Miata

Happy Anniversary To Me

Today would have been our 48th anniversary and if Donna is looking down at me, she is probably a little disappointed in me. Not because I bought another Miata, but more because she really didn’t like the looks of the 4th gen car. And she might even think that taking a loan out on the car was a blunder.

Sorry dear, but I do like the more modern sharper edges design of the ND. And the loan was just a way to not take a huge chunk out of the checking account we use for the non day to day spending. Don’t worry, I can pay off the loan early and in full once State Farm sends me your life insurance payout.

Last night when I picked up the car all I did was drive it home and park it. This morning, I took it out for its initial shakedown cruise. I had no particular destination in mind, I just knew that I would be heading east. First thought was to drive over to the Mt Hood area get some mountain road twisty. I started out down Sandy Blvd and ended up in Troutdale and drove right under the big arched sign reading Gateway To The Gorge. {visible lit light bulb appears over my head} Historic Route 30 runs through the gorge all the way to the most visited waterfall in the state, Multnomah Falls, some 15 or so miles away.

I’d never driven this road before, but was hoping there would be several sections of mountainous turns and boy was I right. It was a narrow road (probably first paved in the 40’s) and there were a lot of twisty sections throughout the drive, all the way to and beyond the falls. I was going to just head home on I-84, but right after I got on the Interstate, I did a Homer Simpson styled head slap and a vocal “Doh!” I got right back off a mile later at the other Multnomah Falls exit and drove that fun road home.

Christmas Eve Pizza Run & Shakedown Drive

We planned on pizza for lunch and when I called our usual place around noon no human answered the phone after about 10 rings. This is not unusual as they can get busy at lunchtime and sometimes I hang up and call again and someone will answer almost right away. As I was about to try this strategy when a machine picked up, they were closed for the Christmas holiday and would reopen on Tuesday. Dang.

Plan B was implemented. I called Papa Murphy’s, a take-and-bake pizza place, and they were open. We have used them a couple of times before and while they are no comparison to Rodeos, this seemed our best option. I opted to take the Miata because the roads were finally almost entirely clear of snow and ice from our post Thanksgiving storm.

Plus I wanted to test my fix for the front tires scraping when making sharp turns. Yesterday I had finally decided to see what the tires might be hitting. Turns out it was just the driver side and it was hitting on a bent down area on the inner fender liner. It was missing one of the plastic twisty fasteners that held the front part of the liner to the middle section. I didn’t have an extra one, so I stole one from an area that had a couple close together.

This helped, but did not solve the problem totally because the plastic liner pieces were still bent down enough to hit the tire on full lock, so I let loose my red-neck engineering side. I drilled an eighth inch hole inside the engine compartment through the inner fender and through the liners. I found a small flat head screw and screwed it through the liners from insdie the fender to hold them tight against the fender. Then I sprayed both sides of my “repair” with some black Plasti Dip to kind of seal it from the elements.

Success, no more ugly sounds when making sharp turns.

Times Miata Driven since 10/28/22: 3

 

Emotional Support Vehicle

A few weeks ago while wasting time on the Insta I came across a sticker that someone I follow had on the their Miata. I just had to have one. So I ordered one. It arrived in the mail a few days later.

It has taken 2 weeks for me to put it on the car though. I hesitated because I thought it was kind of “girly.” Which is kind of funny because the Miata I drive is considered a hairdresser’s/chick/gay car by roughly 75% of the male population and I have zero f**ks given about what people think about it.

Was I afraid that this would confirm that they are right? Whatever, I don’t care, it’s on there because that’s what the Miata is to me. If you’d like one of your own you can get one from Push to Start Design.

Tire Juggling

The last couple of years when it came time to put snow tires on the 2013 Mini for the winter I would take the all-seasons off and mount up the non-studded Blizzaks and MSW wheel package we bought from Tire Rack. Because the Miata and the Mini both had 15″ wheels with the same bolt pattern I could take those all-seasons and put them on the Miata. I’d then take those ultra high performance tires off the Miata and store them. You don’t drive on them when the temperature is below 40 degrees because they turn rock hard and stop handling/riding well.

