Miatatude

Ugly Is In The Eye Of The Beholder

Behold!
01-pininfarina-alfa

From AutoBlog: Take a good look at the picture of the Alfa Romeo 2uettottanta concept by Pininfarina, because the production Spider that will be a joint development with the coming Mazda MX-5 Miata isn’t expected to look anything like it. According to a report in Autocar, designers at Fiat\’s Centro Stile couldn’t figure out how to translate the concept to a production car.

To which I say good thing, so even if it did look sort of like this, later in the same article there was this: …but won’t have any body panels in common with the Mazda.

Maybe next year, if they regrow the passenger foot well and lower the door height to allow comfortable elbow resting again, a 2015 Miata might be in the cards.

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1244

Blast From The Past

I’ve been kind of slack on the blogging around here, with nothing much interesting to write about, I thought maybe I’d fill this spot up with a scintillating post from 10 years ago. Back in 2003 this was actually two blogs The Miata Diaries and Brian’s Daily Rant and I posted something on both every day. I hoped to find something good and I struck out, apparently it was kind of a dull day then too.

From Brian’s Daily Rant:

When Will I Watch A Movie Again?
It has been two weeks at least since I’ve watched a DVD. Right now there are 4 Netflix rentals on the coffee table waiting a spin. ( Rabbit-Proof Fence, Moonlight Mile, Spirited Away and Adaptation ) Also stacked up there are 3 other movies from my Co-Worker DVD Swap Club: Pork Chop Hill, Tuck Everlasting and K-19. Plus on top of those I have A Brother From Another Planet that I picked up in a truck-stop in rural North Carolina for $4.88. I guess I\’m going to have to take a break from writing in 3 blogs and reading 10 for a night or two…

From The Miata Diaries:

House Cleaning Day
Did a little sprucing up around here, very little, but I feel better.
1) This site is now a proud member of the Blogging Brians, so I added a link to the left.
2) I got rid of a stale weblog that hadn’t been updated since like March from the Mortal Blog list and added Blogumentary, go check it out.
3) This page’s extension is now PHP instead of HTML. I snagged a script that allows me to keep a constantly updated set of stats in my search for ET and installed it on the left. Thanks Sam Ley.

Purchased Today: $0
Money spent since 03/03/03: $923.63
Started up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 166

The money figure was money spent on the Miata and of course I was keeping track of the top transitions back then too.

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1241

Bird Feeder

When we eat at DD we always sit at the “bar” that is at the window looking out at the parking lot. It is always fun to watch people park as they try and fit their cars in parking spaces, especially getting an SUV into a spot that has cars in both adjacent spots. We also get to watch the resident sparrows swoop down on the crumbs left behind from dropped food around the two outside tables on the sidewalk.

One day last week we were in the Miata and had it parked in a spot in the front. We were early enough that the car traffic was light, but there were a couple brown sparrows dining on the sidewalk. I guess they finished everything on the ground because at one point they hopped up on the lower lip of the mouth the Emperor. They sat there looking inside the mouth inquisitively for a second or two before disappearing into it and coming right back out.

They couldn’t go far because I have a mesh grill in there to sort of protect the AC condenser. But that is only as far as they wanted to go, they were picking at the dead bugs collected in the grill.

By the time I thought that’d be a cool picture and I grabbed the cell phone, then fumbled around trying to figure out how to take a picture, someone pulled in next to the Miata and spooked them off.

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1235

Turns Out It Isn’t Always

Screendoor

As good as a pickup truck that is.

We have needed to replace the screen door to the screened in porch on the back of the house since last year. It takes a water beating because of its location near a roof valley. But when the bottom part of the screening spontaneously separated from its channel at the bottom last week, it forced our hand. We had to get a new one.

The door is 36 x 80 in size and the width was a couple of inches too wide to fit through the Sonata’s pass through trunk opening, so it was eliminated from cargo duty. Next in consideration was our usual go-to car, the Miata, which I have proudly proclaimed here on many an occasion as being as good as a pickup on a sunny day. We talked through a couple scenarios in which we might carry a screen door back from the store using the Miata, but couldn’t think of a good way, so opted for Plan C.

We decided to hand carry it back from the nearest BBHIW which is only a little more than a mile from home. Our biggest obstacle would be crossing the busy Whiskey Road in front of the store, but because we made the trip over before 8 o’clock this morning, the normal high amount traffic usually present was nowhere to be found, we didn’t even have to slow as we changed from parking lot to street.

