Miata Mods

Another Tale of Woe

Before the Emperor went into exile I removed several bits that I wanted to transfer over to the CTBNL. One of them was a aftermarket little box that allowed music playback from a USB stick (among other things.) Ever since it has been in the silver car it would randomly stop working. After paying attention to when it wasn’t working it seemed to only be after the spent several hours out in the hot sun.

The unit is past its 1 year warranty period, but the manufacturer’s site has a support area where you can fill out a form and start an email conversation with one of their techs. Let’s give it a go:

Me – Sun, Sep 11 2016 8:14pm
Car make: Mazda Miata 2002
Invoice: 77311
Seller: Grom Audio

MAZN2 unit worked flawlessly for over a year in my 2003. Moved to a new to me 2002 and it fails to turn on sometimes after car sits during work.

Will turn on after home in garage after a few hours. Almost seems to me to be heat related. But just the other day on an evening drive it just quit working. Radio display shows CD CH at bottom like normal, but no disc-track numbers and no sound.

Them – Mon, Sep 12 2016 6:42am
I would double check the installation wiring and make sure everything is plugged in secure and solid.

Are you able to move the GROM module back to the 2003 model vehicle?

Me – Mon, Sep 12 2016 10:02am
As expected, it did not work when I got in the car at the end of the work day. This time when I hit the CD button instead of getting no music with a display of CD CH, nothing happened at all.

The 2003 is long gone.

Just to cover all the bases I pulled the Mazda radio out when I got home and unplugged and then re-plugged it back in. I then unhooked the Grom and re-hooked it back up. Then of course it worked fine. But was that because it had cooled off in the hour or so in my garage or did the re-seating of connectors fix it?

I will let you know tomorrow.

Them – Mon, Sep 12 2016 10:27am
What is the batch number to the GROM module? This will be on sticker bottom of the unit.

Please also check what firmware version is on the GROM module currently.
To check firmware version switch to USB mode of the GROM. While playing music from USB connected device i.e. USB flash drive, Android or Ipod/iphone (USB3/MST4 only).
Unplug from USB port. The track number will change and show current version number of Firmware.

Me – Tue, Sep 13 2016 11:02am
Amazingly enough when we got in the car this afternoon the unit worked. It only got into the mid 80’s today. But halfway home my passenger objected to the song playing so she pushed the track up button, the display changed, but the track stayed the same. Tried track down with the same results. She turned the radio off and then back on. Now the unit didn’t work at all. No sound accompanied by no disc/track display and the CD CH display on the bottom of the display.

Tonight after dinner I went out into our air conditioned garage and turned on the radio. It started playing MP3s right where it left off. The track up and track down responded normally. Something is going wonky due to heat…

The number on the sticker on the bottom is: 03-18-031314

The firmware is: 49

Them – Wed, Sep 14 2016 7:02am
Could you share with us a clear photo of the front face of the stereo for us to view?

Does the stereo have a CD changer built in to it?

If yes, does it have its own Mode or does it show up as “CD CH” as well for function?

Me – Wed, Sep 14 2016 10:14am
Radio has single CD, no built-in CD changer.

Attached are three photos:

We had a nice little daily email chain going there for awhile, then they stopped responding. Tonight after not hearing anything for 6 days, I poked them back.

Me – Tue, Sep 20 2016 10:16am
Hello? Did I stump the band? I attached pictures as requested and have not heard back since last Tuesday.

Do I have another option besides buying some sort of replacement?

What do you want to bet I’ll get another corporate speak “Sorry Charlie” email? Then I’m not sure where I go next especially as the unit I have was $99 and is discontinued while the replacement gizmo is $130. Guess if that happens I’ll try and find a cheaper option somewhere.

The Modifications List

Over on the left-hand side in the area marked “Pages” were a couple of links called Brian’s Basic Miata and Brian’s Miata Mods. Because they related specifically to the 2003 LS Emperor I pulled them down the other day. Today the Basic Miata page went back up because I edited it to match the base 2002 CTBNL.

I’ll probably resurrect the Mods page as well, but most of the current mods are David’s so maybe I’ll need to call it something other than “Brian’s Miata Mods.” Possibly The Miata’s Mods and keep it two sections, his and mine.

And in the mine section I’ll have to work out some sort of metric to keep track of how much of a pain in the butt they were to accomplish. 😀

Bare Bar

When David installed the roll bar in the car he never got around to trimming the carpet on the rear shelf. It wasn’t really noticeable because the carpet was sort of tucked underneath tight against the bar, but it was on my To-Do list. This was a perfect project for Saturday afternoon because I could do it in the air conditioned garage.

I tilted and pushed the seats forward so I could get at the carpet and when I put my hand down on the roll bar to climb in, my kind of stuck. When I pulled it off there was a glob of very viscous sticky stuff on the palm. I looked back where my hand was and you could see a streak of glue running in a couple places from under the fuzzy velcro pieces.

The all black interior strikes again. It gets so hot inside the car it surpasses the melting point of the adhesive on the back of the hook & loop fastener tape. We need an alternate way to secure our seat to roll bar anti-squeak measures. Sewing would work, but we have no sewing machine. And even if we did, it wouldn’t be anything heavy duty enough to go through both the heavy vinyl and the fuzzy tape, which is the same reason hand stitching is out.

