Month: September 2016

As things go with the Craigslist Miata, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it, and when in doubt pull it out. Now a brief disclaimer: growing up in South Florida I went through a lot of AC compressors, and each time it was about $800 to get it fixed. So I learned early on how to drive around with the windows down and to bring an extra shirt for when you reach your destination. Now to be honest I never used the Craigslist Miata’s air conditioning for fear that the compressor would lock and I would be out an accessory belt.

So when the bearing was about ready to fail, and making a god awful noise, I thought it best to just remove the unit before bad turned into worse. Lucky enough, Mazda sold new non air conditioned NAs with power steering, so all I needed was to find the right belt and my problem would be solved. Part of the procedure involved removing the fans in order to get more room at the front of the engine, and with little to no protection for one of the vital components to keeping the engine running exposed to soon to be swinging wrenches I was able to find a little peace of mind in the recycling bin. Thank god for Papa Johns.

At the end of that screwdriver is a metal flake. A metal flake that used to be part of the ring gear in Craigslist Miata’s open differential. At over 200,000 miles it’s not uncommon for these things to fail (ie grenade inside the housing), and I am just glad that it happened at low speeds. That is because after the gear oil was drained and the bottom of the pan was covered in a solid layer of metal flake, I can now see what was causing the awful sounds coming from the rear end.

I am sure that Mazda never meant for the original axles to part ways with their hubs, and it turned out to be the stubborn splines stuck in their ways after a quarter century that caused us to bring out the proverbial “bigger hammer” in order to get the job done. From what I was told, this proved to be the biggest time consuming PITA of the entire ordeal. As you can see from the arms that connected the old differential to the chassis, one is much darker than the other. That’s because it is covered in gear oil.

It’s always great to see good friends, but it’s even better when they bring you some uniquely cool. Something that speaks to your inner geek and makes you gasp for at the realization of the rarified air in front of you. I’m talking about the kind of item that would make lesser individuals ask, “What was it again?”.

Good friend of the Crigslist Miata, someone we like to refer to as Mr. Mazdaspeed (who just so happened to have worked as an engineer on the original project over a quarter century ago) presented a perfect example of this when he pulled an original 1989 Chicago Auto Show brochure for the Mazda Miata. This was a only one from a stack he absconded with at the time. Slowly distributing them to select individuals worthy of appreciating such fine things. Best of all, his parting words were “I don’t want to see this thing on eBay.”

Thanks again Dean, you won’t.