Ask Bob!

May/June '99

Why were none of the Miata "test colors" ever put into production? What was your favorite color out of the bunch and do you know what ever happened to those cars?

Larry Alster, Charleston, S.C. USA

Actually a couple of them were, but not on the Miata. Remember the color test cars (both the six Miatas and the eight 323 hatchbacks) were done to evaluate colors for what became the MX-3 - they were never under consideration as Miata colors. A variation of the teal (slightly greener) was offered as an MX-3 launch color and a blue used on one of the 323s was offered on unchanged MX-3s.

As for what happened to them, well, the teal one is in my brother in-law¹s garage. I just called to check. It¹s there. The last I heard the light green was still living in Orange County by the person who bought it from Mazda. The orange one was in a really heavy accident and was parked at Monster Motorsports. It may still be there. The electric blue one was owned by a fireman in San Diego the last I heard. I saw the raspberry Miata in Mission Viejo, California about a week before I moved here to Australia (that was December, 1993) and it looked like hell - the paint was scratched and there was a HUGE gouge in the passenger door. That bugged me since it was my favourite of the half-dozen. I¹ll be damned if I know where the yellow one got off to, but I think Bonnie Lutz in Southern California knows what¹s become of it. She¹s got a 1991 yellow B package car with a hardtop.  It¹s the sample car sent to Mazda¹s US importer.

Bwob

When you were first driving the prototype M1, what was the reaction of other drivers/onlookers? Thanks for all your work and vision!

Steven Collins, Tacoma, WA

My first drive in a prototype was in a semi-gloss black REAL early car. The bonnet was hand formed and was chock-a-block with imperfections. Because I tended to leave work after sunset and get there before sunrise, the boss range me and asked if I wanted to drive it home. After mulling this question over for a nanosecond or so, I grabbed the keys and headed off. With the top down, of course.

Normally my commute was 27 miles from driveway to driveway, and took between 35 and 45 minutes leaving after peak hour. This time it took almost 2 hours, going from Irvine to Dana Point via Lake Elsinore. When I got out of the car went went upstairs, my wife figured that I was driving a P729 from my wind-blown hair and ear-to-ear grin.

What did passerbys think? I¹ll be damned if I know. Now with this thing painted a real hard to see colour at night and my driving along a number of pretty deserted roads, nobody gave it much of a glance. And I was counting on people noticing it. Even in the relative hustle and bustle of downtown Dana Point it went unnoticed. I got suck at a light and, of course, there were no cars along side and no cross traffic. Not a soul seemed to spot the car. While this was good professionally, I was kinda bummed on a personal basis.

A few months later while we were on a test along the southernmost edge of the Mojave desert, we were spotted by a Los Angeles County Sherriff¹s Department Deputy who waited till we pulled over for a driver change. He stopped alongside, eyeballed the car and gave it a Œthumbs up¹. That made me grin.

Bwob

Many have commented on the less-than-subtle resemblance between the original Miata & a certain Lotus model, including photos of the Lotus reportedly in the possession of developement team member(s). Though often casually referred to as the "Japanese MGB" of the 90's, I see no engineering or stylistic link w/the MGB; the Lotus, on the other hand, had a twin cam 1600 cc engine, 4-wheel independant suspension, a very unique chasis design, and looked a hell of a lot like a Miata.. (or vice versa.) Any real connection w/the Lotus? (And would Colin Chapman care?)

B Keiper, Columbia, MO, USA

Boy, am I glad somebody asked this one. Thanks Mr. Keiper! While I really don't like tooting my own horn, I'll take full credit, or I think I should say blame, for the many 'legends' regarding the long-held concept that the Miata was a shameless cribbing of the Elan, 'proof' (to some) that the Japanese have never had an original idea. The sole reason that anyone ever saw shots of an S3 Elan with the clay models of the Miata come from my own personal greed. Here's what happened.

