Sharka's interior: pretty shiny.
I like chrome. Chrome looks good in a black interior. I like making things. When you add up
these three sentences, you get the above result. Pictured are (in no particular order): my Voodoo brake and
shift knobs, a Cobra shift ring, VDO Industrial Chrome gauges, Brainstorm gauge rings, MRoad vent rings,
polished turn signal stalks, a custom speaker ring (kinda hard to see), a VDO Series 1 boost gauge,
and a JVC head unit with some shiny buttons.
Replica Shelby Cobra shift ring - Brandon McComber's idea.
At $25, this beats the pants off any Miata-specific shift ring. It looks alot better
too, in my opinion. The only catch is that you need some skill with bondo and wet sandpaper
to make it fit. It fits fine in the stock square hole, but the corners leave a gap. Bondo removes
that gap. I finished the ring with four polished socket-head screws and a modified leather
shift boot. If you'd like your own, check out
Cobra Restorers
Voodoo polished aluminum shift and handbrake knobs:
Nice but a little demanding. The Voodoo knobs
feel GREAT in your hand, but the aluminum
requires alot of polishing. Once a week would probably keep them looking good, but mine are lucky
to get it once a month. I thought they were really shiny before I installed the chrome Cobra
shift ring. Nope. The chrome gives a better shine. If I run across a sale, I'll be
replacing the shift knob with a Sola Luna chrome model.
Chrome handbrake button: It gets scratched by the aluminum handle if you don't round the edges
on the aluminum. I fould this out months too late. Someday I'll buy a new one....
VDO Industrial Chrome gauges, WMD gauge mount.
I love the look of these VDO gauges.
Being aware of actual coolant and oil temperature
is also a plus. And a little foreknowledge of a bad alternator is a good thing too. The gauges
are mounted using a prototype Wolf Motorsports Development panel. The backing is simple 3/16" ABS plastic,
held in place by a standard single DIN radio mounting ring. The gauges are angled with Autometer gauge
rings cut in half, since they're rediculously thick otherwise. The rings were then slotted
to allow the entire package to fit inside the DIN ring. Overall, about 3 hours of work was put into this.
My new JVC MP3 player is a few steps above the Blaupunkt unit I had originally installed. That poor
Blaupunkt barely made it through one year. It's by far the worst head unit I've ever come across. The
JVC
seems much nicer. I have the ability to angle the face up for better visibility while driving, and it has
a nice dot matrix display for the ID3 tags. I chose to stick the radio below the gauges since I like seeing
my gauges. Otherwise, the volt meter would only be visible in 4th or 2nd gear. It means I can't eject
a CD in 3rd or 5th gear, but that's not usually a problem. On road trips, I just pause the cruise control
and downshift to 4th. 4th is good for something like 110 mph in Sharka anyway.
Custom gauges with Brainstorm chrome rings, VDO boost gauge, polished stalks.
The VDO Series 1 boost gauge is one of my favorite interior pieces. Not because
of the chrome, or the little single Autometer mount, but due to the thing it's connected to in the engine. Every Miata
needs boost.
Though there's nothing shiny about it, my MOMO F1 steering wheel
deserves a mention. Removing the thin, stock steering wheel and airbomb has been one of my most rewarding mods.
The feel of a proper MOMO wheel is amazing.
As for the scarebag, I'll leave that soapbox to preach upon for another day.
I got the Brainstorm gauge rings on sale for $75. That price is about $50 too much for the crap they sent me. Originally,
they were nothing more than dull pot-metal. UGLY doesn't begin to describe. I spent a couple hours with my dremel, a
hard felt polishing tip, and some Mother's polish. Fortunately, the rings polished up beautifully. This was the
last item I ever purchased from Brainstorm.
Notice the polished signal stalks! They really set off the gauges. I decided one evening to see
what was under the dull green metal. To my amazement, shiny stuff peeked out! An hour, some polish,
and a coat of wax later, I have a free chrome mod.
The custom gauges continue to bring a smile to my face. Follow the link for more info on them.
An invitation to go for a drive?.
These are GE stove rings purchased from Home Depot and polished with my dremel. Nice, huh?
The center mesh came from Radio Shack speaker covers. Not the best thing, but the mesh looked
nicer than anything else I could find. A classic black square mesh would have been cool, but I couldn't
find any I liked. JB Weld holds it together and polished socket-head screws finish the look.
The triple chrome Aerodramatics door cups add some needed shiny qualities
to the center of the otherwise boring door panels. I'm tempted by their chrome locks and openers. Unfortunately,
I like the shape of the stock handles too much at this point to get rid of them.
It's hard to beat Mazda's factory chrome door sills for style. None of the aftermarket
offerings even come close in my opinion. I received these from the Miata.net classifieds off a wrecked 94M. They were
a bit dull when I unwrapped them, but that was nothing that an hour with some metal polish couldn't fix.
MRoad vent rings.
Purchased about 3 months after I bought the car, the polished aluminum
MRoad rings look very nice and add
quite a flare to the Miata interior. In 2000, they were the rings to have at $25.
Unfortunately, I'm not sure if you can get them anymore. MRoad has been gone for a while...
return to the Miata Interior Mods index
