I had to overhaul my entire ignition system because I was having witchy issues from time to time. I was having inconsistent performance and vacuum pressure. I finally realized after I had rewired my tach line to the MSD 6AL unit instead of the tach line coming from the ECU, I had discovered that my engine had been missing for a while now.

The problem was: the MSD StreetFire coil. I should have gotten a MSD Blaster coil instead because the Streetfire unit was not designed to work with the MSD 6AL unit. According to MSD’s tech unit, they mentioned that the StreetFire unit was not designed to handle the high current multiple discharge sparks coming from the MSD 6AL unit. It started burning out the coil after a while. I had this replaced. Along with that, I had the distributor completely replaced.

I was using a Motorcraft stock distributor… This comes in another part of the ignition funnies. Apparently the Halls-effect sensor inside the distributor that communicates with the module mounted on the side of the distributor has more precision in the MSD units than the Motorcraft units. For what reason remains unknown. All I know is that as soon as I synchronized the consistency of the ignition system to all MSD and Ford Racing 9mm core wireset, my performance was absolutely different.

I had my engine timed at 12 degrees BTDC and at a fuel pressure of around 36 psi (vac line on, idle). My engine performed, to the best, crappy. The accelerations were extremely sluggish and the like. I was thinking that it was a timing issue… so I decided to lower my fuel pressure to 31 psi (vac line on, idle) and adjusted idle accordingly and then advanced the engine to 16 degrees BTDC.

Holy crap. The car takes off like a beast now. This is newfound power that I had been missing out on.

Moral of the story is… make sure your ignition is set up properly, your fuel, performance and related will all improve.

Cheerio.

Folks,

I realize that I’ve gone quiet for quite a while. The truth is that I had a new addition to the family and that had taken my entire fun-time away from the car project.

Rest assured, I have not completely given up on this car. I have done various fixes in this time frame. Mostly electrical and some cooling related business.

The biggest problem I have been dealing with is ignition in my Miata. Mostly because I was using ancient parts that came with the engine.

More to come, Cheerio.

Finally, my new headlight assembly arrived for my Miata. I bought the flush headlight kit from Advanced Automotive Concepts. I had an average experience with the business. While the product was satisfactory (after some of my own adjustments), there were some flaws with the product.

After working with the product, I honestly don’t think the product was worth $600 for the full headlight assembly minus the xenon HID upgrade. It all began with a very lengthy wait for half of the product to arrive. I ordered my product back in January. I had to call the company several times to get an ETA, while I was given the standard “we’ll ship it in two weeks…” catch-22. Finally, I dropped them a very frank email stating that my carbon fiber hood was made from scratch and with a turnaround time of one month.

Giving them the credit for having such a product that eliminates the dweeby, cute, pop-ups is much due. The engineering and development is much appreciated. However, the manufacture could have been done better.

The driver side headlight apparatus (the carbon fiber and lexan component) were not made very well. They were somewhat mis-sized. The passenger side was perfect. I had to use my bandsaw to trim the edges around the lexan lens to make it fit the carbon fiber component so the metal clips could hold it onto the carbon fiber.

In the end, if it wasn’t for my adequate skill with manipulation of manufactured products, this product would have been sent back for refund or at the least the driver side of the headlight replaced.

Moving on…Here’s what I’ve done to my car…

I had been dabbling around with the idea of changing the gauge faces on my stock Miata gauge cluster but a few things came across my mind such as pros and cons of why would I want to keep the gauge cluster stock?

The pros of keeping the gauge cluster stock:
1. Simplicity
2. Already functioning
3. Legal (Motor Vehicle Division requirements)

The cons of keeping the gauge cluster stock:
1. Gauges aren’t 100% accurate
2. Tired and old
3. Starts to squeak more often with the speedometer
4. Needles warble more with new harmonics from the 5-oh motor.
5. Mix of mechanics and electronics…
6. Positioning of tach and speedo are reversed
7. Oil Pressure Gauge doesn’t function accurately
8. Coolant gauge doesn’t function accurately

The cons won. I figured that I would go ahead and create my own gauge cluster with gauges that i could use and not have lame duplicates. I already have a vacuum, oil pressure, and coolant temperature gauges on the a-pillar. I had acquired them with the intention to provide me more accurate information of what’s really going on in the engine. To support the con number 7 and 8, the autometer gauges I have read back 40psi for oil pressure at warm idle. The miata oil pressure gauge reads between 55 and 60. I know this is a simple resistor issue, but if I can’t have a trustworthy gauge, I don’t want it. The coolant gauge on the stock gauge moves like a millimeter for every 40 degrees. This is unacceptable. I need something more accurate for my own peace of mind.

With the autometer gauges in the pillar for vacuum, oil pressure, and coolant… I figured that I would go ahead and make my own gauge cluster with gauges that could be of use and flip the two gauges, the tach and the speedometer.

Here are the pictures of what I’ve done: