Figured I would post this here since there isn't an any other car forum LOL.

Me and my dad went and got my mom a 91 Mazda Miata. She's always wanted a little sports car so for 1700 we bought it. It had some.......roughness as far as body and suspension go but the engine ran great and smooth and the rest of the drive train was good to go.

We decided to replace the suspension at all 4 corners with stock stuff because the idiots had "torched" the springs to lower it before us. Rode like a piece of plywood and would drag on EVERYTHING.

Here are some pics.

Here you can see how far the wheels are up in the wheel wells.
http://a171.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/37/l_870c898bb360c38d6b8563cd08f732fa.jpg

Here are the front struts/springs. You can see the torch marks on the right of the springs. In the process it also melted the seals out of the strut allowing all the oil to blow out of the strut making it useless. It rode like a pogo stick when you did get some "spring" from them.
http://a878.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/75/l_ca2f05c7fe1593a45b95304cfa6129e5.jpg

What the front springs/struts should have looked like
http://a763.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/11/l_35311d0d40817c37c85dd31ad5142ad2.jpg

The rear springs were all screwed up even worse than the fronts. One of them didn't even do it's job at all. It was so deformed it it didn't touch both sides of the strut so that side was riding bottomed out all the time.

http://a685.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/116/l_f61013837bee402d83045121bc816d2c.jpg

http://a560.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/27/l_2568d746e080c50e799315524a0bc547.jpg

http://a21.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/124/l_7d689364fc10979556e3fd69aa5a2d64.jpg

I also managed to pull out probably a total of 30 or 40 feet worth of useless wiring that went to nothing at all except a non functional LED light bar behind the grill. And found a set of wires that I have no idea WTF they go to[gunfire]

http://a125.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/112/l_744cc96e49d35c51eddc8548da59c06c.jpg

http://a224.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/101/l_bde160ca3716f5bff086e16b9351103f.jpg

Here are pictures of various places of the car that would drag on anything and everything. When you turned the tires would drag on the fenderwells.

http://a700.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/123/l_5b4c2ac6fe4d12574889cc36bf6a7f83.jpg

http://a210.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/6/l_871205521019fbea08f9ffb0f1ce8329.jpg

http://a220.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/125/l_90b104e682cf81d78d4b2cc6752e4c1b.jpg

Alright and here she is after the suspension rebuild, starter replacement, wiring removal and full fluid change.

http://a553.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/19/l_5f71e45391414f6afdf33f949dfc0a70.jpg

Not much of a change overall just from looking at it, but if you drove it before and after you would be amazed at how much better it drives and handles. Like a brand new car.

Here's my mom in the car

http://a966.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/78/l_b1d715b2951e9476331f45cb3912bcf5.jpg

http://a281.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/52/l_3a6e9799f78354982ee18761a36f8170.jpg

We also threw on a factory trunk lid mounted spoiler that we pulled off the same 91 LE British Hunter Green Miata that we got the springs/struts off of.

A quick recap

Before
http://a707.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/23/l_8f6ad548d1d7151300c87348f09ad77a.jpg

After
http://a738.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/12/l_f6e2448dc86c5db952b88028cc925199.jpg

Me driving it. I could get used to that. I know the Miata is seen as a "chick car" in a lot of circles but this thing is almost as much fun as a motorcycle. Handles great, good power, lightweight, ect.

http://a655.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/72/l_68131495440ebf16d44018b13b3d19b6.jpg

I may have to try to find my wife one in the future.............you know so I can drive it also.[;)]

only one pic worked, but nice car.

ARGHHH

I'll have to fix them up later

All fixed.

that sucks how that car was. those guys didnt know anything. i glad you guys got her all better now.

that SUCKS! retards should not be allowed to have blowtorches..

but honestly it looked HOT all tucked before but man you were close to buying a new oil pan...

nice job glad to see you saved her

Thanks for the comments guys. It looked "cool" I guess lowered but this part of Texas is no place to have a car that low to the ground. Drags on everything. My town is also full of pot holes here.

Now we need to scrape off the stickers that pertain to nothing in the car but the rims.

He had NO sparco, or Greddy stuff in the car at all. The rims were made by that Enkei company though I think but they need a real good cleaning done on them.

ETA-it also had a horrible ear splitting loud fart can on it that we had the muffler guy chop off and replace with a nice mellow sounding turbo muffler. Pretty quiet now but still "growls" and you can talk to the person in the passenger seat on the highway now.

lol ur moms a ricer... j/k

LOL at those sweet "modified-specifically-for-high-performance-and-increased-awsomeness" springs.

nice miata! my mom has always liked those. I would definitely drive one!


edit: Forgot to mention that a lot of those came with LSD's. There's a way to check if yours has one by looking at it but i forget. I remember a while back someone saying that if you had all the power options and air conditioning that it had the LSD, but again i'm not sure. You should check though!

lil duce coupe lol

Well, if it didn't come with an LSD, you can sure as hell bet that the previous owner put glue in the open diff to 'limit' it somewhat

sweet car. check out miata.net

any 91 miata with a factory lsd would have lost its ability to function properly by now seeing as how they were of the viscous variety.

do your mom a favor and pull out the style bar. in the event of a rollover, it could possibly act like a mousetrap.

