Hello!
New owner of a low mileage 07’ NC1, after looking at them for years and years.
Delighted it doesn’t have rust on the underside or wheel arches, or in the boot. All the drains work. And mechanics all seem in a good state. It was lowered by a previous owner with Eibachs and has yellow Bilstein dampers but no invoices for these so I don’t know exactly which. It is quite low and grounds quite a bit on speed bumps (painful) so I’d assume c30mm.
She had a leak in the passenger foot-well when I got it, but I fixed that with replacement cowl plugs for the screws. And got rid of about 98% of the mildew smell with enzyme cleaner. It passed its MOT with no advisories and I’m about to get a major service.
Rattle
One thing I could do with some help on is a vibration coming from the roof or rear. The roof was replaced by a previous owner in 2020, so it’s in very good condition. When it’s up, there is a loud vibration at lower revs, the car did have an IL motorsport cat back exhaust, so its the resonation from that that’s causing a vibration but the noise in the cabin is really distracting and irritating.
I’ve checked the catch in the centre for locking the roof in, that is quite loose but if you hold it so it can’t rattle it doesn’t stop the noise, so not that. It’s hard to troubleshoot whilst I’m driving for obvious reasons. It does sound like its coming from the roof, maybe one of the bars?
I’ve included a clip here, perhaps it’s a familiar sound to others / common problem? Suggestions of what to look for?
Thanks in advance,
Rowdy
The parcel tray, a plastic shell behind the seats, is also a common source of rattles, especially with modified exhausts.
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On my first canvass MX5 I had a similar rattle and eventually traced it to the rear plastics behind the seat. I took out the full plastic cover, behind that is the plastic bay for the storage, the feet on this bay were touching the metal directly and could move about, so I added rubber pads on all contact areas, sponge on all the plastic panel overlaps, put it all back in & silence.
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That sounds like it is worth exploring @Olaup although, odd that mine doesn’t rattle when the roof is down.
@richardn is there anything that can be done to the rear shelf to eliminate it?
Exactly what mine used to do. I’ve never got around to taking it all apart but i put some foam draft excluder in between the vertical panel directly behind the seats and the horizontal shelf below it. Stopped the rattle straight away. One day I’ll take it all out and do something more permanent.
Take it out and put foam underneath it
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That was fixed way easier than I thought it would be.
I bought some 15mm x 13mm x 1m foam pipe insulation and side it over the end of the shelf and it’s totally stopped.
Cost 94p from Screwfix and I didn’t have to take anything apart or use any tools (apart from a knife and a tape measure) 
The only thing I don’t like is the colour, I’ll see if I can find some black.
The long section is 20 inch and the smaller section is 7 inch. Just slotted over the edge, no adhesive.
The roof can still fold down but slightly snugger fit.
I’m so chuffed with this, I’ve a long journey at the weekend and was dreading it with that noise it really grates after a while. And no noise at all now.
Thanks for your help all!
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The only other thing that might be worth doing is putting a warm iron over it with a towel to flatten it down a bit.
If you cut the foam so that it only fits between the panels and not above the panels then your roof should clip down easier.
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