Copy and pasted from another forum. Figured I should start a build here too, even though I’m out of that SHITHOLE you call the 518.
:dunno
I found some serious love for roadsters about two years ago. My buddy started showing me pictures of some slammed miatas, after I was already into a few NAs that in retrospect were all but impressive. I graduated college that year and got a job making some okay money and decided I was buying a miata. I wanted an NA but when you’ve got money and you’re a little dumb, it definitely can burn a hole in your pocket. I got an NB purely because it was more expensive and because I assumed it’d be in better shape than the NA. I was partly justified in this, because the one I got ended up being fairly decent… but it was still silly thinking and again, in retrospect, I wish I had gotten an NA.
This is what I ended up with…
Crappy pictures, I know. Those tires are 185/70/14 and look awful. I also can’t stand those wheels. The mark on the door came with an odd story that isn’t really worth repeating, but the car was incredibly clean underneath and that’s what was important to me. I paid 4600 for it and after looking through the car I found a RB front swaybar which was a nice little addition. It also had a DVD player with a ruined screen and a faded ass CF as you can see. The car unfortunately came with an incredible amount of title issues, and it took me four months to straighten that out. I did manage to register the car by mid october, and anyone from the northeast knows, that’s about the end of roadster season.
Before I registered it I had to do some things to make it so I could actually use the car. I’m a pretty tall dude at 6’3 so, a new seat was in order. I found a cheap kirkey through a local miata guy and bolted it to the floor. I was stupid at the time and managed to use the stock seatbelt with it. :woolery: I also picked up a joyfast supershort from Rod since it came with some awful excuse for a shift knob.
While the car was in the garage for the winter I decided I’d start picking up parts for it. I snagged up a supercharger kit that I planned on using but I never managed to find a manifold for it after months of searching, so I sold it to a guy in central NY and started buying turbo parts instead. I got a pretty bangin deal on some stuff from planet miata that had some potential. Next I got in on the KG works group buy and bought a NRG hub and QR 2.0 and a black/black nardi classic from Rod that was a little beat up and had no horn button. The last part I bought that winter was a harddog hardcore hardtop M1 double diagonal and a 5 point harness to go with it. I know these are for NAs but I read that they could be used on an NB and the top just wouldn’t sit perfectly flush, which was fine with me.
These are taken in April right before I reregistered it for the year. I didn’t bother with the turbo at this point, nor with the QR/hub/wheel. Drove it for a while and loved it but I also came across a sick deal on a hardtop. Made a roadtrip to NH for my BRG HT with headliner and defrost and found the only reason putting that rollbar on an NB is foolish. The hardtop turns into a BITCH to put on haha. We finally managed it though and I snapped a picture quick before we left to head back to NY.
I drove around with the HT on for a while but eventually decided it was getting hot enough to want the top down. I took it back off and drove top down any time I could and loved every minute of it. One day though, while late for work and in a rush, I was headed down the mountain I lived on with wet roads and in my haste, I failed to downshift for a corner and slow down… so I was in the least controllable situation possible. The car slide out incredibly easy and scared the shit out of me with no power to control it and no grip… yeah. At that moment I decided I needed to get off of the bald snow tires I was on and upgrade.
Luckily the guy I got the hardtop from also had a set of M edition wheels with nearly new bridgestone potenza S03s mounted for an incredible price. Back to NH I went.
After putting these on I could have sworn I hit something while I was in there, because I had an awful clunking noise. I also checked my tire pressures regularly because the front end felt exceptionally dive-y(Is that even a word? Spelling is a tricky thing). After investigating I found two broken front sway bar mounts and google proved that it was a common problem with upgraded front sways. So I took it to the local speed shop and had a set of heavy duty mounts made and welded in. The came out awesome and the car handled 100x better than it did before the upgrade. Definitely worth the cash.
I love the wheels and tires. The last picture is how the car sits right now. I still need to do something about the passenger mirror, the door, and the CF hood. I buffed it once and it cleaned up nice but quickly returned to how it looks now. I’m hoping someone with a stock black hood is willing to trade me for this one, but we’ll see what happens. Right now I don’t have any plans for the door and mirror, just due to the unwillingness to pay to have them fixed. Eventually I’ll get around to it though. The KG works panel, nardi wheel, and NRG parts have all been installed now but I don’t have any pictures of those parts yet. I’ll take some as soon as I can. I also don’t plan on messing with the turbo as I’ve just moved and making major changes like that right now just don’t seem like the right idea when you’re 1k miles away from home.
I do have a friend with some ricelands he’s looking to unload though and I’ll be picking those up soon. I can’t stand the current ride height and they’ll only be temporary. Plans other than the ricelands include some custom doorcards, a faux nakame center console, visor deletes from Injoy, a stock passenger seat to replace the rx8 one, possibly a radio delete since I hate the look of the dvd player… but I do love having music sometimes, some gauge faces, a stock NB trunk spoiler or if I can find one an MSM trunk spoiler, and eventually I’d like a set of demon cambers or eurolines. I’m also looking at possibly trying to make an ITB setup work that is for sale by a member here and using my emanage blue to tune it.
That’s my thread, sorry for the book and shitty pictures. I’ll be updating with new photos and any new part installs as they come about. Thanks for reading
DSC_8832 by capitalcrew, on Flickr
9/5/11 - shitty ricelands are in the mail.
AK. Bugs me how it doesn’t perfect match at the corners.
MSM. I love the way it sort of seems more squared off. It looks sick slammed.
