Practice

In reply to Zman:

Well, I'm no expert, seeing that I've owned the car 2 years and have only gone to 1 autocross...

It's set up from the factory to understeer. It doesn't plow too badly, IMO. If you go from staggered -> unstaggered, it helps a bit. I got my 18x9.5 275mm all around a couple months ago, so I can't comment on truly stock handling in an autocross situation. I definitely noted being able to get it to slide either end depending on throttle position and weight transfer.

On the street, I can't feel the difference, really. It's fairly easy to provoke a little bit of oversteer on slower corners. However, it has enough grip that you have to deliberately provoke it to oversteer. You really can't push its limits all that much on public roads because it's plenty capable out of the box.

jrw1621 wrote:

Zman wrote: ...Miata ... good car to choose and I still might consider it but imo it looks a little girly...

Yes, you are new here so you are excused from your statement above. Please follow this attached thread for some re-learning http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/grm/guide-to-a-manly-miata/6544/page1/

HAHA nice. Sorry if that was offensive. I know for a fact it's a good car to drive...i'll get reading :)

watched some youtube vids of miatas/mx-5s and they look pretty damn good. sound awesome too. I take it you can get hard tops for them thatwont stop me from fiting a rollcage?

There are several roll bar and roll cage kits out there that work with the hard top. I just got my first miata about a week ago, so I have been shopping around for goodies for the new car.

The Hard Dog series of roll bars are highly regarded on this board.

If your looking for something more serious, like a full roll cage, there are kits out there for the spec miata racers. Since the spec miata cars are required to run a hardtop, I would imagine the cage kits would all be compatible with them.

Zman wrote: watched some youtube vids of miatas/mx-5s and they look pretty damn good. sound awesome too. I take it you can get hard tops for them thatwont stop me from fiting a rollcage?

Yes, I just had my "new" one out to its first event. Yes, it may be down on power. Especially compared to my old Mazdaspeed6 (Mazda 6 MPS on your side of the pond). But I was too busy giggling my way through the corner to notice. It was a blast.

Nice :) pleased to hear about the full roll cages.

Also i'm of the mindset now where i'm flitting between the Miata/Mk1 MR2/Mk3 Golf GTi.

Depends on what I feel like at the time but at this very moment it's in that order.

1.Miata 2.Mr2 3.Golf

Lets see what happens :)

PS: I need to read up on mechanics and just motor modification/maintenance in general. What would you suggest?

Wow, your list of cars all have distinctly different handling charateristics. Depends on what you want. All are probably good choices.

At the autcross this weekend I drove two of the cars in your list. I have been co-driving with a buddy who is trying to develop his mk1 MR2 into a competive STS car. The MR2 is not cosidered to be "The Car to have" in that particular class. But I have been impressed with the car so far.

We have already caused a couple of miata drivers to sweat a bit... But the car still has a ways to go before we are full developed, I think the car is underated. That car has tons of grip. It likes to change direction but it dosent like it when you lift on the throttle mid-corner. As you can see me do in run #1 of the follwing video:

YouTubeLinky

I had my miata out during the fun runs at the end of the day. The car felt completely different from the MR2. First off the miata was stock with crap tires so I had very little grip (which was expected) but what surpised me was the cars willingness to rotate under power. With power off through a corner the miata tended to understeer slightly, but I could induce oversteer with throttle application.

Which contrasts with the MR2 which didn't seem to care if power was on or off as long as you didn't lift.

If your looking for miata information miata.net is the place to go.

Also FatCatMotorsports has some good info on their website, including suspension setup tutorials and online calculators.

flyinmiata is another good source:

Also there is this Keith Tanner guy, who slums around this board a bit, he has written a book or two about miatas they are worth picking up.

Nice info, thanks