The head of the Product Planning group in Irvine, a wonderful gentleman named Hiroshi Iida, came to me with a worried look in his face and some bugetary documents. Essentially what he was worried about was the fact we hadn't used up enough of the budget Mazda had allocated for competitive vehicles for that fiscal year (1983-1984). Normally you'd say 'so what?', but in this case there were problems. We were budgeted on a 'Use it or lose it' basis. Because of the cyclical character of car product cycles, we had a year which required few competitive vehicles to be evaluated against prototypes or to provide benchmarks for upcoming programs. The bad part was that the following year we had a couple of prototypes coming over as well as a project we'd need a benchmark car for. So we had to use all or most of the budget allocated. We had about $15,000 left unspent.

I couldn't think of a single car that we needed to buy for any upcoming project, till Iida-san said 'what about something for the lighweight sports car project?'. This caught me totally unaware, since the projcet was still nowhere near approval. He explained he was indeed serious, so I sat down and gave it a thought. Ther next day I asked him if the car would be handled as a normal company car would be, and if it would be ok to buy a used car. When he explained that a used car would be fine and that it would be sold as an ex-company car after the depreication period (about two years back then), and that we should 'just buy anything, and buy it before the end of the financial year'.

Now, a brief digression. I was a huge fan of 'The Avengers', and like many adolescent males of my generation I was hoplessly enamoured by Diana Rigg's character of Mrs. Emma Peel. And not only because she drove a Lotus Elan. But I liked the Elan too. And I had lusted after Mr's Peel's pale metallic blue Elan S3 that appeared in the second series of Mrs. Pee's episodes. Almost as much Mrs. Peel, in fact.

So after a call to Dave Bean, the West Coast's Lotus guru (based in Santa Barbara, California in those days), I raised the idea of buying a Lotus Elan. Much to my surprise, Iida-san gave the whole thing the ok, adding if used the Elan as my company car it would keep our competitive vehicle fleet budget up while freeing up the lease costs of a departmental company car.

A quick trip to the guys in accounting and numbers-cruncher Tim mentioned that I could buy the car after two years for something like $4500. So I'd have the Elan as a company car for two years, then get it at a significant savings. A call back to Mr. Bean in Santa Barbara and gave him an idea of what we wanted (1967 Elas S3 drophead coupe in silver blue metallic with a black interior, a new galvanized chassis and universals in place of the rubber doughnuts), sent him a check as a deposit and waited.

About six weeks later, I drove up to Santa Barbara to pick the car up from Bean's. I was the happy driver of a company-owned 'new' Elan S3. It even had California license SJH 498D (Mrs.Peel's original number - SJH 499D had already been taken).

Much to our surprsie the lightweight sports car program was placed into 'off-line' status, so the timing of this acquisition was near faultless. We used it for a couple of videos we sent to Japan (it was the only 2-seat open sports car Mazda owned in the ŒStates) as well as a study into backbone chassis for the lightweight sports car, a layout I favoured if only because we could put a new body right on top of the chassis.

Later in 1984 (when it was decided to take the lightweight sports car project to an even more official level), Japan - lacking any sort of open two-seat cars there at Mazda HQ - asked for us to ship the car to them. Now even though 'my' master plan had me driving this Elan for the rest of my life, my bosses wanted the car! What could I do? Well, in a word, nothing. In a couple of weeks our shipping agents, Harper Robinson, had made all the arrangements and a truck appeared with a 20 foot container. I nearly shed a tear when 'my' Elan was packed up in the container and shipped off to an unknown fate in Japan. And I went back into my 323 company car which had been nicknamed 'the beige bucket' by Mark Jordan. Sniff!

Nine years later, on one of my last trips to Japan as a Mazda employee, a co-worker there discretely took me aside after a meeting, whisking me to a garage between the design centre in Hiroshima and the river. Flicking the lights on I saw 'my' Elan sitting there on low tyres, dusty and with a pretty big gouge on the bonnnet but otherwise looking fine. He mentioned tha car was taken out to the Miyoshi proving ground three times when it first arrived in 1984. In early 1985 it did a stint in engineering while it was investigated to see just how small the still not approved lightweight sports car could be and meet the gauntlet of corporate and govenmental design rules. It went back into the garage afterwards and there it stayed. It might still be there for all I know.

