'92 Miata: Budget Project Car

[Huzer]

Today, I took the driver's seat out and noticed a metal crunching type sound under the carpet. Ugh, so I pushed on the spot through the carpet, and sure enough...more crunching and definitely some metal moving around. I put my hand under the carpet by the parking brake, and voila! Hundreds of little metal chunks. Probably at least $10 in coins.

Also, picked up the new Corbeau FX1 seat. It's in excellent shape, and came with a PCI low mount. I'll give it a whirl eventually. In this weather, I go nowhere in the Miata!

[tsx_guy]

glad it was change, I was thinking rust.

[Huzer]

This isn't all of them, there are still a bunch under there that I won't get to until I pull the nasty carpet.



Seat just sitting in there, not mounting until I replace the carpet. The bar behind the seat is the cockpit brace I picked up at the junkyard. It's not mounted. I still haven't decided if I'll mount it or not. I haven't sold myself on a roll bar yet until I get the seat mounted and see what kind of clearance my head will have if a bar is installed.

[Saul_Good]

Check the dates on those quarters. 1964 and below are worth $5.00

Nice seat

[erod550]

Also, picked up the new Corbeau FX1 seat. It's in excellent shape, and came with a PCI low mount. I'll give it a whirl eventually. In this weather, I go nowhere in the Miata!

Hehe, in this weather, I only drive the Miata. Unless my wife's Impreza is home.

[roninsoldier83]

Every time I look at this thread, just a bit of project car envy grows inside me. I've gotta hurry up and pickup another Miata; probably won't be until after tax [return] season though.

Tim, I know you're a tall guy; how is head room (w/top up) with the new seat? I know you haven't mounted it yet, but figured you could probably give a decent estimate. My hair always touched the top in my old Miata and I often had to duck down a little to see out of the front windshield at certain stop lights. Do you have the same problem? I'm assuming the foamectomy at least helped in that aspect? Is the aftermarket seat any better?

[Huzer]

Every time I look at this thread, just a bit of project car envy grows inside me. I've gotta hurry up and pickup another Miata; probably won't be until after tax [return] season though.

Tim, I know you're a tall guy; how is head room (w/top up) with the new seat? I know you haven't mounted it yet, but figured you could probably give a decent estimate. My hair always touched the top in my old Miata and I often had to duck down a little to see out of the front windshield at certain stop lights. Do you have the same problem? I'm assuming the foamectomy at least helped in that aspect? Is the aftermarket seat any better?

The foamectomy definitely helped. With the top up, I still have to duck to see stop lights. The Corbeau seat seems to be a good fit. I'm still trying to figure out the best angle to mount it. I really like how much taller the seatback is on the Corbeau. I'll mount the stock passenger seat and snap some pics eventually to show the seat/height differences.

Today, I had to move things around in the garage, so I drove it with no seats. That felt almost perfect, haha! One thing I've done in most of my smaller cars is sacrifice a little legroom for the sake of headroom, and reclined the seat a little. I found also doing the foamectomy on the seatback helped a lot in that regard, too.

[Huzer]

Pulled out the carpet today. Not much more in terms of coins (a couple of bucks) and no rust...other than the parcel shelf that I pulled out. Should be able to find one at a yard somewhere. The crap left is some of the soundproofing attached to the carpets that I just need to vacuum/clean up.

[Huzer]

Seats on floor + rollbar = good to go. Test fitted the seat on the mount last night and I was good. For good measure, I'll be putting the seat on the floor, which will give a little bit extra clearance. I'll be going with the Boss Frog Clearview Maxx single hoop bar, as it sits a little further back and retains a little more height than the Hard Dog bars that sit further back. Every inch helps. I prefer not to small my head on the bar.

[coloskydiver]

I mounted my FX1Pros to the floor in the back with front through a small bracket I built that mounted to the stock location. When your done your going to have a FN Race Car. Get that baby out on the track.

[Huzer]

I mounted my FX1Pros to the floor in the back with front through a small bracket I built that mounted to the stock location. When your done your going to have a FN Race Car. Get that baby out on the track.

That's my plan. I have the PCI bracket that I'll use, since it came with the seat. Front of the mount to the stock location, rears through the floor.

[geo2maz]

This isn't all of them, there are still a bunch under there that I won't get to until I pull the nasty carpet.

$10 dolla holla! wow that's a lot of change

[Huzer]

So today I drove up to Erie and picked up:

Two complete doors (mirrors, interior pieces, etc)
Hood and headlight covers
Trunk with "R" Spoiler (OEM)
R front spoiler/lip
Rear Bumper
Passenger side fender

He didn't have a driver's side fender, otherwise I pretty much would've replaced nearly all the exterior. The color match is great, I just need to start polishing the rear fenders again and have some PDR done. Front bumper will need a respray as well. So far, I'll call it the easy man's partial paint job.

So far I've installed the trunk, bumper, hood, and headlight covers. The latter still need alignment. No pics of the hood until I have it aligned. The hood, covers, mirrors, and fender have a clear bra.
Before:



After:

(I have different plans for the tail lights, so I didn't buy the finish panel and tail lights that he had. The other tails should be here the end of next month, early March.)







Bumpers:



Other parts:







The doors are in equally good shape, but I'm too lazy to take pictures. All parts are from a '95 R model. The interior of the doors is a little different. No arm rest, just a door pull and a pocket, which I like better. The interior pieces are also in better shape than the old ones.

[Huzer]

A few more pictures...just because I feel like it. Doors/fender still not replaced.



You can kinda see the seat final fitment here. It's bolted in. At first, I found it a little uncomfortable, but I've warmed up to it and like it now. It definitely takes getting used to if you haven't ridden in a race style seat before.



The R front spoiler, obviously not bolted on yet. I like that it's painted, actually. Hard to find OEM front R spoilers, especially for the price I paid. The rear trunk spoiler is OEM R as well. He had the rear lip spoiler available, but it had been cut for a trailer hitch. I have no plans to install a hitch. The front bumper, I scraped off the crappy respray with a razor blade. The bumper will still need paint at some point, but it looks a million times better than what was on there. The single stage paint on the bumper had faded, and the previous owner decided that instead of polishing, they'd just spray over it with clear coat without doing any prep, thinking it would look better. Idiots.



This week, I'll get my nephew in the garage and we'll get the doors and passenger side fender on. One dilemma is the painted on pin strip. I'm trying to decide if I should attempt to remove it, or just add a pinstripe to the rear fenders. Not sure how good my stripe removal abilities are.

[tsx_guy]

that looks great.... what a difference