Should I lose the top? Turbo stuff too.

It looks like the OTM is mine. Now I have to decide on the Miata. It is
already a bit of a nightmare for a modern daily driver, with no A/C, no
P/S, no cruise control, no windshield washer, manual mirrors and
windows, you name it, and it probably does not have it.

This is the opposite of my last Miata except that they both have/had
5-speeds.

I am thinking about keeping it as a toy and both increasing the power
from approximately 200 RWHP, to about 250-300 RWHP, and by taking off
some more weight.

Being a toy, racing seats are a given, and that will knock a nice amount
off. Same with the door panels, and the dash may go as well.

One thing that needs to be replaced is the top, unless I leave it off.
Surprise rainstorms are pretty rare for me, and this may be a completely
dedicated track car soon.
If I do not use the top, I can sell it and put the money towards tires.
I am buying 8 of them soon, a set of Pirelli P5's in 195/50/15's on OEM
alloys for the street and a set of 215/40/16's Azenis mounted on the SSR
Competitions that will be dedicated track tires.

The Azenis are sticky as hell for autocrossing, especially in the dry,
and the P5's are the best all-season tire that I have experienced,
assuming that they last longer than a performance summer tire.

They are sticky enought at it is hard to believe that they will last
50K+ miles, but if they do at least 35K miles, I am happy with them.
Great ride, grip and noise levels.
Good compromise on sidewall flex as well.

Has anyone else removed the top permanently with any level of happiness
on a "sorta-dedicated" track car? Carrying a cover in the car is no
problem.
There are some places I could live where I would never consider it, but
this summer I could have left it parked with the top down for almost 90
days in a row and it would not have been rained in. :-)

Also, I almost always use that cockpit cover that hooks on at the fender
wells to keep out leaves, dirt and sunlight.

Removing the top would make up for the extra weight of adding the roll bar.
It is a 1991 model with a 1.8 liter, the turbo, and almost every after
market body brace made, so I am guessing the weight at around 2300
pounds, and any amount closer to the original 2150 or so that

I can get to is what I am shooting for.
The tire and jack are already out of the car, and of course I
cross-drilled the ignition key. What else can I do?

250+ RWHP HP pushing a maximum of 2000 pounds? Is that asking for too
much? I don't think so, many expensive street cars have a higher power
to weight ratio than that.

The Miata is all about handling, but the extra horsepower does not make
it handle badly, it just opens up more options. ;-)

Even at my far less than professional driving skill level, there are
performance capabilities that I have in my turbo Miata that were lacking
in my naturally aspirated Miata.
Performance-wise, the last Miata was incapable of doing many things that
the turbo Miata is capable of.

With two professional drivers, the difference would be even greater as
the extra power was used to near-maximum potential that I am unable to
achieve.

It really should not matter, but when the lady in a Chevy Astro van kept
me from entering the highway until I fell back behind her bcausee th car
was incapable of getting past her, I just felt bad and could not wait to
get back into my turbo machine.
I will probably never own a Miata with less than 200 HP again, and if it
is one of the newer, bloated models that weighs 2500+ pounds, than
maybe 250HP, especially if it has two typical Americans in it, which
means add at least another 500 pounds. ;-)

Pat

In article >, pws >
wrote:

> a set of 215/40/16's Azenis mounted on the SSR
> Competitions that will be dedicated track tires.

Pat, the Azenis has a reputation as a lousy tire for track days, if
that's what you mean. They're designed to work well cold, for autocross,
but sustained stress allegedly overheats them and makes them greasy
pretty quickly.

I've never used the Azenis on the track myself, but there are a ton of
tales at miataforum.

Just sayin'...

--
Lanny Chambers
St. Louis, MO
'94C

On Fri, 02 Oct 2009 16:29:59 -0500, pws > wrote:

>Has anyone else removed the top permanently with any level of happiness
>on a "sorta-dedicated" track car? Carrying a cover in the car is no
>problem.

I have no soft top on my 95R, and don't miss it at all. I carry a cockpit cover
that goes under the windshield wipers, has loops that secure with velcro around
the mirrors, covers the roll bar, and attaches at the rear with strong magnets.

In the winter, the hardtop goes on. That's it.

We non-power-steering types have to stick together!

-- Larry

Lanny Chambers wrote:

> Pat, the Azenis has a reputation as a lousy tire for track days, if
> that's what you mean. They're designed to work well cold, for autocross,
> but sustained stress allegedly overheats them and makes them greasy
> pretty quickly.
>
> I've never used the Azenis on the track myself, but there are a ton of
> tales at miataforum.
>
> Just sayin'...

Not sure if it will be true track days, autocross only, or both. What
would you go with for a dedicated track tire that is not likely to see rain?

Gaining experience is obviously more important than the tire choice, but
as long as I am spending the money for new rubber, it seems like I
should get some nice tires on there while learning the ropes.

Thanks again!

