Anyone Miata?

I had a 2.5l Wrangler when I was in college, with the 3 speed auto, and I loved to drive absurdly slow and take the long way everywhere. Miatas seem to check many of of the same boxes at a MUCH lower entry price.

BTW I was able to convince the other half by pointing out that you can’t even find a 60-70k mile corolla for $2800.

 

Agree flip ups are what really makes the car

 

Always thought about a miata. Itd be a fun track car. Gravitated back to what i knew last time though with an integra.

I couldnt imagine having one as a DD though imo.

 

I recently

 

Street class autox in FAST and NASA.

No struts on this baby. Double wishbone coil over shock F/R IFS/IRS.

 

Garage star

 

Crossing my fingers and being super nice to my coworkers today, as I'm going to look at a couple of cars tomorrow and need the good karma.

 

I am about 90% sure Im ordering a Exocet within a few months. About 9k$ for the chassis kit delivered to my door... Mazda donor ~2k -4k I figure. Then turbo.... Should be around 15k for what looks to be one of the most fun cars I have seen. Really 0 utility, but the taco does everything I could ever want in that department, I figure this will be more of a replacement for my motorcycles.

 

I daily drove a modified 2000 Miata for 8 years, did all the work myself. Started out dead stock, then got a Flyin'Miata suspension upgrade, wider wheels and sticker tires, Hard Dog roll bar and FM frame rail stiffeners. Just upgrading the suspension made it into a serious backroads pavement burner. Then I added an intercooled centrifugal supercharger, with tuning upgrades. It dyno'd at 225 wheel horsepower, (stock is about 105). It was a solid low 5-second 0-60 car, dead reliable and a hoot to drive.

If you want one to be fun to drive, stick with the stick. Automatics are ho-hum. If you want to build the engine, they can take almost 275 wheel horsepower before starting to eat transmissions (6 speed is stronger than the 5 speed). If you want even more power, drop in either a LFX 3.6 V6 out of a late model Camaro, or a LSx V8. I've driven both, and prefer the V6. The V8 adds 200 pounds and slightly biases the weight to the front, changing the beautiful handling a bit and 400+ hp is hard to get to the ground in a 2600 pound car. The V6 actually drops 75 pounds over stock but the weight bias doesn't significantly change so handling improves and 300 hp in a 2300 pound car is just perfect. Kits are made to drop in either engine, and the GM tranny fits the tunnel, and the CTS Caddy rear end is used to beef up the back end for the extra power.

 

Well I did it! 1992 with exactly 70,089 miles after my 90 mile drive home. This thing literally feels like it came out of a time machine.

We drove the back roads on the way home and I can honestly say that I didn’t dislike the automatic. There are some mystery rattles and brake noises that I need to chase down, but it’s probably the most solid 27 year old car I’ve driven.

 

Not that anyone cares, but I am very pleased with the Miata after driving it almost 60 miles/day for the past week and my only complaint is visibility in the rain.

I would never (ever) want to race the automatic, but I still stand by my statement that it’s not as terrible as everyone makes them out to be. It really excels around town and cruising the back roads at 55 mph.

 

Everyone hates on the automatic since it's not a REAL Miata if it has an auto.

Same as on the Jeep forum where people hate since it's not a REAL Jeep unless it's a Rubicon.

Get what you like/want.

The opinions of people you don't know won't affect your happiness.

 

Bump thread: OP are you still spooling around in the miata? I have the opportunity to pick up an 2006 NC miata touring 53k miles for around 8500-9k. Its an auto, but like yourself, my wife HATES driving my manual and prefer we get an auto, so...here we are.

 

Yep, still driving the '92 and have added 35k miles to the odometer!


The Tacoma (5 speed, Access Cab) ended up being traded in on a Subaru, when we found out we had a mid-life baby on the way....My wife has probably put less than 500 miles on the Miata and the Subaru is an automatic, so a manual swap may be on the horizon

 

Congrats on the Miata ownership even though I'm four years late to the party. I have a 99 that I've owned since new and love that little car. whenever I think it's time to move on into something bigger and faster I always take it for an extended drive and then realize I can never part with it. It is exactly as I want a car to be after almost 25 years.



Recommend looking for a hard top if you can find it. The rear window is much larger, the car is quieter, more headroom than the softop, the AC works better and you can carry on a conversation with your passenger a lot easier.