Even though the Mini’s tires fit on the car they weren’t a perfect fit, they would scrape against the plastic inner fender liners when I turn the steering wheel almost all the way in either direction. This was really okay, because it was not like I was going to drive it in the snow or take a trip in it. This was just so the Miata could be driven on dry roads about once a week to keep the battery charged and give the car a little exercise keeping from having to winterize it while it sat for 4-ish months.

Well, the new Mini has thrown this routine into disarray. The 2013 was a 2nd generation of the “new” Mini and the 2016 we just bought is a 3rd generation, besides growing a few inches in all directions they changed to a 5 lug wheel. So, now what do I do about putting an all-season tire on the Miata in the winter? Turns out the solution was relatively easy.

After test driving the 2016 Mini we realized that we were going to need new tires for the car. CarMax put on two new tires because they were worn down enough as to not be safe and replaced them with a bargain Chinese brand that were very noisy. Maybe the 6-year old OEM Michelins contributed to the sound some too. I went to TireRack and found a Grand Touring All-Season that was the quietest of all the options, the Kumho Majesty 9 Solus TA91. We still wanted to maintain the ease of wheel swapping that we had previously, the Kumhos were ordered mounted and balanced on their own set of rims.

While the lug count on the 2016 Mini changed, the wheel diameter stayed the same at 15 inches, so that meant we could keep using the 2-year old Blizzaks, we just needed some 5-lug wheels to put them on. Those wheels were literally right in front of us, the current wheels that on the 2016 Mini. All I had to do drive to a local tire store in the Mini with the old Mini’s winter tire package and have them flip flop them. So, now the new Mini sports the Blizzaks on the OEM wheels and the crappy tires are on the MSW Type 22T rims, that as you can see above, I’ve put on the Miata as its winter wear.

Lack of Attention to Detail

About a month ago we were in Walmart, shopping for some groceries that we like, but Fred Meyers stopped carrying them or never did. When we got back to the car to put our purchases in the trunk an employee out gathering carts stopped and said, “You know you have your tires on the wrong side of the car?”

I looked down at the rears tire I was closest to, sure enough the tread pattern was facing the wrong way. Doh! “Wow, I must have messed up when I swapped the summer tires for the winter all-seasons back in March”, I told him. The fellow said he noticed because he also has a Miata, a ’90, and has run these tires on his car in the past.

I thanked him and the next day I swapped the tires to their correct sides. This was not a real big deal because the tread pattern is that way to improve wet traction by channeling water from out from under the tire and I don’t think the Miata has been in the rain since we have lived in Oregon. Well maybe I had the wipers on intermittent once last year…

Today was another one of those Walmart runs and when we pulled into the lot I noticed a white early model Miata, so I parked next to it figuring it might be that guy’s car. When we here last time and I asked him where his car was he had pointed over in the side of the lot. When I got out and looked at it I noticed he had a “Share the Road” license plate too.

Busy Tunnel

On my morning cannabis run last month, because I was unsupervised, I decided to stop and take a Miata picture for Instagramming. There is this cute little one lane tunnel under some railroad tracks a short detour off the way home that I thought might be nice. In all the times I have passed by on the road perpendicular to the tunnel I have never seen anyone use it.

HA! I pulled in and stopped and hopped out to take a photo. When I moved a little closer to take a photo from a different angle I could see someone trying to come through from the direction I entered, so I just hopped in the car and moved forward to let them by.

I did a K-turn and headed into the tunnel to take one from the other direction. Sure enough, the same thing happened again. I got one photo and had to move the car for a whole different vehicle coming in opposite direction.

When I previewed the photos it really wasn’t that scenic, so I just went home.

Spatial Recognition Test

List the following items from the picture above in order of size from small to large:
Truck, SUV, shopping cart, Miata.

1.
2.
3.
4.

21.7 miles around town mopping up our weekly shopping.
Times Miata Driven since 01/01/22: 37