Controlled Over-Steer

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1 The Official Newsletter of the Indy Miata Club Volume 26 Issue 12 December 2015 What s Inside Page 2 Classified Membership update Controlled Over-steer continued Page & 2016 Club Events Page 4 Club News Page Regional Events Page 6 Miatas & Fiatas Page 7 Not So Technical Report. Controlled Over-Steer By Tom Lewis, President If you love to drive your Miata, this is the time of year when you re forced to remain optimistic, that the winter won t be as bad as the prognosticators are forecasting and spring will be here before you know it, right? Well, I m not going to sugar coat it you re just going to have to accept it and mentally prepare for the biting cold, the shoveling, the darkness But, we ll get through this winter like we have with so many previous winters here at the Indy Miata Club. We ve made it through November, so only another 120 days or so until another driving season is upon us! And did we end the year of events with a bang or what? This year s annual Hidden Drives Rally brought out record crowds for 2015, with nearly 30 Miatas participating in another epic route put together by our own Rally Master Extraordinaire, Sara J McBride. Sara has never failed to put together a really fun route over the years, and this year s Hidden Drives had to rank at or near the very top. The weather, while cool, was quite tolerable for top down driving with the sun shining and, somehow, Sara managed to find some of the most freshly paved roads in Morgan, Monroe and Bartholomew counties! On behalf of everyone who attended, thanks so much to Sara for putting together a tremendously fun day to end a great year of events. I m also looking forward to Saturday, December 5 th and the club s annual Officer Elections and Holiday Celebration at J. Razzo s Italian Restaurant in Carmel, IN will see a number of changes with several open officer and volunteer positions being filled. Those members in attendance will be voting in new officers for the President-elect, Treasurer and Secretary positions, and the Board of Directors will be appointing a new Membership Director. Following the elections, we ll be having a number of drawings to give away 2 huge Zoom-Zoom Boxes of goodies that has recently arrived from the very generous and supporting folks at Mazda North America Operations in Irvine, California. This year s boxes have lots of new and, surprisingly, different items, with, of course, lanyards. Lots. Of. Lanyards. A new design and a different color, but lanyards nonetheless. So everyone can plan on coming home with, at the very least, another Mazda lanyard for your growing Mazda lanyard collection. And if that isn t exciting enough, we ll also have our Continued on page 2. Page 8 Funny Stuff? Page 9 Advertisers Page 10 December calendar Attention, Members! Your annual membership expires on December 31, dues should be submitted before January 31. Accepting contributions to our Open Road newsletter? Send your ideas to editor@indymiata.org.

2 Page 2 Open Road December 2015 Indy Miata Club Officers 2015 President Tom Lewis president@indymiata.org Vice-President Ken Koehler vicepresident@indymiata.org Treasurer Ken Rabbers treasurer@indymiata.org Secretary Joan Rabbers secretary@indymiata.org Membership Director Darlene Evans membership@indymiata.org Website Editor Sara J McBride webmaster@indymiata.org Newsletter Editor Steve Crouse editor@indymiata.org The Open Road is published monthly for the members of the Indy Miata Club. The Indy Miata Club assumes no liability for any information contained herein, or injury or damage resulting from the use of this information. The ideas, opinions, maintenance or modification tips expressed are to be used at the reader s discretion. Individual contributors and/or the editors express no approval, authentication, or endorsement. Thank you. Controlled Over-steer, cont. CLASSIFIEDS FREE Miata Magazines from Fall 1989 (premier issue) through May Full set of all issues to the first contact to make arrangements for pick up. Contact Gary Collings Mazda Miata MX-5, M edition with hard top, and many extras miles. Price: $8,000 Call for more information. John Reba: phone More photos on club website Classified page. Membership Update: 100 members. Welcome New Member! Geoffrey Andrews traditional Gift Exchange, with a very loose interpretation of the word Exchange, allowing the more choice gifts (usually something in a bottle) to be stolen up to 3 times. Top it all off with some delicious Italian food and desserts, and it s a perfect ending for another great year in the Indy Miata Club. As a two-time President getting ready to step aside, I d like to leave you all with a few thoughts. A club is only as good as its members, and we have some of the very best at Indy Miata. In January, I appealed to the membership to step up and fill the calendar with events, with a goal of 14 Events for the 2015 driving season. We ended up with 18. Not only did we exceed our goal, we ve seen a significant increase in interest judged by the number of new members, and most importantly, how many of those new members are participating. More and more, we re seeing lots of new faces and Miatas at events! Even more encouraging is the number of new members who have recently stepped up, and who have voiced an interest in the open officer and volunteer positions. This renewed energy insures the future success of the club. And those who are coming into these new positions are sure to find new and long-lasting friendships with people from all walks of life, but share a common interest in the Miata. And that s worth far more than the small commitment made to the betterment of a car club. So, I say, Well Done to all of our members this year. Thank you to everyone who came out and participated in our club events this year. And a HUGE Thank you to all who gave their time to plan and host an event during 2015; your efforts are greatly appreciated by a club that simply loves to drive. We look forward to seeing the Events Calendar fill with new events in And don t be shy if you have an idea, or just want to contribute to everyone s enjoyment, or need ideas for hosting a Drive or Event, just ask any officer. Everyone is more than willing to help you in planning a successful event. Stay warm! If I don t see you at the 2015 Holiday Celebration and Elections, have a wonderful Holiday Season, a successful and healthy New Year - See you on the road in the Spring!

