One year ago today, I drove about 90 minutes away to buy my 2009 Miata from an old couple who was downsizing their fleet. It was an unloved little thing, rarely cleaned, sat outside and looked pretty homely. However, it only had traveled 28,000 miles and had routine maintenance records. After initially being turned down on an offer of $9000, the seller called me up a few days later and said he would accept if the offer was still on the table. I agreed and made plans to meet him later that week.
Picked it up and it looked as homely as ever – here’s how it looked after driving it back home:
Completely filthy, jams full of caked on grime, a top in need of replacement and a poorly-repainted front bumper. A smarter person might’ve walked away since there were so many Miatas made; however, I saw this as an opportunity to restore this car and end up with a low mileage, clean title, clean Carfax Miata with extremely low mileage, ultimately turning it into what I thought would be a NC MSM, so I began to make my list and of course shared my score with Oppo.
After a thorough cleaning, the first two items that I wanted to tackle were the front bumper and the top. I again returned to the wisdom of Oppo and you all rightly suggested addressing the top first before worrying about the bumper. So I did and upgraded the car in the process. The Touring trim comes with a vinyl top, but I ordered a Robbins canvas top from Moss Miata and arranged to have it professionally installed. A few days later, the Miata had a new top that took years off its life.
Next, I tackled another maintenance item – the dreaded NC coolant expansion tank. These are known to get brittle with age and crack right around the lip where the cap sits. The one on the car looked fine, but as a $50 part, it was cheap insurance. My folks were up visiting, so my Dad and I knocked out the swap as well as a coolant flush with some Mazda FL22.
After that, I wanted to continue some subtle upgrades to the interior. I scooped a pair of NC2 Grand Touring doorcards, which have pleather in place of plastic and installed those. I also made a point of doing Miata things on some of my favorite backroads.
To continue the improvements to the interior, I placed an order with RedlineGoods for a new shifter boot, e-brake boot and console cover in leather with silver stitching. This required pulling the console out, which was easy peasy – biggest hassle was unclipping the window switches which reside in there. After the install of those three items, paired with the door cards, I was pleased with how the interior started coming together. I also had scored a new Raceseng Contour shift knob that I added around the same time to replace the beat-up OEM knob.
Interior improvements mostly sorted, I decided my sports car needed to sound like a sports car instead of a sewing machine. I rang up my friends at GoodWin Racing and placed an order for their RoadsterSport2 exhaust. The RS2 is probably the mid-level exhaust they offer as far as noise goes – louder than the SuperQ but quieter than the Race versions. After it arrived, I backed the Miata up on my ramps and got to it. Two bolts and four hangers later, I had it fitted.
When I was updating the interior, I realized that my changes made the steering wheel look pretty lousy. Recalling my old Audi S3, I absolutely loved the thick steering wheel in that car and wanted to see what options were out there for the Miata. After a bit of research, I found the folks at GuardianDesigns across the pond. They work with you to design custom wheels for the NC (and a few other models) and helped me get exactly what I wanted. Wait time was a bit of a bear, but from order placed to receiving it in my grubby hands took about two months. Honestly, not too bad for a custom piece from overseas. Install was easier than I thought; however, taking the airbag off isn’t something I’d like to do again.
At this point, I wanted to improve how the Miata handled and stopped. I called my friends at GoodWin back up again and placed a couple very large orders: Ohlins DFV coilovers, Progress swaybars and scored a Helmholtz midpipe they had used as a test fitting for a nice discount. I also went ahead and decided on the Enkei PF05 17.8.5 as my wheel choice. Next, I called up Flyin’ Miata and ordered their Wilwood front LBBK and some endlinks for my new swaybars. New Stoptech rotors and pads were on the way from TireRack. Some items were backordered and the PF05 came on the slowest tugboat from Japan, but as the parts arrived, I rang up my buddy who builds Miatas as a side-business and booked some of his time. Just before I took the car to his place, I scored a set of Enkei TSVs 17x8 with nearly new Indy500s to hold me over until the PF05 arrived.
After picking it back up, it just looked fantastic. We agreed to set the ride height at 13.25” hub to fender and that just provided a great stance. Between the Ohlins and Progress swaybars, it corners with so much more confidence and the added width on the wheels with better rubber just provides significantly more grip. During the install, he did find a bit of rust that I hadn’t noticed, but cleaned that up, hit it with preventer and then some undercoating, so it should be back to good as new in that regard.
The most recent endeavor has been the NC3 nose swap. I started gathering parts for this back when I picked the car up as it was one of the first things I wanted to do, but ended up among the last. I found a set of NC3 Club headlights with black housings on eBay and scooped those up, ordered the JDM fog light housings from Amayama and the grille and Club lip from Tasca. As that was all arriving, I was struggling as to where to get a front bumper painted and installed. The online options seemed okay but shipping killed whatever savings you might be able to find. I didn’t have any luck finding one off a crashed car, so I just decided to let my fingers do the walking and called up a few local body shops. One local shop that handled my wife’s car a couple times had done great work for us and ended up quoting me a very reasonable offer. I had been planning on installing everything myself as it seemed rather straightforward, but they offered to do that for free, so I wasn’t about to turn them down. While they had the bumper off, they also installed new Hella Supertones horns and LED indicators from DiodeDynamics. I located a TapTurn module and installed that myself to control the hyperflash, plus offer a few other benefits.
Shortly thereafter, the PF05 arrived and I got those mounted up with some takeoff RE71R and then installed them on the Miata. Unfortunately they’re a bit… snug… so I’ve got an appointment next week to get the fenders rolled and then a more aggressive alignment the week after to tuck them in a bit as they’re currently rubbing, moreso on the rear.
I’m honestly so pleased with how this car has been transformed from where I got it a year ago. It looks great with either the TSV or PF05 and with all the suspension work that’s been completed it handles so much better over stock. I’m glad I sucked it up and went with the Ohlins because ride quality does not suffer, even on a mid-range setting. The car inspires so much confidence on a windy road and I can’t wait to unleash it at the next Motorsport4theMasses event down in Darlington later this month. The addition of the Helmholtz midpipe and RS2 duals doesn’t do anything for power, but it makes it sound like a proper sports car. Great sound, no drone with a bit of fun pops on decel. The NC3 bumper looks great and the mouthguard even makes it easy to dress up for Halloween.
You might be wondering what does the next year have in store? Not much! I’m going to try and start saving for a turbo kit now that the rest of the car is sorted and the only changes I’ll likely make will be small aesthetic ones. I’d like to add the Club stripes on the doors and wrap the windshield frame and mirrors gloss black. I might also add a set of those parabolic mirrors for better rear visibility if they ever get back in stock to replace my grubby OE ones. Aside from that, lots of driving. Currently at 33,000 miles, so looking forward to adding to that total. I’m just glad the Miata’s appearance now reflects its mileage!