So I did the best thing I could, I removed the offending vinyl cover and the high density foam piece that was stuck on the front of the bar. Now there is no need for anti-squeak measures at all because the seat back sits a full inch in front of the bar. And because the seats of the 2001 and up Miatas have the higher backs there is not much chance of my our heads contacting the metal roll bar if we ever get rear-ended.

Of course when you think of safety aspects of the roll bar, you would hate to have it protect you in one way and be a hazard in another. Not much chance of hitting your head is not the same as zero chance, so maybe it might be worth a few bucks to find a local upholstery shop to sew that velcro on for us.

Another Can Of Disappointing Silver Paint

Wheel Dress Up

So Sunday afternoon I got around to the dark wheel dress-up project. I had the plan all laid out, but it needed a change mid-process, so it went sort of like this:

  1. Remove the 4 black lug nuts
  2. Remove wheel from car
  3. Pop out the center cap by pushing from the back
  4. Remount wheel on car
  5. Install new chrome lug nuts
  6. Repeat 4 times
  7. Mask middle of center caps
  8. Paint center caps with shiny silver paint
    1. shiny silver paint dries not so shiny
    2. apply second coat
    3. shiny silver paint still not so shiny
    4. instructions say to not use clear coat on top
    5. shrug and paint over the non-shiny silver with the car color-matched silver
    6. don’t clear coat this either or it will turn green
  9. Remove masking tape from caps
  10. Apply new RevLimiter badges
  11. Snap center caps back on wheels
  12. Stand back and admire sigh

And while the center cap is not very chrome-like, the plain silver, along with the chrome lug nuts, does help brighten up the place. But it is just one another example of how all the little mods I’m trying to do to this car turn out to be harder to accomplish or end up not nearly as well as imagined.

Third Time’s Not The Charm

Gray Mats 2

Our first two attempts at floor mats came from the cheap throw rug aisle at Wally World. Both the red and the gray didn’t look as nice in the car as they did in our heads while looking at them in the store. Plus they were a bit flimsy and moved around when they were stepped on getting in and out of the car.

Last weekend we were in Home Depot looking at their in-stock commercial grade carpet because we had so much success with the remnants from the Valve Store’s office remodeling. No luck there as everything was browns and tans with nothing in gray. But over in the rack with some other stuff we thought we had the perfect solution to our mat desires. There was something that might have been an outdoor mat or an internal dirt catching carpet protector that was a solid gray, not too dark and not too light with a nice square high-low texture, so we bought it.

When I got home I used my usual procedure to turn carpet into mat: Trace the upside down OEM mats onto the back of the newly purchased mat material with a sharpie. I cut out the new mats using a utility knife and a retired pair of kitchen shears. Then the finishing touch, running around the edges with my butane charcoal grill fire starter to seal them. They were just the right weight and stiffness, plus the back side was covered in a rubbery #10 grit sandpaper-like stuff. They seemed perfect. After several days of use the mat’s Achilles heel showed itself though, the fine fibers it was made from started to shed like the fur of an Angora cat in the summertime.

So, we’ve now tried three different times to find a floor mat that would meet all our stringent criteria, spent around $50 and are nowhere near happy. Might be time to go ahead and bite the bullet by spending the $130 on the Zeromotive Checkered Floor Mats in black/light gray I’ve been eyeing for a while now.

Shiny

Shiny

  1. Remove the 4 black lug nuts
  2. Remove wheel from car
  3. Pop out the center cap by pushing from the back
  4. Remount wheel on car
  5. Install new chrome lug nuts
  6. Repeat 4 times
  7. Mask middle of center caps
  8. Paint center caps with shiny silver paint
  9. Remove masking tape from caps
  10. Apply new RevLimiter badges
  11. Snap center caps back on wheels
  12. Stand back and admire

What Color Is The Miata? (Stripe)

What Color Is The Miata Stripe

Back in June when I was dreaming of a 2016 Miata I was also dreaming of what color I make it with a vinyl wrap. I went so far as to order some samples and stick them on the trunk lid of the Emperor. Well, I’ve ordered some more samples. This time it is not going to be the whole car, just two 8″ stripes with a 4″ gap in the center. Donna and friend Jackie picked the outside blue (Satin Perfect Blue S347) while I picked the one on the inside.

This afternoon when we walked out after work Dona said it really didn’t matter which one as long as it was blue. So we peeled off the other 3 colors and left my pick the Matte Riviera Blue (M67). Tonight as we left through the garage to go out to eat, I looked at the one lonely 2″ x 4″ sample and thought, that looks familiar, the blue painter’s tape that surrounded the windshield a few days ago. I pulled out a roll I had in the garage and the painter’s tape is actually a little darker than the vinyl. But I can’t get that image out of my head now.

So I have my criteria, blue for her & matte for him. Back to the color chart and look, there is another slightly darker matte blue available – Blue Metallic (M227). Now, that number sounds familiar and sure enough, it was one of the colors that were applied to the Emperor back in June. Back then it was the inner left one. Looking at it now, that color in that photo doesn’t look any different than the Matte Riviera Blue (M67) on the CTBNL does right now. Maybe we should go with the Satin Perfect Blue the ladies picked or maybe I should buy a couple more rolls of the blue tape…