My 91 Miata has been acting up lately and i want to know if anyone would know what it is.......ok, here goes....today, my Miata felt like it was not catching on the clutch during acceleration. It would accelerate for a second, then it would throttle off, revs went down too, then it would repeat it over and over again. Once the engine was warmed up, it would idle roughly. The erratic acceleration....is that my clutch or is it from the transmission? Is it from the engine? I have a 01 transmission in the garage and a new clutch from Mazdaspeed is on the way along with a new rear main seal.
My $0.10 would be on the engine, probably the fuel system. Have you changed the fuel filter recently?
Yeah, I'd start by checking the fuel pressure because it's easy to do.
Haven't replaced the fuel filter. Its on my to do list before my Sept 15th SCCA SOLO event. What's the average price of a fuel filter?
How do i go about checking the fuel pressure?
In reply to miataman86:
FM has them for $34 so I guess that's probably the going rate. It's a pretty hefty filter.
To check the pressure - use a tee to install a fuel pressure gauge on the feed line to the rail. Not the line coming off the regulator. I usually have some extra fuel line on mine and stick the gauge under the windshield wiper if I need to read it at speed.
It should be in the 38-43 psi range if memory serves, with the lower pressures at lower manifold pressure. The behavior of the pressure when the car is misbehaving is the really interesting part.
Cool. I will look into getting a fuel pressure gauge soon as well as the necessary fittings for it. I'll pick up the fuel filter first seeing as my Miata has 141K on it and its the same fuel filter that came with the car. Yeah, its waaaayyyy overdue to be changed.
