Hi, I’ve been under my 3.5 today cleaning and rust proofing ( yes I know, I should have been out driving it in the sunshine ) and came across some captive nuts on the cross member behind the engine undertray and the cross member under the gearbox. They look as though they may be there to hold another undertray further back from the one under the engine. Does anyone know if I’m missing this undertray or is it just some redundant captive nuts that are not used?
Sometimes I think I really must get out more.
Thanks.
Sorry the pictures below are not very good but they are all I could get given the limited space. They are on both sides by the way.
If I remember some cars did not come with all the undercovers others did.
On the other hand it is well know for people to remove the under covers to do a job and they are two idle to replace the covers when the job is complete.
Yes. There are two, one each side of the wider cross-member. One under the bell housing with a trapdoor to get to the slave cylinder and rear wishbone adjuster, one under the gearbox with a neat hole for access to the drain plug.
Thanks Eddie, and Richard for your answers. Having read your answers I spent some time on the interweb and it seems unclear as to which cars had these fitted. Some sites seem to say it’s area specific ( USA, Canada, Europe ) other say it’s transmission related ( manual, auto, LSD ) but no definitive answers.
I’ve just been crawling under the car again and it seems to me that this cover would have to be removed to change the oil filter, so if it was fitted from new, who’s to say it was not removed by the garage doing the service ( as per Drumtochtys comment above ). ( Another reason for doing your own services in my opinion )
Out of interest, any chance any of you MK3/MK3.5 owners out there could take a look under their cars and see what percentage of them have this cover fitted. I would be really interested to know.
Many thanks again all.
Dave.
Hi Dave, here’s a picture of the various under trays on an NC1 2 litre. The one to come off for the oil change is on the far right, witness the spillage on the crossmember. Your missing pair are centre and left.
Excellent, thanks again Richard, and complements on your photographic skills.
Yes that shows exactly what I’m talking about, and it seems I’m missing the two covers not just the one.
So the next question is, can these be purchased? I looked through MX5 Parts but couldn’t find anything. The online parts catalogues seem mainly American orientated but still very unclear. I may take a trip to my local Mazda dealer and ask in there, but after my last experiance I don’t think I’d have much luck. I guess the other thing is am I worrying unnecessarily, but being a bit of a perfectionist, if they are available I would like to fit them. Any of you guys that deal with second hand parts have any?
I’d still be interested to hear from other Mk3 owners to know if they have these fitted.
Many thanks.
Dave.
Full set fitted, but to be frank they are so flimsy they offer little or no protection and certainly don’t provide any chassis stiffening. Biscuit tin springs to mind…
Many thanks for resurrecting this post. Interesting. I see Mac5 notes the two rear shields are flimsy. As the one under the engine is very substantial, I thought they may provide some stiffening, but it appears not. From the various comments they seem almost optional for some models!
I don’t think any of the three stiffen the car, but they might help smooth the airflow slightly and keep some of the carp off the gearbox and cat. Only the gearbox one is metal.
