Junkyard Gem: 1992 Mazda MX-5 Miata

The Mazda MX-5 Miata has been with us for nearly 35 years now, giving the world what it had lacked for so long: a two-seat convertible that was just as affordable and fun as the MGB or Fiat 124 Sport Spider had been… but without the horrid reliability and leaky tops of those cars. Intact Miatas haven’t been easy to find in the car graveyards I frequent, because worn-out ones tend to end up in the hands of racers before they can reach your local Ewe Pullet. I run across plenty of picked-clean and/or crashed-beyond-recognition Miatas during my junkyard travels, but today’s ’92 in a Denver self-service yard is unusually complete and un-smashed.

It’s clear from the toasted top that this car spent many years parked beneath the fierce High Plains sun.

The odometer shows nearly 225k miles. I think this car spent a couple of decades as a reliable daily commuter, then got parked in a driveway or yard when something broke.

If you’re looking for a Miata differential in the junkyard, an automatic-equipped car is your best bet for a not-so-thrashed one. This car has the five-speed manual, like nearly all early MX-5s, but some racer is certain to buy the diff anyway.

This 1.6-liter DOHC four-cylinder made 116 horsepower and 100 pound-feet. Members of this engine family went under the hoods of everything from Ford Escorts to Kia Rios.

Junkyard employees couldn’t get the trunk open quickly enough, so a bit of force had to be applied.

This sticker tells us the car (probably) was running in 2012, when Colorado voters said “yes” to Amendment 64 and made this the first state with legal recreational cannabis.

For the first few years after that, the influx of annoying cannabis tourists grated on the nerves of many locals. Now that 23 states have legal recreational weed, I don’t see as many angry messages like this on junkyard cars. Every junkyard is a history lesson, if you know where to look.

Perhaps so many racers are switching to Spec Land Yacht these days that we’ll soon have a flood of Miatas into junkyards.

The MSRP for a 1992 MX-5 was $14,200, or about $31,373 in 2023 dollars. 20 years earlier, the inflation-adjusted price for a new MGB roadster had been just $24,646. However, the price of a new 2023 Miata starts at $28,050, so it’s both faster and cheaper than it was 21 years ago.

If you like the Miata, you’ll love the MX-3 and 929!

Diners were popular. Style was in style. And Mazda introduced the Miata.

In its homeland, this car was known as the Eunos Roadster.

Mazda had plans to bring the Eunos brand to North America, as a competitor for Acura, Infiniti and Lexus, but that never happened.