The $1,200 Miata

In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :

Awesome!  I shall satisfy my tool whore desires!

I spent most of yesterday driving the Miata down to Bowling Green and back to fetch my daughter for Easter.  About 6 hours round-trip, just buzzing along at about 4k RPM, just as happy as it could be.  My leg, however, is not particularly happy about the situation.  I'm going to have to add "installing cruise control" to the list of things to do on this car at some point.

In reply to wae :

Man, I hear ya!

Given the choice between working cruise control and functioning A/C, I'd take cruise control all day, every day.  My leg gets numb the same as yours.

In reply to Indy - Guy :

Back when I was young and stupid (as opposed to now when I am old and stupid), I bought myself a brand-new Saturn SL2.  That part wasn't stupid but I absolutely insisted that I didn't want cruise control.  At this point in my life I cannot fathom what I was thinking, but it was stupid.  Maybe it was because that required some crazy option package or an automatic transmission or something like that.  Maybe they didn't have one on the lot in the color I wanted with cruise.  No idea.  But damn, that was dumb.  I can actually manage driving without cruise in some cars.  I did the trip to Gainesville in the Saab and in the Neon and I was able to make that work.  I don't use the cruise very much on the motorhome because it'll want to rev to the moon on every little hill instead of just shaving a few mph off.  But the Miata is just too small and the angle is just too wrong to be able to be comfortable for long periods of time.

According to my Internet research, my '97 either definitely has the factory cruise wiring, definitely doesn't have it, or might have some but not all, of the wiring.  Thanks Internet.  Looks like Moss has an aftermarket kit for about $500 that I might have to think about.

In reply to wae :

From my experience driving the Neon from Nebraska to Ohio, it's so tempting to just whoooosh into some boost periodically that cruise would be detrimental 

In reply to wae :

I used to have an aftermarket cruise kit on the DMC that I'm not going to need anymore that I'd be happy to give you. Difficulty: I don't know where all of the parts are at this point. -_-;

In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :

Cruise would sort of take the fun out of a little hooligan like the Neon, wouldn't it!?

In reply to Ashyukun (Robert) :

That might be worth exploring, if you happen to trip across it, thank you!  I've got a pretty long list of stuff that I'd like to do to the car first, but some day.... 

wae said:

In reply to Ashyukun (Robert) :

That might be worth exploring, if you happen to trip across it, thank you!  I've got a pretty long list of stuff that I'd like to do to the car first, but some day.... 

I saw some of it when I was going through the tubs of parts for the DMC, I'll see if I can find the rest. 

In reply to wae :

SL2 offered cruise with the manual, and it was one of my favorites ever. Right under your fingertips, so you could enable and adjust without needing to move your hands off the wheel. 

My '91 GTi 16v didn't have cruise control, which I didn't discover until after I'd bought the car.  I was quite displeased with myself for not checking that while I was on a test drive, I just assumed it was standard, when it actually was an option that very few of them came with.

I drove that car coast to coast numerous times, plus from Cleveland to Boston and back numerous times.  I wouldn't want to do that now.  In fact, having radar cruise control on my DD is a must have now.