Topic: Miata help please

[jaustin]

I know some of you guys have or had miats in the past and was wondering if you had any thoughts

 1995 rough idle after storage


About a month ago I went and had my battery tested at Advanced auto (since it was in the basement while in storage) they said the battery was fine. I went and hooked it back up and removed the steel wool from the exhaust and air intake. Started the car and it was running fine it seemed. About 15-20 min later I shut it off and headed on my way.

Today I went to go move the car back to my new garage when I fired it up everything seemed fine. Stalled it out twice trying to get it out of the garage (clutch is way different then my audi) I noticed once I got it up to the stop sign the RPM's seems to be bouncing all over the place from 900 all the way down to nothing. It seemed like it was going to stall out once while I was coming to a stop so I just passed on stopping and headed home. Car never stalled out but seemed like it was coming close a couple times.

My drive today was only 2 miles so its hard to say if it was running great or not I thought I noticed a surge but that could just be from me not driving it for so long.

Pre storage I filled the tires with air, changed oil, and filled up with 93 octane gas. Parked it and removed battery.

Maybe just old fuel? or something else?

[ken]

I would wait until you got new gas in there before worrying too much.

A couple things though:

Have you replaced the plug wires?  It's common for them to go bad, and that's the 1st thing I did when I bought mine.

Also the idle air control valve can get sticky.

Have you ever checked the timing?  You'll need a timing light. 

I've had idle issues in the past where it does strange things.  It usually goes away after I get the timing right and then adjust the screw on the idle air control. 

That being said, the idle is not as stable as the Audi.

[Castle]

Its not uncommon for cars to get a bit loaded up after some time in storage.  Since nothing is really poking its head out as a problem I would put some miles (close to home) on it and get new gas in it.  I would also put a fuel treatment in it to dry out the gas if there is water from being stored.

Try that and let us know how it goes.

Oh and next year throw some snow tires on it cause mine is a hoot in the snow  

[jaustin]

I've got it running out in the garage right now hoping to burn up some of that gas (doors are open) I'll pickup some of that fuel stuff later today.

Ken whats a good place to order those wires from? I've not done it yet and don't know if it has been done.

[ken]

I just got some from Ebay. I don't know what brand they were, but it was a name brand.

*They were NGK wires, $32 for the set.

[SpeedyDTP247]

it sounds like bad gas. should've used fuel stabilizer right before you put it away for storage.

[jaustin]

^ thanks paul lol now's a good time to bring that up. Ken, thanks ill look into that either way here.

[Castle]

oh you didn't use fuel stabilizer?  Your going to have to run the bad stuff out.  What I would do is run a half tank out and fill it up with new gas and some fuel additive.

[SpeedyDTP247]

^ thanks paul lol now's a good time to bring that up. Ken, thanks ill look into that either way here.

well. i guess you missed my winter storage prep thread here is a reply from ken in that thread. i bold the important part of his reply

On the Miata I always change the oil, fill up the gas tank, and dose it with stabilzer.  I put on the all season tires, and I have a car bag so I roll it into there and close it.

[jaustin]

I drove it all day yesterday and put almost 80 miles on it and I still got tones of gas

[Castle]

I drove it all day yesterday and put almost 80 miles on it and I still got tones of gas

ya 80 miles is only a quarter tank at most....get out and drive son!  

[jaustin]

Filled it up with 93 and some fuel stuff but I'm still getting a miss almost like when you have a bad coil pack in an audi. Only really notice it when push down the gas when just cruising and sitting it seems fine with a slight jump of the tach every while. Wires looked good, so I guess ill swap the plugs tomorrow maybe?

[ken]

I'd do both wires and plugs.  You can get a new set of wires for like $35, and they really do go bad.

[jaustin]

Okay, Ill see how much they are at Autozone tomorrow.

[jaustin]

Fix.

Started with just plugs and that didn't do it went and got the wires at like 10:45 and that did it.

Thanks for the help!

[SpeedyDTP247]

thats good. so how does your rear feel since you had to bend over and smile for the ridiculous prices

[jaustin]

It's doing better today. I notice the car seems a lot quicker then it did before.