| MIATA BUILD |
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 | |  | January 18, 2007 - Here's our raw material.
The chassis is a 1994 R package car that had been destined for a rotary swap. For one reason or another, that never happened. But the owner of the car did strip the whole thing down as far as possible and power wash it. He even seam-welded the chassis. Even better, it's never been damaged. It's a perfect start for us.
entry 3 - tags: stiffening | | |  | January 18, 2007 - The seam welding makes the car noticeably stiffer.
If you stand inside the car and try to flex the windshield frame, it will move on a normal Miata. On this shell with the welding, that doesn't happen. Of course our roll cage will make the car even stiffer, but this is an easy upgrade at this point.
entry 4 - tags: stiffening | | |  | July 18, 2006 - Many of the braces from the 2003 will be added to our car.
It will make things heavier, but we want the car to be as strong as possible - particularly since we expect to make more horsepower than even the turbocharged 2004 Mazdaspeed special edition. We're going to make the bracing do double duty as impact protection. This is a rear subframe brace.
entry 11 - tags: interchange, stiffening | | |  | July 18, 2006 - A large number of our parts are coming from salvage vehicles.
Here's one of them. Seeing the chassis in this sort of condition makes it easy to spot the structural improvements made over the years.
entry 12 - tags: stiffening | | |  | January 31, 2007 - A bit of reinforcement for the chassis.
This frame rail reinforcement kit is from our sponsor Flyin' Miata. It slips over the frame rails and provides a surprising improvement in stiffness of the chassis. An added bonus for us - beyond the fact that our 200,000+ mile chassis could use all the help it can get - is that it also armors the underside of the car somewhat and allows us to use the entire length of the frame rail as a jacking point. It's an extra 14.5 lbs, but worthwhile. At least the weight is very low and centered between the wheels!
entry 29 - tags: sponsors, stiffening | | |  | July 12, 2011 - The original hood prop wouldn't fit the engine bay anymore.
But I have one of the old Flyin' Miata shock tower braces in my "stuff for the Targa Miata" pile, and we used to offer a hood prop that mounted to those. So I installed it. Voila, problem solved! And an increase in front end rigidity, too. There are some who don't think a shock tower brace does anything on a Miata, but you can see the distance between the towers change as you lift the car up! That's even true on my caged, seam-welded car. Regardless, even if it didn't do anything, it does make an excellent hood prop mount.
entry 873 - tags: stiffening | | |
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THE DIARY