Now the details. One of the original documents I prepared described the Mazda lightweight sports car as 'an MGB that will start on a rainy day and won't leak oil on your driveway'. The position of the car in the marketplace was much more in the area inhabited by the likes of MGB and Sunbeam Alpine, particularly in terms of afforability (based on weekly wages vs car cost, not the direct dollar ammount) and size. The Elan was a smaller (too small to meet even basic criteria like Mazda's toe working space requirements), apreicably more expensive vehicle. Yes, as you know the car with the 1.6 litre engine, twin cams and independent rear suspension there are Elan similarities. But only the 1.6 litre engine was part of the specs going in. The original engine was a 1.6 single cam, though this was altered later to a 1.6 single came 3-valver, and later yet again to the 1.6 twincam we know. The car also started out riding on strut front suspenbsion and with a rigid rear axle hung on five-link geometry with coils.

As we got into the project and started using a little lateral thinking, the other bits fell into place. Norman Garrett proposed the first independent rear idea, using all the bits from the rear of the old 4wheel-drive turbo 323 GTX, including the tall rear struts. Japan eyeballed that and tried seeing if they couldn't do something better and stay within budget. They did.

The twincam engine came about as a result of Japan going DOHC mad on 323-class cars, so with that sort of generous sales volume, the twincam engine became economically feasable. So despite what you might have neard or believed, similarities with the Elan are more coincidental than planned.

As for Mr. Chapman's opinion, well my Ouija board is notoriously unreliable (I have a Lucas-built one). But at least Mazda had the brains to make it rear-drive. You couldn't say that about the last Elan...

Bwob

Do you have any input or 'pull' with the current Miata team for those suggestions (2.0L!)

Randy Stocker, Georgia, USA

No more than you guys as owners do. Probably less. Don't forget that you people are in the catbird seat. Make your opinions known, show your interest and you'd be surprised how positively Mazda can respond.

Also, How would you describe your tenure with Mazda, would you consider going back to work for them?

To answer the first part of your question, I think it was just about the best time of my life. The best way to describe it is to say it was like playing with a great model train set, but one with real locomotives. Mazda was - and is - a great place to work, even for someone like me. Somebody with talent can r e a l l y go far.

Part two? Well, I think that would have as much to do with Mazda as me. But a commute from Sydney to Hiroshima or Irvine would be a real drag. Great for the frequent flyer miles though...

bwob

It was great to see you at the Miata Birthday Bash in Dallas. Disappointing to see it took so long for you to make an appearence. No offence, but when they announced your name many Miataphiles said "Who's that?" I had to fill them in. My question is, will we be seing more of you at any of the events or are you going to disappear again?

William Curran, Dallas, TX

If they had to say 'who's that?', I've done my job well. The Miata should be the thing people focus on, because the real people who count with the car aren't bozos like me or the guys who are paid to do deveopment work. The folks who really matter, the genuine heroes are you people who are owners. Without owners, whatever was done on the car would mean a thing. I was just doing my job.

As to when you'll be seeing me again, well, who knows? While Australia is a wonderful place to live, I'll be the first person to admit that it's miles away from everything. Well, everything except New Zealand and Antarctica. I hope I have the opportunity to meet as many of you Number Ones (Miata/MX-5/Roadster owners) as possible. I still get a gentine charge from  seeing someone on the road behind the wheel of one with a big, ear-to-ear grin.

bwob

As you may well be aware, there is a great debate on what color God's Miata is. What color is God's Miata?

Eric Knight, Indianapolis/IN

I thought everybody knew. It's Mariner Blue. It matches her eyes.

bwob

To your recollection, what was the biggest concern from a design stand point at the 1st launch of the Miata? Did this concern ever become a real problem?

