Mazda Miata

I'm wondering if there is any way to convert my 2002 Miata to drive by wire.

I just installed supercharger and it requires you to move the placement of the throttle. So now my throttle is really sticky and i would like to convert it to DBW.

It seems easier to fix the sticky throttle then install drive by wire and even if you could why would you want to.

Well, we've done it on a few cars. But it also involved installing a brand new LS3 and completely rewiring the car. Might be a bit extreme for your purposes, but the car was certainly transformed!

I don't know of an easy way to do it. I suppose it might be possible to make the drive-by-wire hardware independent of the ECU and simply feed a signal that mimics the TPS to the ECU. But it's never been done as far as I know.

An easier solution would be to work on the throttle cable routing and make sure there are no small-radius bends.

I'd imagine the stickiness is caused by an inadequate length of the cable resulting in some small-radius bends, like Keith suggested.

If there's simply no way to reroute, a cable replacement may be in order. A quick Google search yielded this company that will custom-make a PTFE (Teflon) lined throttle cable to any length you need. A longer cable would allow smoother bends, and smoother operation.

http://www.pegasusautoracing.com/productselection.asp?Product=1270

Unless it's a home-brew supercharger, this is not a unique installation. You don't usually have to replace the throttle cable to make a Miata supercharger work. Simply paying attention to routing should make it work.

Lokar makes some great universal throttle cables. Use a piece of string to measure your ideal jacket length, and ideal inner cable length, then order one that is closest.

You could also poke around your local salvage yard with those numbers in hand and see if there is one off another car that could work for nearly free :)

Good luck!

If you want to be really GRM use bicycle brake cable. I used them many times to replace the throttle cable on British cars with great sucess. Not to mention that they are very inexpensive.

Don49 wrote: If you want to be really GRM use bicycle brake cable. I used them many times to replace the throttle cable on British cars with great sucess. Not to mention that they are very inexpensive.

Inexpensive and smooooooth!