☆☆☆ '97M- Warbird ☆☆☆

[Greasemonkey2000]

07-17-15:Here are a few videos to see the led taillights, from the Carbon Miata taillight panel, in action:

[— Phatmiata —]

That's pretty bright !!!

[Greasemonkey2000]

Yes they are Randy! It was quite difficult to capture them w/o 'flaring' but thankfully my friend, Colt, kept at it for about 45+minutes to get some good video. He had to keep making manual adjustments to compensate for light change, etc.

They were originally shot in 4k resolution but he had to decrease their size to send them to Marc, wish i had thought of uploading them to YouTube that way the original resolution could have been retained.


Honestly the videos do not do the lights justice, they really look incredible in real life!

[Greasemonkey2000]

07-20-15: Mileage: 105,420- I had bought some used front hubs from Tom at The Parts Group since i had concluded that my front passenger side one was failing and making noise when make sharp left hand turns. Against Tom's sound advice of just putting the low mileage(52k miles) hubs on, i decided to repack them like i had previously but this time 'armed' with more knowledge thanks to this how to on repacking a front wheel hub: http://www.miataturbo.net/suspension...ont-hub-75372/

Here is one disassembled:



Here is the same one cleaned and ready for Lucas Red and Tacky high temp grease:



Here it is repacked with grease and the races about to be reinstalled:



Here is one with the ARP extended wheel studs, installed:



Here is the original(?) front wheel hub that i had previously repacked with what appears to be some abnormal wear(?) on the inner race(one inner most to the car):



Unfortunately the noise persisted even after this 'repair'.....so was it for naught or is the noise coming from something else?? I am not sure at this point honestly.

I also had purchased some 5 led amber and red 194 bulbs for the front and rear sidemarker lights that i installed and are much brighter than the incandescent bulbs they replaced, sorry no pics. I also bought some led bulbs for the license plate lights but they would not work and Superbrightleds.com says i need a resistor to get them to work.....

[Greasemonkey2000]

07-24-15: I also purchased some red led 3mm bulbs(NE03 bulb) from superbrightleds.com to replace the bulb in the S2000 push button start, thanks to pacman 99 for this tid bit of information!


Superbrightleds.com NE03 3mm red led vs oem S2000 push button start bulb:



Before w/ oem bulb:



After w/ superbrightleds.com NE03 3mm red led:



Definitely brighter but in the pics doesn't look as red but definitely more of a red color with the led bulb. Also the head of the led bulb is larger and can be difficult to get into the whole. I decided i would take the S2000 push button apart to make it easier. Well i end up breaking a little plastic part when reassembling making the button inoperative.....yay so don't do that. Guess i will be buying another S2000 push button start.

[Greasemonkey2000]

07-27-15: When i did the front hubs i noticed that the tie rod ends were rubbing against the Singular Motorsports 2.5" brake ducts and was now thinking that MAYBE the noise was coming from the tie rod pushing against the brake duct which i thought was possibly touching the back of the brake rotor. I had contacted ThePass aka Ryan about the issue and he said that the brake duct is made to clear the tie rod and brake rotor with mm's of clearance and if contact was happening the duct must have been bent. Well good call sir!

You can see that there is a bend that the brake duct is made to have but then another that i must have done...for what reason i cannot recall...silly me.


Where it wore thru:



So i went ahead and just cut off those corners(had a pic but accidentally deleted) since they were damaged anyways and was HOPING this would cure the noise when cornering but alas it did not. What are the chances that i messed up repacking two sets of hubs? Apparently a rather high probability.

[Greasemonkey2000]

07-30-15: Received a barely used(approx. 2k miles) Flyin Miata 10.3lb flywheel from Pat aka patsmx5, so thanks again!



This will compliment my used(approx. 2k-3k miles, iirc, maybe less) Spec Stage III 6 puck clutch rated for 320ft/lbs torque that i picked up from Tom at The Parts Group almost two years ago.





Still need to get a catalytic converter, header(probably Raceland for hotside supercharger compatibility), Racing Beat resonated midpipe(let me know if you have one you want to get rid of) and various applicable seals. Then i can install the Spec Stage III clutch, Flyin Miata 10.3 lb flywheel, header, Mazda comp motor mounts, cat, RB midpipe and Racing Beat dual outlet muffler.

[JamieH]

What's planned that would call for that pucking clutch?

[Greasemonkey2000]

Honestly it was too good of a deal to pass up...like $75 dollars too good.

Tom with The Parts Group bought a guys MSM that he was selling for appearantly a good enough deal that Tom saw a profit margin as the car had nothing wrong with it(wasn't wrecked or anything) and just had a bunch of work done at BEGI. Tom verified the mileage when Begi had it and it had only been a few thousand miles since a bunch of parts were added including the Spec clutch.

I have personally had two cars with a aftermarket clutch. A '04 SRT4 with a Clutch Masters Stsge III/IV 6 puck clutch that was essentially a on/off switch but i loved it and a '01 Bullitt with a solid disc clutch i believe but still grabby. I like a nice stiff clutch pedal and the grabby nature of either clutch's didn't bother me and my wife could drive them w/o complaint so i would rather have too much clutch than not enough and boost was part of the plan and still may be.

Ultimately it was just a great deal on a $400 clutch that had just enough miles to be properly broken in (>500), so it was a win win, imo.

[JamieH]

Shoot, can't knock that any!

[Greasemonkey2000]

08-20-15:Picked up a used (approx. 7 mikes) Raceland header from Top_Gear, thanks Zachary! I will clean up, spray it with high temp paint, wrap it with DEI header wrap and top it off with a Track Dog Racing header blanket.




Now just to get a new catalytic converter and Racing Beat resonated mid pipe so I can put a bunch of parts on!

[Greasemonkey2000]

08-22-15: My interior is mostly comprised of brushed finish metal pieces, save for the S2000 push button start, Miata Roadster tall angled sts and Joy fast tall shift knob so I wanted to alleviate the two obvious ones.

Before:



After:


Simply used a red scotch brite pad, that my coworker got for me from his second job at a automotive paint supply store, and went over both for probably a few minutes each at most. Very happy with the results so thanks to Revlimiter aka Adam and aarrow aka Ly for both offering that great tip on using a red scotch brite pad!



I also had bought and received a new S2000 push button start due to my original one not working but after installing the new one and it not working either I started checking wiring. As I switched out between the two starter buttons I would start to plug in the 3 wire connector to the button and the car would turn over like I had pressed the button?? Then I noticed that if the button was lite up then it wouldn't start but if the light wasn't on it would....???

I pulled the center console because I wired mine per Revlimiter 's excellent instructions and he used the parking brake as the signal/hot wire for the light so it should have NOTHING to do with one or the other or at least in my mind. I didn't figure it out but the starter button works but just isn't illuminated, no biggie for now.

[bogaut]

dang that joyfast knob looks good like that.. maybe i should do that

[HarryB]

Looking great! Speaking from experience, it will become "polished" again after some driving, but you can re-do the scotchbrite treatment once more then!

[Greasemonkey2000]

dang that joyfast knob looks good like that.. maybe i should do that

Thanks Bo! I was really happywith the results!

Looking great! Speaking from experience, it will become "polished" again after some driving, but you can re-do the scotchbrite treatment once more then!

Thanks Harry! I wouldn't think i would have to redo it because i gave it a good few times over but thanks for the heads up!