Help me diagnose “the lean”.

so, the NC has a lean to it now. And this is recent. I've only had the car about 3,000mi, but in that time I've done shocks/springs/sways and alignment. It didn't have this lean a few months ago. And all I've done is drive it on public streets.
 

The arm bushings aren't twisted and the alignment was done by a respected race shop. The springs all seem to be seated in the shock collars. In fact, the only spring that wasn't fully in the shock collar was the driver side?
 

It handles well, it makes no noises and I can't find any suspension bolts or nuts loose or missing. I'm at a loss. The only thing I can think of is the springs are just now settling and they did so unevenly? I had the car ballasted for the alignment too. 

And I just measured ride height, the passenger side is in fact about a half inch higher than the driver side

If you hadn't done the struts, I'd suggest one of them was going out.  Since you have...

I think I agree with the springs settling for now, I'd get in there with a flashlight and make sure everything is on the perches properly.

What kind of springs?  Don't buy them again.

Move out of Detroit.

You don't happen to be like 400 lbs are you?

I would probably take the rear springs off an see if one is measurable taller, then put a weight on them and remeasure their height.

Also if these are bilstein shocks, do these have ore than 1 Grove on the shock body?   If so, are the grooves the same distance down the shock body? 

I'm going to say the bushings need to be reset. The NC is quite susceptible to bushing preload. Mark the alignment cams, loosen all bolts going through rubber bushings on the control arms, bounce car enthusiastically or drive slowly, tighten with weight on the wheels. 

Springs should not settle, that's a sign of terrible metallurgy. I think most spring "settling" is the bushings fatiguing.

They don't have adjustable perches. I weigh 220lbs, I'm fat, but not huge (yet). They are progress springs and Koni oranges. 

I see part of your problem.  The bottom pic, the spring isn't on the perch properly

Keith Tanner said:

I'm going to say the bushings need to be reset. The NC is quite susceptible to bushing preload. Mark the alignment cams, loosen all bolts going through rubber bushings on the control arms, bounce car enthusiastically or drive slowly, tighten with weight on the wheels. 

Springs should not settle, that's a sign of terrible metallurgy. I think most spring "settling" is the bushings fatiguing.

Thanks Keith. 

In reply to Mr_Asa :

Right. That's the drivers side front though... wouldn't that make the drivers side lift up instead of being lower?

In reply to Buck Futter :

Yeah, sounds like it would cause the front to settle a bit more.  

What do the rear springs look like?  I'd expect the rear to be the cause.  That's probably cause you posted a pic of the rear of the car, though.

In reply to Mr_Asa :

Rears looked fine. Nothing to report. 

Are you swaybar endlinks adjustable for length?  Make sure the swaybar doesn't have preload and isn't bent.  At ride height it should be unloaded side to side.  

In reply to nocones :

Factory endlinks. 

Side note...are there really no lower rubber spring isolators on these cars?

It's not clear from photos, is the whole left side low or just the rear? If it's just the rear it's possible that the front spring being unseated could be contributing but probably isn't the root cause.

Honestly my next step would be to pull the rear springs and check that they're the same length. Maybe make sure the dampers measure the same and aren't like able to be installed backwards in a way that shifts the spring seat around or something weird like that.

Following, as I have a similar condition on my BMW..

I was going to suggest what Keith said. 

Clock the springs properly, top and bottom if needed, and then do what Keith said. Do it on a flat level surface.

If the drivers front spring is seated wrong it would cause the drivers rear to sit low. Think about it like if you pull up on one corner of the car the weight shifts and another corner will move down.  Fix the front spring first and see what happens. 

In reply to dculberson :

That's good thinking, but I measured ride heights and the driver side is spot on for the springs I have, it's the passenger side that's too high, and equally too high, front to back. About a 1/2"

Usually these issues are caused by very old and saggy springs and/or a vehicle that has a large lateral weight imbalance (like a Samurai or Willys GP / early Jeep). If springs are the cause here then those new springs are junk - even the seating issue shouldn't be enough to cause this.

You can disconnect the sway bars to rule out any issues with those, but you'd probably have to crash a car to cause that level of sway bar bias by accident. Bushings could be an issue but this looks like more lean than bushings alone could cause too.

One more thought, are all four springs similar-looking enough that springs intended for the rear could've been put on the left side by accident?

In reply to GameboyRMH :

They are labeled front and rear and are different length as well as differently coiled

In reply to GameboyRMH :

You'd be surprised at how much bushing preloading affects ride height in NC and ND Miatas. It's much less of a problem on the earlier cars. If the car's been dropped by an inch, you've effectively got a couple of dozen springs trying to lift it back up. We get this a lot when people buy our springs to lower their car, don't reset the bushings and then call us to find out why their car isn't as low as we said it would be...

Have you meausured the height of the strut (mounted) from the bottom of the spring perch to the top?  That should tell you if it's the spring or something else.