That is the coolest MOMs car ever!

sweet car. check out miata.net

any 91 miata with a factory lsd would have lost its ability to function properly by now seeing as how they were of the viscous variety.

do your mom a favor and pull out the style bar. in the event of a rollover, it could possibly act like a mousetrap.

I believe it was the NB Miata's that came with the Torsen right?

you should put a v8 in it

that sucks how that car was. those guys didnt know anything.

Sad but true. Heating the springs to lower a car goes beyond ghetto all the way to hillbilly.

Jeep- Ask to borrow it on a Sunday and find a local autocross. It's what Miatas were made for-http://www.focusfanatics.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=11342&d=1173307931

I want to get her a functional roll bar for it. I followed her and my dad up FM4 today on my KLR and they reported it drove GREAT.

I would love to get into autocross but I have been unable to find a local one. I would want to run mine and my wife's ZX5 in it but I would either a)try to get my mom to go with me and race :D or b)borrow it every once in a while to race it myself.

Do you have a link to look up clubs or events??

Sad but true. Heating the springs to lower a car goes beyond ghetto all the way to hillbilly.

I've never even HEARD of that. I thought cutting the springs to "UBER-AWESOME-SOOPER-PERFORMANCE" height was bad. This is just hilarious.

I saw a kid do it to his car in welding shop in High School. As he was driving away there was a loud BANG! and the car dropped to the bump stop in the rear passenger side corner.

One of the springs broke in half.

I believe it was the NB Miata's that came with the Torsen right?

torsen was an available option during all years past 94

I want to get her a functional roll bar for it.

http://www.bethania-garage.com/ where i got mine

make sure that you read up about all the pros and cons of installing a rollbar on miata.net

Reading up. I check it out. Just seems like a big con to not have one in there if you run off the road and it rolls for whatever reason.

ETA-Checked out the website looks like it may be a good idea to rip that thing off of there.

ETA#2-the Miata.net "Garage" is full of info that is super useful. Thanks for pointing me to Miata.net. Not sure if I want to join the forum though I've got a bunch of those that I'm apart of right now.

good save!!

I would love to get into autocross but I have been unable to find a local one. I would want to run mine and my wife's ZX5 in it but I would either a)try to get my mom to go with me and race :D or b)borrow it every once in a while to race it myself.
I autocrossed our ZX3 a couple of times this season and although it was fun it's no Miata.

Do you have a link to look up clubs or events??
Check out the clubs listed on the bottom of this page (http://autocross.com/autoc/scclub.shtml). In your area of Texas you should be able to find an event every weekend.

Have fun!

wooo! miatas are the shnit! nice car.

Thanks for the link. I found that last night and searched all the event calanders of clubs that I would consider local to me. Next Autocross event is in my town of Mineral Wells in Sept. :(

The last autocross event was one at Texas Motorspeed way that was just over this last weekend so I missed out on that one. As far as I can tell there are no more autocross events untill the one in Mineral Wells in Sept in this area.

What I can do is go out to the Airport and the area where they do autocross is pretty much only used for that purpose and the lines are still painted on the ground. I can probably run most of the course there. Or setup my own.

Reading up. I check it out. Just seems like a big con to not have one in there if you run off the road and it rolls for whatever reason.

ETA-Checked out the website looks like it may be a good idea to rip that thing off of there.

ETA#2-the Miata.net "Garage" is full of info that is super useful. Thanks for pointing me to Miata.net. Not sure if I want to join the forum though I've got a bunch of those that I'm apart of right now.

Miata.net garage is great, so is most of the forum. Though a lot of the posters are old guys who are VERY opinionated (a FWD car CAN'T be a sports car kind of rubbish).


I have a 97 Miata that I actually bought from my parents, they had it for 6 years, it was always garage kept and barely driven the last 3 years they had it. I bought it last year and set about modifying it into an STS2 car.

I was lucky and the wife bought me a lot of Flyin Miata stuff for Christmas (they were having a moving sale). So I have front and rear FM adjustable sway bars, koni shocks, FM springs, FM exhaust, FM rear upper shock mounts, new bushings. The car rides great and it is a bit lower but not too much.
Interior wise we installed headrest speakers (all NA Miatas have space in the seats for headrest speakers), a better (still pretty cheap) receiver, speakers, chrome ebrake and shifter handle, I painted some trim to break up all the blackness, and neoprene seat covers.

Some obligatory pics.

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a10/dubalicious42/Miata/IMG_0336.jpg

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a10/dubalicious42/Miata/IMG_2595.jpg

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a10/dubalicious42/Miata/IMG_2597.jpg

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a10/dubalicious42/Miata/IMG_0380.jpg

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a10/dubalicious42/Miata/IMG_1537.jpg

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a10/dubalicious42/Miata/IMG_1533.jpg

After picking the cats up from the vet.
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a10/dubalicious42/Miata/IMG_0377.jpg
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a10/dubalicious42/Miata/IMG_0375.jpg

BTW I did dyno my Miata once right after I bought it, the results were what I expected.

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a10/dubalicious42/miatadyno141_001.jpg

ROFLMAO

The seats in the car had speakers and wiring harnesses to hook into the car's wiring harness but the car had no wiring harness for the seats. The speakers in the headrests were also blown out and the cups were ripped all apart.

We took some computer speakers we had laying around and raped the speakers out of the housings. Surprisingly they looked exactly the same as the orig. headrest speakers but the drivers were larger on the computer speakers.

Also something else we didn't understand was that the original round headlights had been removed. The POs had taken smaller square headlights from Wal-Mart and litterly GLUED them into place. They took the pod housing for the orig. headlights and pushed them down on top of the square ones and glued them into place[gunfire] We thought for sure that the headlight pod motors were burnt out or something but to our surprise they worked like they were brand new.[woot]

We ripped them out and the original mounting cups had been removed and tossed I guess. We went to the junkyard and pulled the headlight cups and rings out of a late 70s or early 80s Chevy pickup and they fit perfectly we just had to drill/tap some new holes for them to screw on right. Now the headlights look back to stock and it only costs us 20 bucks counting buying new round headlights at Wally-World.

ETA-Nice cats. I like cats.

LOL at the Dyno! Man I want a Miata!

ROFLMAO

The seats in the car had speakers and wiring harnesses to hook into the car's wiring harness but the car had no wiring harness for the seats. The speakers in the headrests were also blown out and the cups were ripped all apart.

Try this site, I've used them before to buy a "new" spare tire and some trunk carpeting after a trunk fire caused by a wire that went straight from the battery to where a 6 disc CD player USED to be, the jackass who owned it before my parents just cut the wire about 4 inches from the battery and left it. It didn't cause a problem until I put away a windblocker and it shorted to the wire.
http://www.partsgroup.com/

They have pretty good prices and were great to talk to. You may be able to replace most of the ruined stuff through them.

This is the company I got my harnesses from (my car didn't come with either headrest speakers or harnesses).
http://www.pbcauto.com/pbcauto-products.html

We took some computer speakers we had laying around and raped the speakers out of the housings. Surprisingly they looked exactly the same as the orig. headrest speakers but the drivers were larger on the computer speakers.

There is a debate on Miata.net about if the headrest speakers are worth while or not, I consider them to be since the main speakers are so low. I went with Aural NS3's that I caught on sale.

\Also something else we didn't understand was that the original round headlights had been removed. The POs had taken smaller square headlights from Wal-Mart and litterly GLUED them into place. They took the pod housing for the orig. headlights and pushed them down on top of the square ones and glued them into place[gunfire] We thought for sure that the headlight pod motors were burnt out or something but to our surprise they worked like they were brand new.[woot]

Wow, that's messed up.

We ripped them out and the original mounting cups had been removed and tossed I guess. We went to the junkyard and pulled the headlight cups and rings out of a late 70s or early 80s Chevy pickup and they fit perfectly we just had to drill/tap some new holes for them to screw on right. Now the headlights look back to stock and it only costs us 20 bucks counting buying new round headlights at Wally-World.

Good to hear. I love jukyard fixes.

ETA-Nice cats. I like cats.

Thanks, it's taken me awhile to get used to them but they are fun.

Thanks for the website.

For the cats. Invest in a laser pointer. It's worth it just to watch them go nuts trying to catch it. :D

Thanks for the website.

For the cats. Invest in a laser pointer. It's worth it just to watch them go nuts trying to catch it. :D

No problem. The Miata is a great car and seems to have a bad reputation with those who do not understand it, not everything needs 1 billion horsepower and can't handle a corner.

As for the cats, I've tried a laser pointer and they both ignore it, though they do love to chase my Air Hog indoor helicopter.

LOL bet that's interesting to watch.

BTW I did dyno my Miata once right after I bought it, the results were what I expected.

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a10/dubalicious42/miatadyno141_001.jpg

HOOT! Man, I laughed so hard I blew Diet Coke out of my nose...






(What a mess.)

I want a Miata, but just can't find one. Hopefully not in that condition!! Great save, and good luck on the car (for your mom, although I think it's yours eventually-LOL)

I told'em if they ever sold it they had to offer it to me first [grinking]

HOOT! Man, I laughed so hard I blew Diet Coke out of my nose...
(What a mess.)

Glad I could be of service!