Kansei's Garage Queen

[CSM]

I've got the Bilstein PSS B14 on order! I've read good reviews from most folks, but you don't seem to be too happy with them right? At least not until you raised the perches to max height?

Just sort of level setting my expectations. Hoping to install next week.

 

[kansei]

I've got the Bilstein PSS B14 on order! I've read good reviews from most folks, but you don't seem to be too happy with them right? At least not until you raised the perches to max height?

Just sort of level setting my expectations. Hoping to install next week.

Oh I like the Bilsteins, I had an issue with something loose or out of alignment that I never quite nailed down. I went to the max height to see if getting closer to stock ride height would make the suspension geometry proper again, but plenty of people on here sit low and I haven't seen anyone else complain about the car's handling. I had a blast on an empty forest road (paved surprisingly) in the wilderness yesterday and it felt extremely composed, no weirdness to report.

 

[kansei]

Great thread, just read through it. I love your pics and discussion and mod choices.

I never found a full review of the traction etc. bars once you got the steering thing fixed, maybe I missed it. Curious as to your impressions. I've used all of those bars as well except the midframe, except I did them one at a time so I could experience the change of each. 6 point was killer awesome, rear torsion was pretty great too, all the others made no difference at least for daily aggressive driving.

I would have removed that res delete as well, it sounds great but like you said too much of a good thing.

Great car thanks again, love your build.

thanks!

I don't think I ever posted a review of all the bars because I did them all at the same time, and because I bought them early on when I was trying to solve the steering thing. That issue .. doesn't seem to be a problem anymore? Not sure how. I should get the car on a lift again to see how beat up the 6 point brace is after a couple years tearing up rutted dirt roads haha

For the exhaust, I'm contemplating switching to the Thermal. I ran thermal mufflers on my two prior cars (04 and 06 Miata) after first experimenting with much louder exhausts.

 

[CSM]

Oh I like the Bilsteins, I had an issue with something loose or out of alignment that I never quite nailed down. I went to the max height to see if getting closer to stock ride height would make the suspension geometry proper again, but plenty of people on here sit low and I haven't seen anyone else complain about the car's handling. I had a blast on an empty forest road (paved surprisingly) in the wilderness yesterday and it felt extremely composed, no weirdness to report.

Awesome to hear! I am looking forward to installing the bilsteins

 

[kansei]

Since Seattle is full on blizzard status lately, I've been doing little bits of spring maintenance on the car while it sits in the parking garage on 1 season tires. In the middle of cleaning and oiling the air filter right now, and adding the cp-e sock over the filter. New plugs going in too, going with NGKs one step colder than stock to see how that goes. I haven't pulled the stock plugs yet to see how they're wearing, but figure given that I see 27psi it's probably not a bad idea.

I also put down a deposit on another orange car with recaros so I might end up parting out in the next couple months. I guess I have a type . I'm still not 100% on getting rid of the Fiesta because it's just such a useful little car, going back to something much less practical will be challenging.

 

[KyleS]

I also put down a deposit on another orange car with recaros so I might end up parting out in the next couple months. I guess I have a type . I'm still not 100% on getting rid of the Fiesta because it's just such a useful little car, going back to something much less practical will be challenging.

Miata 30th anniversary?

 

[kansei]

Miata 30th anniversary?

yeah I've been wanting to get back into a miata for a while, but was bored with the color options. I was about to settle on a white 2019 when the first blurry "photo" hinting at the 30th anniversary came out. The deposit is refundable so I figured why not. Now I have a month or two to convince myself that losing the hot hatch practicality is okay. There are zipcar impreza hatchbacks in my garage so I'll just use those when I need to haul things.

 

[kansei]

oh hm lots of changes. I got rid of the idea of the Miata and decided to do a cross country move instead. Now I'm in New England with family planning my next move.

As a result my car has lots of new shoes and is very dirty . The good news is I actually drive the thing often now, because the roads here are all incredible and because I have nothing better to do living somewhere so rural than go hiking or snowshoeing every day. The car hasn't seen a highway since it got delivered here over a month ago.

Got a set of Continental DWS06 (205/45-17) for the Team Dynamics wheels for 3 season daily use. Also grabbed Blizzak WS90s in 185/60-15 on sparco terras for winter. I'll probably get a.. 4th set of wheels for some track/autocross tires in the spring because I have space to store wheels and tires now bwahaha

I am not a fan of grey wheels on my cars so I'll have to fix that at some point, but here she is yesterday:

 

[M-Sport fan]

You are about 3.5 hours closer to The New England Forest Rally (held in late July/early August in Newry, Maine this year) than I am, and you are all but 'around the corner' from Lime Rock Park up thar!

 

[kansei]

I try to get up to NH every summer, this year no family trip so I might drag the boyfriend and go to the rally 😅

Speaking of NH, here's a couple pics from there a few weeks ago and then some more recent ones here in northwestern CT

Kancamagus Highway NH at -1F at night (highly recommended but oof my braking distance on 185 blizzaks is poor):

after driving from north country NH down close to Boston during a bad snow storm:

both in the last week here:

 

[kansei]

To close out this thread, I got rid of the car back in January, moved to a new city and it made apartment hunting too difficult when only a couple percent of places have any sort of off-street parking. Also because the steering/alignment issue I complained about a bunch in this thread caused the car to fail Massachusetts safety inspection, invalidating my registration 😅. After paying 4 shops all over the country to try and fix that I was so over it. At some point I gotta go visit my family to clean up some of the parts I have sitting around, there's a lot, like the EDM headlights, the winter and summer wheels, etc.

I've been thinking about the ol Fiesta a bunch because I'm picking up my next car in a couple days. Going back to my roots with a '19 Mazda3 hatch. It'll be slow, but hey it's cute (red leather interior 😍) and has a manual transmission what more could a guy ask for.

 

[Jabbit]

To close out this thread, I got rid of the car back in January, moved to a new city and it made apartment hunting too difficult when only a couple percent of places have any sort of off-street parking. Also because the steering/alignment issue I complained about a bunch in this thread caused the car to fail Massachusetts safety inspection, invalidating my registration 😅. After paying 4 shops all over the country to try and fix that I was so over it. At some point I gotta go visit my family to clean up some of the parts I have sitting around, there's a lot, like the EDM headlights, the winter and summer wheels, etc.

I've been thinking about the ol Fiesta a bunch because I'm picking up my next car in a couple days. Going back to my roots with a '19 Mazda3 hatch. It'll be slow, but hey it's cute (red leather interior 😍) and has a manual transmission what more could a guy ask for.

I live in So. NH so I'd be interested in some of your parts laying around.