3 Page 3 Open Road December 2015 It s not too early to choose a date for your 2016 rally, mingle or weekend trip. Get it on our 2016 calendar ASAP. Please report the date to Event Coordinator, Ken Koehler. Contact him at events@indymiata.org. The FINAL 2015 Indy Miata Club Event December 5, IMC Christmas Dinner-Party Optional Gift Exchange Tentative 2016 Indy Miata Club Events > January 16, annual President s luncheon & Officers meeting < April, 2nd Quarter Officers meeting April or May; Leavenworth, Madison or OTHER weekend Sat., May 28, Night before the Indy 500 Mingle June, Marietta Madness July, 3rd Quarter Officers meeting Sat., July 25, Night before the Brickyard 400 Mingle September, St Louis Fireworks weekend October, 4th Quarter Officers meeting November, Hidden Drives December, annual Christmas Dinner-Party & Election

4 Page 4 Open Road December 2015 It s an Honor! The Official Vineyard of the Indy Miata Club wins awards! Vintners Ann Cole & Eric Drumwright Lily Valley Vineyard, the Official vineyard of the Indy Miata Club, is now an Award Winning vineyard. Ann Cole and Eric Drumwright started making homemade wine in They have made a few different varieties over the years. Club members have had a chance to sample some of these at different club events. They have produced wine from kits, as well as from their own grapes and fruit. This summer they decided to enter two different varieties in the Indy International Wine Competition, held at Purdue University. This year over 2000 wines were entered in the amateur division, with about 300 awards given. Ann and Eric brought home two metals! They were awarded a Bronze for their Riesling (made from a kit) and another Bronze in the fruit wine category for their Pear Wine (made from their home grown pears). Congratulations! Hidden Drives XIII Report The 2015 Hidden Drives rally was run again (lucky 13!) on November 7th and was a great success with 27 MX-5s showing up on a nice, sunny day. We had a good mix of current members, new members and members-to-be! Most cars took advantage of the warmish temperatures and ran top down, though I'm sure heaters were on! The route took the ralliers from Trafalgar to Nashville and of course, followed my #1 rule that states "Do not take the shortest route to Nashville!". What Google says should be a 18-mile drive was, for the ralliers, a fun 79-mile route. In my route planning session, I found a lot of freshly paved roads and took advantage of them (though I couldn't convince the Brown County Roads department to patch that one 20 foot stretch of gravel), and the cars scampered over hills and through woods on a lot of curvy, fun roads. The ralliers had a quiz to complete (I reminded everyone to bring their brains!) that included identifying where a photo on the route instruction sheet was taken, how many counties we drove through during the event, and a few other questions. Several cars got four answers correct (no one answered all 5 correctly) so a blind draw was held with Robert Lewis and Teresa Young winning the prize package which included a can of raspberry jam imported from Canada. Solo drivers weren't left out for a prize as I know there's no way a car without a navigator can read the rally instructions, answer questions, and stay on pavement. A separate drawing was held for all solo cars and member-to-be David Hughes won, receiving seat belt shoulder pads. Thank you to everyone who attended... it's not a rally without you! Not able to attend? The route sheet is on our website ( routes/) so you can see how much fun we had!

