This week, I picked up a 93 Miata to replace my 2010 Yaris as my daily driver. For $3k I drove home with a rust free (really rust free, not the 'rust free' we normally see here in New Hampshire, which just means there's more car than rust) little soft top with 109k miles on it. I'm trying hard to just treat this like a less horrible Yaris, and have no plans for it to replace my 'proper fast car' - a 75 Datsun 280z with a 2.8liter turbo motor. For now, I'm sticking with maintenance and baslineing the car.
I flushed the engine oil, transmission oil, and differential oil. I couldn't reach the oil filter with any of the tools I have on hand, so I'm just going to get to that the next time I change the oil. I checked the pads (fronts are dead, rears look fresh), and just picked up some generic replacements for them so I can pass State Inspection.
I'm still hunting down a 'wobbly feeling' in the rear end. Whenever I go over a rough patch of road, it feels like the rear end is trying to decide which way to run away toward. After seeing what the eccentric control arm bolt settings look like, I'm not surprised it's a little squirrely (I think a couple of those bolts are upside-down). Much-needed new tires (decided on Kumho XS') are coming in this week, so I'll get an alignment when I have them mounted/balanced.
I really hate that this car has power steering. One of the headlights had a lot of wobble when they were up, so I started poking around trying to find what was loose/broken. It turned out that the rear-most headlight bracket mounting bolt was loose, which happens to be directly under the headlight motor. No problem, I'll just go at it from the side ... but the power steering filler is directly in the way. It's like Mazda intentionally placed it in such a way that 11 years later, I'd come along and they'd finally get to have their laughs. I ended up having to remove the motor altogether to get at that loose bolt. #firstgenproblems
This weekend I'm planning to take this up to Mt Ascutney in Vermont for a hillclimb event, and spend the weekend racing up a mountain road in a gorgeous state park. I have a few 1080p cameras (6, the last time I counted) and am curious as to how other people have mounted cameras on their NA's. The goal here is to give myself as much footage as possible, in the hopes of gaining some insight into what I'm doing right/wrong.
I'm basically starting this thread here (instead of continuing my introduction or specific-question threads) to document my progress.