Purchased my second Miata Friday – a red 90 model, 63k miles, original
owner, older couple (with 4 cars – 2 drivers), all records from new, garage
kept, looked good, drove well – bought it 7k even.
Drove it all weekend (after oil changes etc.), took on road trip yesterday.
After 500 miles of use, the car shuddered from start up in 1st. No
problems with other gears, only starting in 1st.
Got home, put the car on stands, and found oil dripping from bell housing.
No smell, appears to be engine oil. Rear main seal? Read shop manual. Not
as easy to pull tranny on Miata as I would have thought.
1st QUESTION: The factory manual is a bit vague on pulling the PPF from the
diff. Many warnings on what not to do. The "Miata Enthusiast Manual" gives
much more information, but it conflicts in some ways with shop manual.
Who out there has pulled the PPF from a Miata? Is it simpler than the book
makes it sound? I’ve done many tranny pulling jobs on other cars, never a
Miata, so the PPF thing is a new one on me…looks neat though…all that
aluminum.
2nd QUESTION: After the rear main seal is replaced, should I buy a stock
clutch/pressure plate, or go with some other hiperformance model. If so,
whose is good?
3rd QUESTION: What is the history/frequency of rear main seal failures on
the Miata?
Thanks for any advice. The red Miata was for my son, so he wouldn’t drive
his mom’s blue 90 model all the time … so at this point in time he is one
sad puppy, and his old man looks like a big dummy for not finding this
problem before he forked over the cash. As an aside, bought the blue 90
last year from used car lot, with 65k on the clock. No idea on how it was
maintained, how it was driven etc. It now has 95k and still runs great.
So much for service records and talking to the owner.
What does this prove? Buying used cars is a gamble!
It also shows that I am a nut, because I own two Miatas, and can’t drive
either of them. My RX-7 does fit in because it is white, so we have the
full patriotic spectrum of red, white and blue.
HP
Henry Payne wrote:
> Purchased my second Miata Friday – a red 90 model, 63k miles, original
> owner, older couple (with 4 cars – 2 drivers), all records from new, garage
> kept, looked good, drove well – bought it 7k even.
> Drove it all weekend (after oil changes etc.), took on road trip yesterday.
> After 500 miles of use, the car shuddered from start up in 1st. No
> problems with other gears, only starting in 1st.
> Got home, put the car on stands, and found oil dripping from bell housing.
> No smell, appears to be engine oil. Rear main seal? Read shop manual. Not
> as easy to pull tranny on Miata as I would have thought.
It sounds like the proper diagnosis — the seal blew, squirting oil all over
the face of the clutch, causing lockup problems.
> 1st QUESTION: The factory manual is a bit vague on pulling the PPF from the
> diff. Many warnings on what not to do. The "Miata Enthusiast Manual" gives
> much more information, but it conflicts in some ways with shop manual.
> Who out there has pulled the PPF from a Miata? Is it simpler than the book
> makes it sound? I’ve done many tranny pulling jobs on other cars, never a
> Miata, so the PPF thing is a new one on me…looks neat though…all that
> aluminum.
> 2nd QUESTION: After the rear main seal is replaced, should I buy a stock
> clutch/pressure plate, or go with some other hiperformance model. If so,
> whose is good?
If you are planning to install a turbo or super, now is the time to spend an
extra $200 or so to install a Flyin’ Miata kevlar clutch. You might want to do
this anyway, as you will never burn out the FM clutch under normal or heavy
use scenarios.
> 3rd QUESTION: What is the history/frequency of rear main seal failures on
> the Miata?
This is the first trouble I’ve read about, although with the weird oil
capacities on this car, if somebody just threw in 5 quarts, and did it enough
times, then the seal would be exposed to oil pressure in addition to crankcase
gas pressures, and would be prone to leakage.
> Thanks for any advice. The red Miata was for my son, so he wouldn’t drive
> his mom’s blue 90 model all the time … so at this point in time he is one
> sad puppy, and his old man looks like a big dummy for not finding this
> problem before he forked over the cash. As an aside, bought the blue 90
> last year from used car lot, with 65k on the clock. No idea on how it was
> maintained, how it was driven etc. It now has 95k and still runs great.
> So much for service records and talking to the owner.
> What does this prove? Buying used cars is a gamble!
> It also shows that I am a nut, because I own two Miatas, and can’t drive
> either of them. My RX-7 does fit in because it is white, so we have the
> full patriotic spectrum of red, white and blue.
> HP
Good luck — I hope your son helps you turn the wrench on this puppy so that
he learns the potential trouble of over-servicing the engine. By the time the
job is done, he’ll hate the former owner!
—
Nick
Soldier, seeing Patton standing in moving Jeep: "Where ya goin’ General?"
Patton: "Berlin! I’m gonna shoot me a paper-hangin’ son-of-a-bitch!"
Come visit my home page @ http://www.concentric.net/~greek/