I think this sums up perfectly, and in more detail what I was alluding to in my earlier post. I’d been at work for fourteen years before the arrival of the firm’s first computer. A huge IBM which needed a room with slightly higher air pressure to keep the dust out an operatives in white coats, and computing power much less than my great nephew’s smart phone. So I’m in the first generation with an analogue brain.
Ouch Saz. I am not a total luddite and not altogether criticizing the digitised world, I am actually writing this on my brand-new laptop and I used to use very high powered “workstations” in my previous job (recently retired now) and appreciate the technology involved (as an Engineer). Also, I don’t really see where the fact I own a ND comes into it. We don’t want to go down the which mark is best road again. As for “connectivity” I am aware that the ND throttle is drive by wire rather than a Bowden cable but I did use the word connectivity in the same context as the other forms of “connectivity” now lauded by many car manufacturers as their USP’s (look at some Citroen and BMW adverts). I think that you are taking my post a little out of context. Basically what I was saying, was that I preferred driving my car to listening to music in it. However if stuck in a traffic jam (rare for me) I do put it on and enjoy it. I am not against the digitized world at all but some people seem to not be able to do without it, even for the briefest time. How many people do you see driving whilst using their mobile phones or texting? How often do you see couples tapping away on their mobile phones rather than actually talking to each other? And good as the music system is in my ND it does not sound anywhere as good as my “retro” hi-fi.
Radio’s are a bit pointless in a 5 too much noise coming from the stupid roof I prefer to listen to the soundtrack of the muffler .Are the RF’s any quieter?
More positivity toward the 5 Davyo and completely untrue in my experience, 4 x MX-5, one PRHT among them and the radio has always been fine with the stupid roof up…
Come on Gerry, you were on T1R’s, you couldn’t feel what the tyre was doing!
I have had over 20 boring cars over the years apart from my first car which was a mk1 Escort I am done with boring which is why I own an NA and a NC3 if I want the music I just turn it up if I want the car noise I turn the music off.
Various views from good folk out there, but some are not seeing the real point, the thread is about MX5’s, not the ‘other’ workhorse that get’s you to and from work, or serves as transport elsewhere when needed. I sit here most days looking at NEW POSTS, and as today, some of them are all about problems with reaching the outside world, but little about whether they enjoy the car, regardless of which model it is.
I clearly remember while reading the old Yahoo group dailies, for two days some poor guy was appealing for urgent help, while a techie group on there were busy going on about how to connect their music players through the radio and ignoring that poor bloke, till I finally, totally exasperated, posted “There’s a poor guy out there asking for help, so why are you all not helping him?” . That was back early in 2002, just after buying my car. There was no forum then, without repeating what I said elsewhere, Yahoo was the only means of communication, but even then technology was rearing it’s head. That’s always annoyed me, this is a car club, not a technology forum, albeit it’s that we learn to rely on while driving our car, whichever model we have.
Saz said “The first MX5 needed a computer to run” But it doesn’t, to say so confirms that technology rules, and it doesn’t. It needs a computer because they loaded the car with sensors, so nothing else could interpret them or detect problems with the car. My first car was a Chevvy station wagon, and every other car I owned prior to the five was a pure petrol engine, with no sensors needed to track problems or monitor all the add-one that have gradually increased over the years. It’s called ‘progress’ but I don’t see any really. Greasy mechanics have ceased to exist, replaced by white coated ‘technicians’ who now insist on plugging your onboard computer into a diagnostics machine, (at a charge) before they ever roll up their sleeves and get down and dirty. Meanwhile a good mechanic in older times would immediately know what the problem was, or soon find it. Now technicians need a computer and a works manual to tell them which item to check, and as I posses a works manual for an NB, the list is endless. Robbie is one of a blessed few who can still tell you what to check, without recourse to a works manual, obviously trained in former years by a good mechanic, and remembering what to look for.
I have no idea who started the rot, but I’m sure Saz will tell us, from his vast store of unrelated information. The lecture on radios alone tells us we know next to nothing. The Japanese have always been the first to embrace technology, and it’s debateable whether the world is better for it - or not. I have my own views on that, but airing that get’s me named as a Neanderthal, apparently I’m just too old fashioned for the modern world. “Look where it’s going”, is all I need to say.