Pat

pltrgyst wrote:

> I have no soft top on my 95R, and don't miss it at all. I carry a cockpit cover
> that goes under the windshield wipers, has loops that secure with velcro around
> the mirrors, covers the roll bar, and attaches at the rear with strong magnets.
>
> In the winter, the hardtop goes on. That's it.
>
> We non-power-steering types have to stick together!
>
> -- Larry

Good to hear. I will try it, but I will hold off for a while on selling
the soft top just in case.

My car will not take a hardtop, the rollbar is too tall, but we also
don't have much of a winter, and I can drive the OTM on the really cold
days. (well, cold for central Texas anyway).

The OTM will also get driven on the really hot days, since I have no
A/C, but at least half of the year here has great weather for top-down
driving, as is nighttime during the summer when it gets down to a comfy
80 to 90 degrees by midnight in July and August.

October, November and December are some of our best top-down month. If I
remember correctly, the temperature was in the mid-seventies on my
birthday last year. (Dec. 5th).

Go non-power steering! I wish that all Miatas lacked this "feature". The
car is not heavy enough for this to be an issue for me, and it's not
like I am a strong man contender.

Pat

On Oct 3, 1:58*am, pws > wrote:

> Go non-power steering! I wish that all Miatas lacked this "feature". The
> car is not heavy enough for this to be an issue for me, and it's not
> like I am a strong man contender.
>
> Pat

My '92 was a base car; no power steering, no power windows, no power
mirrors. My '97 'M' edition has all of those. I like the power
windows and mirrors, but I prefer the unassisted steering. I find the
'97 to be darty and nervous at initial turn-in and the steering to be
too light at all speeds.

The interesting thing to me is that I always thought that the '92
would make a great Spec Miata race car (because of the lack of PS),
but my son who races Spec Miata says that in his experience it doesn't
really make a big difference to the racers, but that in general there
seems to be preference in favor of the power steering, and that the
preference is greater in the 6,12, and 24 hour endurance racers.
YMMV, etc.

Tim

Tim, although I agree the steering is a bit too light on the NA power
assisted cars, your dartiness may be more a factor of your alignment. Larry,
I mean Lanny ;-) can help you with that if you want to try something
different than your current setup. He specializes in a 'performance
alignment' or is is 'precision alignment'? Anyway, either way, you'll
probably be able to get your car to act just the way you want it to. He's
quite helpful / knowledgeable if you want to tweak his favorite setting he
can help you do it right.

Why is it that every time I want to get into this, I have to go back and
read up on toe-in and caster and such ...... what's wrong with me? Ooops,
let me retract that ;-)

I think they got the PS pretty much perfect on the NB, it feels pretty much
un assisted w/o the higher effort at low speeds.

Chris
99BBB

"Tim M." > wrote in message
...
On Oct 3, 1:58 am, pws > wrote:

> Go non-power steering! I wish that all Miatas lacked this "feature". The
> car is not heavy enough for this to be an issue for me, and it's not
> like I am a strong man contender.
>
> Pat

My '92 was a base car; no power steering, no power windows, no power
mirrors. My '97 'M' edition has all of those. I like the power
windows and mirrors, but I prefer the unassisted steering. I find the
'97 to be darty and nervous at initial turn-in and the steering to be
too light at all speeds.

The interesting thing to me is that I always thought that the '92
would make a great Spec Miata race car (because of the lack of PS),
but my son who races Spec Miata says that in his experience it doesn't
really make a big difference to the racers, but that in general there
seems to be preference in favor of the power steering, and that the
preference is greater in the 6,12, and 24 hour endurance racers.
YMMV, etc.

Tim

In article
>,
"Tim M." > wrote:

> my son who races Spec Miata says that in his experience it doesn't
> really make a big difference to the racers, but that in general there
> seems to be preference in favor of the power steering

Probably due mostly to the quicker ratio.

--
Lanny Chambers
St. Louis, MO
'94C

On Sat, 03 Oct 2009 18:08:43 -0500, Lanny Chambers >
wrote:

>In article
>,
> "Tim M." > wrote:
>
>> my son who races Spec Miata says that in his experience it doesn't
>> really make a big difference to the racers, but that in general there
>> seems to be preference in favor of the power steering
>
>Probably due mostly to the quicker ratio.

That's what the F1 guys say too. I find it awfully hard to believe from my FF
racing -- as long as the car was doing 5mph, steering effort was absolutely
nothing at all, but what do I know?

-- Larry

In article >,
pltrgyst > wrote:

> >Probably due mostly to the quicker ratio.
>
> That's what the F1 guys say too. I find it awfully hard to believe from my FF
> racing -- as long as the car was doing 5mph, steering effort was absolutely
> nothing at all, but what do I know?

I think you misunderstood. I meant they prefer power steering because
the power rack has a quicker ratio than the manual rack. They put up
with the slight loss of feel to gain the benefit of smaller hand
movements and less shuffling. Effort has little to do with it. I don't
know if de-powering a power rack is legal in Spec Miata, but I doubt it.

--
Lanny Chambers
St. Louis, MO
'94C