Mazda MX-5

My other half is thinking of getting an early type Mazda MX5 [pop up headlights], does anyone know anything about them? are they any good?

good friend had an import (eunos) he loved it, till the lack of proper antirust rotted it out under him. tonnes of bits to customize it your way, and not too expensive either, from what i understand a very active club scene too.

only drove it a few times, but was all the blurb said about being right in there and involved with the car.

yeah here

very basic so less to go wrong and easy to work on. great to drive with RWD and nice handling. they're well built and very reliable so they've stood the test of time better than expected. you can get some very clean imports for cheap. only problems are the interior is too basic and dated, and the 1.6 engine is a bit crap (unless you only want to cruise about), so i'd defo go for the 1.8. if it wasnt for the girly/gay image i'd probably want one.

One of the best drivers cars around, perfect balance, great chassis and the engine is different in that it has a very low compression ratio compared to engines of similar age which lends its self so well to forced induction.

With no internal mods whatsoever you can boost them to 250bhp and still be reilable. jackson Racing, HKS, Blitz to name but a few all do forced induction kits, not many people bother with trying to tune them N/A because not much to gain.

So it comes down to choice of supercharged for big engine feel, or turbo charged for more top end power and more breakaway power delivery.

If importing you can get a 1.6L model if its pre 1996 IIRC it has 120ish bhp, some 30more than UK models, and not far off the unstressed 1.8 but it is also lighter.

There is a buying guide in this months Practical Performance Car mag which goes into much more detail than I have on what can be done, and why some have LSD's and most (UK) models do not.

Of course as its for Mrs you may not want to know of the plethora of mods available for them, but you may just enjoy driving it soo much that you do

Really fancy getting one of these as well actually for the missus (and me if it's sunny )

Aaron forgot to say there was also a BBS model which came with the turbo conversion when new..

After reading up quite a bit on them i've heard that the 1.6 is quite a nice revvy engine when compared to the 1.8 and you wouldn't find much between them although for a more civilised relaxing drive the 1.8 is the one to have..

As has been said loads parts available obviously Mazda build quality and cheap parts around when needed..

Agree with what has been said about the interior's I mean wooden sterring wheels and also some dodgy coloured interiors about..

Absolutely loads of diffent special editions with various little toys from just Aircon all the way to LSD's etc.. so best get oevr to somewher like here
http://www.mx5ocforum.co.uk/

Hope that helps


And for the temptation factor

thanks

its probably a couple of months off but we are already talking of lowered springs and sports back box

it'll be the mk1 1.8 that she gets.

You all bought one on Gran Turismo at some stage so dont use that hair dressers car rubbish

cold day in hell when i play on a sony