Thoasiii, Detroit, MI

Fortunately there were no eleventh-hour problems which cropped up beyond the usual little niggly things. There were a couple of real concerns before the project was officially approved, however. During the development of the so-called 'Mark II' clay model, there was a push - and a strong one - from a group which wanted the car stripped down and turned into a sort of modern Lotus/Caterham Seven; sidecurtains instead of wind-down windows, a removeable soft top (as in take the cover off the frame, pop the frame off and put it all in the trunk), single cam engine and even little headlamps on stalks like the Lotus clubman. Though management was never swayed, the detour wasted time and manpower. Of course you could say that the Mark II  proposal was on a similar dead end.

One thing that kept coming back like a bad penny was a hard top boot that some people in design just insisted on. It was prposed as either a pop-up flap (functioning as the one on the Capri did) or a two piece fiberglass thing that would live in the trunk when not being used, soaking up more than half of the estimated trunk volume. Management would ask for it to be dropped, but it would then appear on the next clay model. When the project got the official go and Hirai-san was made program manager, he put the kybosh on the pop-up roof cover for once and for all. He didn't like the added weight, complexity or the fact you had to get out of the car to raise the top any more than we did.

About eight or nine months prior to the launch at the 1989 Chicago Show, some of the people in Japan got r e a l l y nervous about the Miata being offered solely as an open car. There were a number of paper studies on adding a coupe to the range, along with a proposal containing real voodoo numbers on how much more successful a coupe would be in place of an open car. Needless to say this sort of misplaced concern had a few people running around like chickens in need of heads, and caused a couple of headaches with crash sketch programs in design and maket estimates (no money was available for real research, mind you) from Product Planning, none of which ever amounted to anything.

But by and large, we were really lucky that there weren't any real major concerns.

bwob

"Skippy Oyster"?

Todd Barney

That was Brian Wannan's idea. The guys at the Lone Star chapter of the Miata Club wanted to keep my presence at Miata World 99 low key, so Brian used the analogy of my being the bit of sand that start a pearl to develop in an oyster as the source of my last name. I mentioned Skippy, thinking of the Kangaroo that was to Australia on TV as Lassie was to the States. He put them together. All I had to do was be embarassed.

bwob

How did the "seed" for the Miata get planted?

Gary Fischman, Miata.net

I guess the meeting with Mr. Yamamoto at Mazda GHQ in 1979 would be the place the seed (as you put it) was sown. Whenever we had visitors from Japan's development groups I'd somehow find time to explain the basic idea. And lobby them whenever I ran into them afterwards. For years, in fact. Also, as the project progressed (even as work of the "after hours" variety), it managed to get other folks on the periphery interested. Sort of infected others.

bwob

If you could do it all over again, what would you have done differently on the first generation MX-5?

Gary Fischman, Miata.net

Boy, where to start? I always wanted the rear license plate to be in the bumper with a nice clean and simple panel between the taillamps, so if I had my way I would have seen to that. I sure would have put power mirrors (or a passenger side power mirror at the very least) instead of that damned power antenna. I would have made sure that there was a small chrome hubcap on the basic car with the tin (steel) wheels, and I'd have designed the alloys with exposed lug nuts instead of those #@!%&! plastic center caps which go yellow at the blink of an eye. And (this will tick some folks off) I'd have removed the chrome rings from the speedo and tach OR I would have put the chrome around the temperature, fuel level and oil pressure gauges in addition to speedometer and tachometer.

bwob

Had you been involved in the M2 design, what would you have done different?

Gary Fischman, Miata.net

Right off I would have offered the three original launch colors (Classic Red, Crystal White, Mariner Blue) plus BRG and Sunburst Yellow for the first three months of production, with the final 1999 (metallic/mica rich) color palette coming on line afterwards. The original chrome door handles would have stayed, too. I was not a big a fan of the crown of the deck lid on the original Miata, so the even more extreme curvature of the M2 has even less appeal to me. I'd certainly not have gone that wacko. I'd probably be a little less extreme with the sculpting of the bodyside sections. And I would have put the damned oil pressure gauge back! I'm pretty sure 2.0 litre four-cylinder power and four-piston discs from the second-generation RX-7 would be on my shopping list, too. Then again if I had been involved in the M2, it probably wouldn't have been as good as it is... [Somehow, we don't believe that. GF]

bwob