NOHOME
NOHOME SuperDork
11/16/14 5:53 p.m.

Anyone know the exact dimensions of the Miata Pinch-welds from side to side of the car?

cvx_20
cvx_20 New Reader
11/18/14 11:53 a.m.

I measured a '94 NA at 3 points, front, middle, back with two different tape measures and got 53 to 53 1/16" outside-outside. That's about as exact as I can do. This particular car has pinch welds that are in pretty good shape.

Mike

Keith Tanner
Keith Tanner GRM+ Memberand MegaDork
11/18/14 1:15 p.m.

There's a full diagram in the back of the shop manual.

NOHOME
NOHOME SuperDork
11/18/14 3:52 p.m.
cvx_20 wrote: I measured a '94 NA at 3 points, front, middle, back with two different tape measures and got 53 to 53 1/16" outside-outside. That's about as exact as I can do. This particular car has pinch welds that are in pretty good shape. Mike

Thanks Mike, that is what I needed. This means that it will work perfectly for what I want. The sills on the specimen that I have were rotted beyond the pinch-weld.

NOHOME
NOHOME SuperDork
11/18/14 3:55 p.m.

Keith Tanner wrote: There's a full diagram in the back of the shop manual.

Keith, this is the only diagram I can find and I am not clear on the dimension being specified at the front of the drawing. 49.2 is a long way off from what I could guesstimate even from the scraps of sill on my mule.

Keith Tanner
Keith Tanner GRM+ Memberand MegaDork
11/18/14 4:57 p.m.

Those dimensions aren't to the sills, they're to the frame rails. That's not the factory diagram, though. This one looks more like it.

cvx_20
cvx_20 New Reader
11/19/14 6:26 p.m.

Actually all 3 of those images are very similar to the ones in the back of my 1993 factory manual. The top one in Peter's post shows side to side dimensions to reference holes. The one Keith posted shows pretty much the same view, with diagonal dimensions which are a big help in determining squareness of a chassis. Pretty sure none of them reference the pinch welds which leads me to believe those dimensions are hard to hold accurately in the factory assembly process. I'm not in the shop to measure, but it looks to me like the 49.2 dimension might be the front hole where the fenders bolt to the shell. I'll double check that tomorrow.

Mike

NOHOME
NOHOME SuperDork
11/19/14 9:24 p.m.

Since the pinch welds tend to be to locating points for when a car goes on the frame rack, I thought it might be a well defined dimension. Would not be the first time I made a wrong assumption.

cvx_20
cvx_20 New Reader
11/20/14 2:57 p.m.

FYI, the 49.2" dimension is definitely taken from the front holes (of 3) on the top of the inner fender where the fender bolts on. I measured several at just over 49 3/16". I can't find any reference to the pinch weld dimension on any of my documentation. It is sort of dependent on bend allowance and other potential distortion influences, whereas the punched holes they reference are pretty immune to that sort of thing.

Mike

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