5 Page 5 Open Road December 2015 Regional Miata Events in 2016 Here are some of the regional Miata events scheduled for next year. These gatherings are a great chance to meet Miata-fanatics from other areas of the U.S. They are tons-of-fun! Need help finding information? See links from the Non-IMC Events page on our website, contact one of our club officers, or search Miata.Net. April 21-24, Miatas at Myrtle Beach X, Myrtle Beach SC June 9-12, Zoomin the Mountains of East Tennessee, Johnson City TN June 22-25, Miatas in Utah VII, Deer Valley UT July 14-17, Cruisin CT 2016, September 15-18, Miatas Play Music City, Nashville TN

6 Page 6 Open Road December 2015 Speedster Two fourth-gen Miata concept cars from the recent SEMA show. Spyder The Miata-based Fiat 124 Spider

7 Page 7 Open Road December 2015 Our Not So Technical Page Convertible Top Improvement By Indy Club member, Dave Besterman Do you have trouble putting your convertible top down while sitting in your Miata? If so, then read on. For several years this was my predicament on my 2000 Miata. Try as I might, I just couldn t get my top to lower easily on its own. The rear bow which is supposed to move forward when the top comes down would hang up on the fabric of the top and so I always had to get out of the car and manually help get the top to fold down properly. to the rescue. An article from the site recommended a product called McLube Sailkote. No, this isn t something sold at the local fast food restaurant. It is a sail lubricant intended for sailors. It is a dry lubricant spray used to reduce friction and drag on sail fabric. Another quick search on the internet produced Jamestown Distributors which sells Building and Marine Supplies. You can check them out at A 6oz. spray can of McLube Sailkote is $9.50 plus S&H. A quick spray on the underside of the convertible top where the rear bow moves should be enough to get the top to go down more easily. (Editor s note: I expect this is an application that would apply to all years of Miata cloth tops) Wait, there s more. Anyone out there own a 2000 year Miata? There is another problem which is unique to this model year. It seems that early 2000 cars had undersized springs that connect the rear bow to the front bow. The purpose of the springs is to pull the rear bow forward while the convertible top is coming down. With the top up, the springs are visible just behind the side windows. At the next club get-together, compare your springs with another year car and see if the diameter of the wire in your springs is smaller than theirs. (The springs should be 1/8 in diameter.) Mine were too small and I ordered a replacement set from my local Mazda dealer. Installation is easy. With the top up there is very little tension on the springs and so they are easy to remove. The springs are opposite hand construction so just make sure that you get the left one on the left side and the right one on the right. Changing these springs further improved the action of the folding top on my 2000 Emerald Mica. What a pleasure it now is to be able to just unlatch and throw back to top to go from top-up to top-down driving without having to get out of the car. A special thank you goes out to Mal who posted the information for this article on on April16, (Editor s note: Beginning in 2001, a different form of spring was used.) If your spring looks like this, you don t have a problem. This is the improved item.

8 Page 8 Open Road December 2015 FUNNY STUFF? Do you recognize the car in the trailer photo?

9 Page 9 Open Road November 2015 Now celebrating 40 years! Exclusive Discounts for Indy Miata Club Members Tom Roush Mazda, Indiana s first Mazda dealer established in 1972 has not only the most experienced sales and service staff in town, but also is the highest volume dealer in Indiana. We hope to serve you in our next 40 years as Indy s premier Mazda dealer. In support of the Miata Club member s we would like to offer the following benefits: 15% off regular door labor rate 15% off any accessory purchase S-Plan pricing to eligible customer s Extended Saturday service hours 7:30 3:30 US th Street Westfield, IN Tom Lewis INSURANCE GROUP Hughes Insurance Group is an Independent Agency representing over 35 insurance companies. Our ultra-competitive rates assure that you receive the most value at the best price for all of your home, auto or business insurance needs. For a limited time, I m giving away a $20 gas card with an insurance review and quote for your home, auto or business with no obligation! If I m competitive, consider allowing Hughes Insurance Group to write your business. If I can t provide you with a better value, you ll have the peace of mind knowing you re properly insured at a fair price. Call or Indy Miata Club member Tom Lewis today! tom@hughesinsurancegroup.com Have a few dollars invested in upgrades? Ask about Agreed Value Coverage for your Miata!

10 Page 10 Open Road December 2015 Benefits for Indy Miata Club Members -First year dues to the Indy Miata Club after purchase of any Mazda -S-Plan Pricing to Current Members -15% off All Parts & Accessories -15% off Labor Rates -Maintenance for Life with the purchase of Any Mazda -Saturday Service Hours 9:00 AM to 1:00 PM -Free Cookies!! Contact Lauren Auld for more information.