Early on, my friend Mick told me to switch the radio off, - very kind Mick, but I don’t switch it on at all. The Japanese ‘Horse and rider’ concept seems to have gone astray, too complex for some? Mick tells me “We’ve gone past horses”, and Saz refers to horse racing, not entirely in my or Mazda’s concept at all.
So I use a PC, One of several I’ve gone through over the years. My first entry into the digital world was borne out of necessity, with the advent of industrial computing (PLC’s), I wanted to know how to program one, but the Texas TI that I bought was of more use to my son than to me. Industrial computers do not rely on C type programming, which has long since become the loss of prior dos based computers, with of course the aim of silicon valley, to negate the past and start anew. Now they are hell bent on creating the New World - the machine age, we know where that leads to. Progressives welcome this, but they know not what they are doing. Progression leads ultimately to regression. - Better people than I have warned against it.
Nuff said.
Nick my friend, you are full of ■■■■. You have an inbuilt mania against any tyre other than the ones currently in your supply, so no need to push it on here. You used to be an engineer, funny how the mantle changes
I also recall you once loaded your car into a fork lift and used the tilt mechanism to invert it for an oil change, would you still do that now? I have a lot respect for you, why destroy it?
Yes, horses for courses indeed!
We only go out in our MX-5 when my wife wants to go out for a relatively civilised drive! I bought it because she doesn’t like riding in my “real fun” car, which is definitely not a Mazda (I built it). She won’t often come along because it’s definitely not civilised. At ten feet long it’s considerably smaller than an MX-5, only about 60% of the weight and has no hood, side screens or rear windscreen so you do need to consider the weather.
It rides on 145/95/16 crossply tyres and it’s supercharged. In the wet, you need to be very careful!
It sometimes spits flames, pops and bangs and you really need earplugs. I built it 16 years ago and my wife has only asked to drive it twice, both times not on public roads (but once through a river and once on a trials course).
No doubt I’ll upset some by saying that the Mazda is not as much fun!
Your OK mate as long as you don’t say the word ‘rubbish’ it a membership ban allegedly.
I fear you take things too seriously in your dotage Gerry. It’s a bit like concentrating too much on getting the radio grammar just right in those all important posts and overlooking the actual joy of having a laugh at life!
I feel your pain Gerry.
The car is the thing, and the gadgets can be a pain, but sometimes worth compromising over - if we have the choice!
I grew up with cars where the circuit diagram could be sketched out by hand from memory on a single sheet of paper, and was happy to tinker, repair, improve, customise, all as part of shoestring motoring on old bangers.
I’m an analogue person, but adapted to first stage digital, and then second stage digital, picking and choosing the bits I needed simply to remain in employment.
Four of us, as a hobby project, designed and built and introduced computing (Z80 micros and embedded hardware) to our work in 1979/1980, and saved it a fortune no longer needing to be spent on a particular range of equipment, so we were tolerated.
But then it runs away from us. There is no point in trying to keep up with everything, it is impossible, even the software one uses all the time advances daily to become unintelligible because it has more monkeys producing more unwanted “features” that we’ll never need than one can ever get to grips with, while wrecking the ones we use. So I have no social media of any kind apart from a couple of simple forums like this, but I do have a good PC (NOT running W10) to do useful stuff using old software that I know actually does what I want it to. I do not keep up with the Joneses, I’m happy to let them run away into the quicksands.
In the car on a long or boring journey I’ll have the FM radio on quietly so as to hear the RDS traffic reports and help keep me awake, or it will be a USB stick. Most of the time these days it is Radio3, but fifteen to thirty years ago commuting it was Radio2 or Radio4 depending on who the talent behind the microphone was - several names to avoid, several worth catching. No longer.
In the pool yesterday we were subjected to Capital radio, but it was MOBO mumbling doggerel sometimes relieved by some agonised female wailing in the background; it all sounded the same for two hours, a loop? Fortunately my ears were under water for much of the time, so I escaped most of it. It is no wonder I don’t listen to much radio.
I spent my working life improving audio and picture quality on TV and radio, and the advent of digital was utterly fantastic; at source the quality is unbelievably good, and being digital it survives editing and effects much better than the old analogue systems did. However when broadcast it is now wrecked in so many ways to squeeze several gallons into pint pots through a straw using lossy heavy compression, and it has forced on us far too many unacceptable compromises.
