Miata worth it? Stance, yo

http://cleveland.craigslist.org/cto/5885185302.html

Looking for entry level fun/track car for my wife. This one has to be very close to me, the red one in his pics is usually parked at the shop up the street.

The stance look is dumb, but it has coilovers which could be adjusted to proper height, and those wheels are absolutely stunning with the black paint.

Give me a reason not to bother calling. Going to look at a bitchin camaro tomorrow for myself. Not enough garage is not a reason, we're building a 4-6 car next summer.

Coilovers, depending on the brand, could be worthless for performance. Roll bar is junk. It's probably had the bottom dragged on every speedbump. The shifter doesn't seem very safe. My wheels (15x9 949 6ULs) are cooler.

I like '99s, but I'd hold out for a sport.

Decent price for an NB, but yeah coilovers are probably junk, style bar is junk, shifter is junk, steering wheel is junk, harnesses are junk, stuff on the underside is fairly low at normal ride heights so it could be pretty beat up under there.

I'd probably pass on that one.

I'd look at it and ask if the stock springs/shocks are available. As Gimp suggests, I'd look at the underside, check for rust in the front chassis legs of any NB, and plan on buying a proper roll bar for track work. I doubt the shocks on it are anything special and any Miata will need an upgrade for track use anyway. If you got lucky and the shocks are decent then you only need appropriate springs and a roll bar. If the car is solid and in good order it's worth $2500, or whatever you can talk him down to.IMHO

Someone on here bought a previously stanced miata and it didn't end well for them. Wish I could remember who know.

cmcgregor wrote: Someone on here bought a previously stanced miata and it didn't end well for them. Wish I could remember who know.

I think that was pheller.

Since the ad doesn't mention what kind of coilovers they are I would assume they are racelands which are junk.

I guess they were sold out of periods that day.

Are you guys looking at the same car as I am??

$2500 NB? Of COURSE you should call. The wheels alone are worth $600.

There is nothing easier to do than swap the suspension on a Miata. Roll bar? So what- most don't even have one. Bottom scraped? Perhaps- but no one will know until you take a look.

Could you be disappointed? Sure. But nothing ventured, nothing gained. I guarantee you won't find any opportunities if you stay at the house because of the possible things that COULD have happened from a guy who lowered his Miata.

You are not an amateur. You know what to look for. Of course you should call.

Why is low bad?

The Mumpkin sits so low I can't even fit my toes under the splitter. It's plenty of fun, and I've never ripped anything off the bottom.

Biggest question is can she look this cool driving it?

SVreX wrote: Why is low bad? The Mumpkin sits so low I can't even fit my toes under the splitter. It's plenty of fun, and I've never ripped anything off the bottom.

How much daily driving do you do with it? Low itself isn't bad, what's bad is the type of owner who's going to slam the car for no reason then drive it around bouncing the undercarriage off every bump.

You're right that the other stuff is all easily fixed. Now that I'm looking at it on a screen bigger than my phone, it's not so bad. $2500 is cheap.

I'd at least look at it, but I'm a broke high school student with low standards. YMMV.

In reply to cmcgregor:

I don't daily drive it at all. But we don't actually know that the current owner does either, or that there is any damage at all.

All the negative in this thread is pure speculation. Pat will not know anything until he looks at the car.

Pat, I'd use the input from this thread as potential things to look for, and nothing more. They are most certainly NOT a reason to avoid looking at the car.

I'd say that one looks like it is worth a looksee at that price. If it is in decent condition and has been taken care of (and I feel like a LOT of the stance cars are taken care of) then it isn't a bad price. Maybe too much work to get it to what you want it to be, but not a bad price.

Go look.
But, in two seperate pictures, the paint on the front end and hood looks bad. Like a poor respray with blotchy clear coat. It could just be bad photography.
Are the front side amber turn signals missing (nose cone replacement) or just blacked out?

Speaking of photography, notice that none of the pictures were taken to sell the car but rather a collection of pictures that just happen to have the car in them too.

The ad has been up for 20 days and there is snow on the ground. This wont sell for asking price!

Expect a fair amount of amateur moves like the seat belts in this photo mounted to the uprights of the style bar. My guess is that on impact these belts slide up the hoop as the hoop is bending forward!

I would suspect that if an aftermarket stereo has been installed the wires are twisted and then held together with black tape. The tape only if you're lucky.

mtn wrote: (and I feel like a LOT of the stance cars are taken care of)

THIS!

99% of the proper "stance" builds I've seen are treated like numbers matching 1969 Z28s, even if they're 15 year old Golfs. Full synthetic every 5k, OEM or Mann filter, constantly being washed, often stored over winter in a heated garage while hooked up to a tender, some of them are even up in the air every weekend it's warm out, the owners gently power-washing the underside and suspension bits. They figure that if they can't afford to race because they can't afford to wreck, they can at least modify their cars to their taste while still keeping them in excellent visual and good mechanical condition.

Think of stance as the modern version of lead sleds and cali-look Beetles. Always lower than stock, sometimes wider than stock, but made for just cruising around at or below the speed limit and looking good. It's those with chopped pigtail springs, hockey pucks, blown dampers, eBay coils, etc. that give everyone else a bad name.

Will see how things go with the bitchin camaro tomorrow, then base looking at the miata on that.

Can you wash the smell of vape out of it?

Heck parted out its worth 2500. You can't lose!

Joey

Definitely look. Those mods can all be undone but the car looks like a decent buy for a nb. Might be able to sell some of the mods and use it for other things. $2500 is a must try

I would go look just to see the "katana sword shifter"

SVreX wrote: Why is low bad? The Mumpkin sits so low I can't even fit my toes under the splitter. It's plenty of fun, and I've never ripped anything off the bottom.

There's a "slight" difference in road quality once you get south of the Ohio River. I can scrape the nose of my stock ride height MINI turning into my subdivision here in Michigan. I'd carefully inspect the underside of any slammed car here, no matter how well cared for it has been.

Buy it, and then please send me the Katana sword shifter so I can put it in the S10!!

Simply asking what make of coilover is installed will tell you how this car was modified. Although, as noted, the style bar and harnesses give you a pretty good idea. The fact that there are no front marker lights and no plastic inside the nose says it has a history as well.

Basically, before this could become a track car, you'd have to undo everything that's been done to it and hopefully the bottom isn't too banged up. Stance Miata guys have been known to take out oil pans fairly regularly, it's a definite danger sign. $2500 is cheap, but it might be too much if the car's badly shagged out.

SVReX, I'll sell you as many of those wheels as you'd like for $600. Street price on an AVID.1 AV-18 is about $100/corner new