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1229

Three Planets

New Radio

Yesterday afternoon I put the final touches on the new radio install and what better way to put it to the test that a pleasant summer evening drive. Donna had the idea of what to see, a rare grouping of 3 planets in the night sky and I had the perfect spot to see a nice unobstructed view of the west northwest sky, J. Strom Thurmond Dam at Clarks Hill.

We arrived just after sunset with the west sky a brilliant red to find the parking area pretty full. There were people fishing along the shore, people watching the sunset and a few folks there like us to see the celestial triangle in the sky formed by Mercury, Venus and Jupiter.

The middle third of this 75 mile journey is the best part, all rural and with some semblance of windiness to the roads, add to it our own soundtrack and it made for a perfect evening drive.

Great Lucas’s Ghost

I drove the Emperor and Donna drove the Purple Whale to Augusta this morning. We both came back in the Miata. We left the Sonata at the Whale Doctor for it’s 30,000 mile service.

On the way over driving the Interstate I set the Miata’s cruise control to 75 and that was fine for the first half of the trip. Then for no reason it surged a few MPH up and coasted back down. Then surged back up again and coasted down again. Then it seemed fine, but it was kind rainy, so I shut it off for the rest of the trip. On the way back I tried again and this time it wouldn’t engage. The on/off switch would turn on and light, but when I tried to set the speed the cruise light would flash on and right back off, without engaging the cruise control.

So what do these two things have in common? I don’t know, but maybe a search of the Miata.net garage will tell me.

Started down, went up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1226

The Sounds Of Silence

The only radio we listen to in the Miata is from RadioParadise.com. OK, occasionally on a Saturday morning I’ll tune to an NPR station to catch some classic Click & Clack, but 99.9% is an MP3 ripped from an internet stream and burned to a CD. Ten of those CDs sit inside a cartridge housed inside a Sony Disc Changer that is tucked into one corner of the trunk. It has been that way for the 9-1/2 years the Emperor has been in the family. This same changer even predates the Emperor for a couple years prior it sat inside the spare tire of the trunk of our previous Miata With No Name.

Recently this unit has been randomly powering off leaving nothing but static emanating from the speakers. I’ve checked all the connections and they all seem sound, wiggling any of them (especially the power cable to the changer) will not make it hiccup, once or twice a ride it will cut out for anywhere from a few seconds to around a minute. Annoying to say the least. Last week I decided to do something about it.

I ordered a GROM AUX-IN Adapter that that allows the use of an iPod and plugs into the back of the Miata’s head unit where the OEM Mazda disc changer would have went. We happen to have a 4Gig Nano that only gets used one or twice a year when Donna and I fly in an airplane, the rest of time it sits in a charger waiting patiently, this will give it reason to get excited for each new day.

The adapter arrived in the mailbox on Monday, so naturally the rest of the day was spent ripping out the Sony Disc Changer, reclaiming 5% of the Miata’s tiny trunk space. Then I needed to remove the OEM radio to get at the connector on the back. Using instructions found in the Miata.net Garage I made my removal tools from a coat hanger, but no amount of pushing/pulling/squeezing/ wiggling would get it to come out. After 20 minutes, a couple of cuts, several bruises and a blood blister on my left index finger I gave up. I guess I might have to breakdown and buy 2 sets of the official removal tools. I had disconnected the battery to take out the CD Changer, so I hooked it back up and set the time on the clock and even loaded a couple of the local radio stations as presets.

Tuesday morning when I got in the car to drive it to work the radio didn’t come on! Pushed the power button and it just bounced back at me, no click. The display didn’t even light up with the clock. There wasn’t any faceplate illumination either. Didn’t have time to do any troubleshooting, so we took the Sonata to work.

At work I called a couple auto parts stores to see if they had any of the removal tools and struck out. Then I tried a local car audio place and the guy there said just bring in the car and I’ll pop it out for you. After work I went there and lickity split he had the unit loose. Amazing what the proper tool for the proper job will do. I thanked him and came home. The radio fuse was fine. I pulled the head unit out and disconnected the harness. Got out my trusty Radio Shack Multimeter and with with the pin out diagram for connecter (thanks again m.net garage) checked for 12 volts. Unfortunately I had the correct voltage at the correct pins. I say unfortunately because that meant the radio was dead.

Hooked the radio back up, slid it back into the dash, buttoned it up so the interior looks good and wishfully tried the power button again (still didn’t work.) Now comes decision time, try and locate a very scarce used Miata Bose head unit keeping AUX-IN box or return the AUX-IN box and just buy a new aftermarket head unit with the iPod function already built in. Until a decision is made it’ll be kind of quiet in the Emperor’s cockpit.

The sound of silence will not be as hard to get used to as it will be to not see the time on the radio display…