Motoring is going the same way with all the auto functions on the new cars. They are fine for the unthinking, but also often stupid in the implementation. For example there is an option to turn off the automatic function on the lights, and drivers often forget their headlights at night, DRLs only and no rear lights. The auto system should either not be there at all or always there, no options for idiots to muck it up. Then there is the Stop-Start; five doors down lives a great big lovingly polished four-year-old bells and whistles full-spec automatic Audi SUV with the function and it has major problems with the battery always going flat because it only ever does journeys just long enough in heavy traffic on congested roads to enable the S/S but not enough to recharge the battery from so many restarts, simply stupid. The AA home-start van seems to be there every other month.
My NC is my escape to sanity, it allows me the illusion of simple motoring, where I have to use my brain.
Saying something “is not as much fun” is worlds apart from saying something is “rubbish”. I would say that the Fiata 124 possibly “is not as much fun” as the ND but I would never say that the 124 is “rubbish”. Also doesn’t the 124 have the same “stupid” roof as the MX5 ND.
I really don’t understand why people want to be a part of this forum if all they can do is criticize the MX5 whichever mark it is. As Gerryn said, this forum should be about why we own and enjoy our cars and to garner advice on technical problems etc, not to tell people they are lacking in wisdom as to their choice of NA, NB, NB and ND which are all a wonderful alternative to the generally joyless offerings from most manufacturers nowadays.
Here’s the wiring diag for a Series 2A Landrover, mine was a 1965 model
Here’s the landy
Respectfully, I think you’ve taken Pauls comments the wrong way, I can understand what he’s saying, his FUN car is a pocket rocket, and he’s proud of it. That his other half refuses to go out in it does’ not surprise me, my wife hates my car, and refuses flatly to go anywhere in it. In it’s own way, that’s a bonus, as the car is a lot quieter without her. I don’t think he intends to be critical of an MX5, he just views it differently than most of us with either no other, or one other car to get around in. - He has more.
I went (in the Five) to the Classic show at Donny several years ago, found a pre-war Austin 7, with the bonnet open, and comparing mine to it was the difference between prime simplicity and a plateful of spaghetti. Car wiring was so simple to navigate in those day and big spaces all round the engine other than my bonnet full. My Mazda wiring manual has 104 pages, easy enough to figure it out, but just reveals how complex it really is. The '63 MGB I owned for a while was a lot simpler. (leaky as hell, but simpler!)
Bet a new Landrover is even worse. (When they restart building them anyway - - - - -)
Ah well, the Mini circuit shares several features, I posted it during a similar thread
https://www.mx5oc.co.uk/forum/yaf_postsm695433_Most-useless-feature.aspx#post695433
Gerry’s correct. My MX-5 (one of the first NBs) has it’s place in our family. I like it a lot, but the driving experience is not as much fun as my other car. Arguably, the NB is safer and very much more comfortable (my wife s totally sure of that).
The thread is about the raw driving experience without being troubled by modern encumbrances (or conveniences, depending on your personal viewpoint). My other car is more raw than an MX-5, and for me, more fun for exactly that reason.
I also have a couple of motorbikes. The “newer” one (albeit 27 years old now) is a Honda CB750 and it’s great. Very smooth, very quiet, very reliable. My other bike is a Royal Enfield 350. It’s totally basic, it’s noisy, it vibrates like hell and it doesn’t have an electric starter so I have to kickstart it (not so easy now I’m not so young). Yet I ride it far more often than the Honda.
Richard- you are in tune with me more than I figured, hence your fist sentence - “I feel your pain”. I admit it, it’s a post of nostalgia really, but still relevant to everyday posts. I’m on the lookout for NB/NBFL problems, and there are few to answer. Space being taken up by new owners with what to me are pointless queries, as I’m no technophile. Hence the rant. Reminiscent of my past experience on the Yahoo group, which was where I gradually learned more about the car, though mainly the NA, as few NB;s were around then. You live and learn.
From forum stats, active discussions:
Seems a good mix of topics. The forum is intended to be more than just a discussion of the latest break down from owners.