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

Reply to
pws
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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'...

Reply to
Lanny Chambers

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

Reply to
pltrgyst

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

Reply to
pws

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

Reply to
pws

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

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

Reply to
Chris D'Agnolo

Probably due mostly to the quicker ratio.

Reply to
Lanny Chambers

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

Reply to
pltrgyst

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.

Reply to
Lanny Chambers

I am also pretty sure it is not legal for spec racing. For general street use, or for a car that is already modified beyond spec racing rules, I like a de-powered steering rack a lot.

Quicker ratio and excellent feel, and I don't find the car hard at all to turn even when it is stationary, and that is with 215 width tires up front instead of 185's or 195's.

It seems like the super-lightweight Momo Champion steering wheel also helps with the steering "feel" over the heavier, air-equipped steering wheel.

The best part for me, however, is the removal of the P/S pump, belt, reservoir and fluid lines.

Less parts to ever wear out and no more taking up any space under the hood for a system that provides power steering assistance that I do not need or want. Also, no power steering fluid to ever worry about changing, and it probably took at least 5 pounds of weight off of the car! ;-)

Since I am not concerned about the spec racing aspect, I can see only advantages to de-powering the rack for myself. I am just glad the the previous owner de-powered it before I bought it, as it does not look like the easiest project ever.

Pat

Reply to
pws

On my last alignment for the '96M before it died, they screwed up and gave me 1/32 inch of toe-out instead of 1/32 inch toe-in. Now that was a darty car, but I did not take it back in right away as it was kind of fun.

All I had to do was look at the steering wheel and it would change lanes. "Use the force, Luke"

Pat

Reply to
pws

No, I didn't misunderstand, Lanny. I'm assuming that's also the reason why the F1 teams go for it. What I don't get is how often -- apart from the hairpin at Monte Carlo -- is the quicker ratio really meaningful enough to offset the lack of feedback?

BTW, I de-powered the rack on my TR-8 and really liked it that way.

-- Larry

Reply to
pltrgyst

You're still misunderstanding, Larry. With a Miata, you have two rack choices: quicker power or slower manual. In stock autocross classes, you can only use a manual rack in a car that came with it, or has had all of its other equipment adjusted to match a car that came with it. You can't drop a manual rack into a 1.8 NA with a Torsen LSD, e.g., unless it has all the R pieces and none of the options not available on the R. Thus, to compete with a manual rack I'd have to lose my electric windows, leather seats, etc., and add the R spoilers.

F1 teams can make any ratio rack they want, with or without any amount of power assist, so their choices are based on driver preference, not necessity.

Ever watch Montoya's hands in an F1 race? Lots more lock used than you might think, searching for grip at 110%. Things happen *fast* in F1, and shuffling an F1 steering "wheel" is not an option. Slow steering means wasted opportunities to save spins.

Reply to
Lanny Chambers

I don't think so, Lanny. From his OP, he's already at 200hp and more, along with other mods, so I don't see any indication that he's even thinking about running stock.

-- Larry

Reply to
pltrgyst

I thought the issue was why many top autocrossers prefer power steering.

Reply to
Lanny Chambers

Yeah, I kinda thought we might be talking at cross purposes. Never mind. 8;)

-- Larry

Reply to
pltrgyst

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