomo]

Many thanks for the advice, I will start the search for the Holy Grail of parts, suspect that fabrication may be the only choice. Unsure about the interior & will investigate as to why it is an S2.
Being that it is such an early car I intend to restore it to an original as possible very good road car, not concours. I was initially looking for a good car to build as a race car in the HSCC 70's Roadsports, unfortunately it turns out they are not very popular within the series & are outlawed, in my quest I found this 78 car on ebay & its story seemed a good one so had to buy it.
The flitches are what I describe as the panels between the front screen & the bonnet, mine need work!

[Threesevens]

I think that is called the scuttle panel.
I would have thought that they are inter changeable with series 2 & 3 as may some of the other bits you are after, which may be a little easier to source.
I am sure other members on here can confirm.
good luck

[ian65]

Hi, welcome to the forum Nice to see another series 1 turn up on here, we've been tracking this car for a while. As the other have said, new panels are very hard to come by, there is some NOS out there but it seldom comes up for sale and new repair panels are also practically non existent. Your best bet it to find someone breaking a 1st gen and see if you can cut some panels out of it. It's pretty easy to drill out spot welds and unpick the panels along the factory seams. The good news is that series 1,2 & 3 are virtually identical so panels are more or less inter-changeable.
Looking forward to see how you get on with it.

[DB RX63]

I agree with Ian, the only major body panel difference is the rear panel and the panels under the front bumper, its possible that S1 front wings were different but I may be wrong there ?

[rotarypower]

I see further up someone mentioned that rear arches and sills are available.

Can I ask who sells these?
Cheers
Rich

[gt_james]

Front wings are different, rear panel with lights on is different, most other metalwork is the same.

I know Jesse bought some panels when he did his sills, hopefully he can give you contact details

I was meaning to post about this. I messaged him on ebay 2 weeks ago and he got them to me a few days later! Pretty happy with them aye. You'll find him if you search "RX7 repair panel" on ebay