What to look out for?

[H18 ENF]

Hi All,

I'm pretty certain that I've made a decision that I'm going to take my £1000 and purchase an MX5...

Ideally looking at the Roadster, so am aware that I'm looking (probably) at a 100k mileage MK1. I've seen a few and have worked out where the common problems seem to be - torn hoods, rusting around the arches but want to be sure that I'm not missing a trick and that actually they suffer from something mechanical that I haven't yet picked up on.

Also, with regards to rust what would be a typical price for a repair job on them I know that that is a bit of a piece of string question, but being sensible about it, I'm not likely to go for something riddled with holes, but a small patch of rust on an arch - what would that set me back? Any ideas?

Cheers!

Ben

[attym3]

I'd say rust is your biggest enemy. On mk1s the sills seem to go more than the wheelarches. Check where they meet the rear wheelarch as this is the worst part. Tbh from what I've seen imports don't suffer as bad as UK cars. It's also nice to see a bill for underseal/rust protection when it was imported.

HTH

Mark

[skinny]

as long as it drives nice and tight with no funny noises, then all you need to look for is a decent hood, and rust.

worst case, you can factor in up to around £800 for a full cutting out sills, repair, and re-spray.

[LukeSi]

skinny said:

as long as it drives nice and tight with no funny noises, then all you need to look for is a decent hood, and rust.

worst case, you can factor in up to around £800 for a full cutting out sills, repair, and re-spray.

And don't forget that is as far as I know one of the biggest bills that they can throw up. You can get engines for less than half of that figure and being a popular car they are a dime a dozen.