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