The Miata is officially mine.

Hell. Yes.

Already went out and got it sideways, god rwd is fantastic. Honda obviously knows this, if only they cared...

Anyways, engine swap-wise, I did some thinking. A swap that will get me any decent amount of power will cost like $4,000, unless I get lucky finding parts or know someone. That's pretty much the price of a Fox Mustang.. hmm.. (or I could just not spend the money, ha)

I cant really justify an engine swap. That makes figuring out what to do next a lot easier though. Suspension mods FTW!

 

Any reason why you picked a foxbody mustang to reference the money to? I personally think those are the worst Mustangs (if I had to pick one).

Suspension, beat the hell out of the motor and start saving for a nice swap. Love me a 99-05 Miata. Jussayin, i know you have a 94

 

Fox Mustang because they can look really cool, have a big aftermarket following, V8, RWD. Obviously it's not the most amazing engine/chassis, but newer/older Mustangs look terrible (except really new and really old). I'm quite partial to them, but I haven't driven one or worked on one haha, so that might change my mind on them. I'm not going to buy another car though, not yet.

Civic Stuffs
I got a Thule roof rack for $175 off a guy that's part of a FB Honda owners group in New Mexico. Had my friend pick it up, now it just needs to find it's way to Alabama. Also bought a ram air intake. I don't expect any real hp/mpg bump, but should sound good. Next thing is to clean my headlights. I just did them, but now they're just a super clean haze

Miata Stuffs
I cleaned the Miata's headlights, too. That went MUCH better, those lights look absolutely brand new. I managed to pick up 4 OEM Miata M Edition wheels for $100 because they were a steal! I plan on polishing them up really nice, most likely put some tires like Falken Azenis on there.

 

Because a picture is worth a thousand threads:

The new wheels and necessities (Decent IPA from ATL):





Not quite before, more like in the middle pic:




Obviously have some issues






Just for the LOLZ:




New AEM Intake:







The back of the wheels are a lot worse, but it's all good. I was planning on polishing the **** out of these anyways. There is some curb rash, but it isn't evident unless you're like a foot away. All in all, I'm still happy with them.

The AEM Intake did just what I wanted, it sounds better than stock. As for added power... I think people feel a "power gain" because they push the gas harder and/or rev it higher than usual. That and they want to feel a difference. There is MAYBE a noticeable increase in power, maybe. I only felt a slight difference in first and second, but then again, I was revving it higher/ pushing harder on the gas than usual

 

So I picked up some LS Meshies for 125, woo! A bit of curb rash on one, all need a little polishing. Way better than the Miata wheels.

I have sooo much sanding ahead of me, Got Dayymm. It'll be worth it though. To have all my wheels polished and lookin sexy as hell, yea buddy.

 

I got one wheel sanded down. I was looking at the others, and they really don't look bad at all. Might try to skip straight to polishing. Only problem is the machined ridges, 1 of 4 wont have them. We'll see.

I also noticed that the machined faces dont match each other. Two are wider, and two are narrower. Anyone else ever notice this? Are the two pairs from different years? I took some pics, I'll post them up tonight, you can see what I'm talking about.

 

Pics or GTFO

Letting the paint stripper go to town




The first wheel after stripping the paint/clear coat. Not too bad!




I sanded this one down because it was kinda bad. We'll see if I can get away with not sanding the others. I don't think so, but I'm gonna try.

Middle shot




After shot




This is definitely a messy process.




This is what I was talking about earlier. Those spokes aren't the same width, no way. The one on the right is like 2mm wider. Wtf?




Anyways, my 40 ounces of Wenol will get here tomorrow. Almost time to go to town!

 

Do all of the wheels have honda on them? maybe one is a replica?

 

Nope, they're all stamped with the same stamps. What years did these come on? I'm think two are from a different set or something.

edit: Apparently there are some replicas floating around? I'll double check all the stamps again, see if they're exactly the same, and check for any other differences

 

In the picture, I would venture a guess that the right one is a replica. Look carefully at any differences in the markings. They only produced one version of the 15" "webs".