Finally Custom Plates on my MX-5

When you live in a country with a small population, getting unique things which mean something to you is easier. So here I was with an MX-5 and I knew I wanted some custom number plates with my lucky number on them. Fortunately VicRoads has a special program Vplates which allows you to select registration plates of your choice and they ship them to you. The options I was after were my initials and lucky number and I got exactly what I wanted!

The process of ordering was quite easy, and the plates came in a week later. The treatment from vicroads is royal! The plates came in a nice case, with a certificate of authenticity, and a nice keyring.

The  keyring said 'signature plates' on one side and had a random number on the other side. My understanding was this number should be my registration number (same as plates), however after several calls vicroads confirmed, that is only done for the heritage plates (not signature plates).

The difficult bit began when I realized the plates wouldn't fit my MX5. Once assigned, you have to immediately have the plates on the car. Now unlike India, labor isn't cheap here in Australia, so I couldn't just run out to someone to fix the plates for me. The plates come in a protective frame with a mounting bracket and vicroads advised its best not take the plates out of the protective frame for obvious reasons. So finally after exhausting various options like trying myself, going to a local mechanic (who suggested drilling holes!), went to my mazda dealer and they agreed to modify the plates to fit the car during my first 1000kms service.

So the servicing is done today and the plates fixed (cost 80 dollars) and here are some more pics!

Shots of the interiors

Lorne Run(in)

Had been itching for this for a long time. A long drive on the twisties in my new MX-5. With my first car service coming in a few days, this was the last weekend I could do a proper run-in of the MX-5 and get to 1000kms on the odo before given her in for servicing.

The day started early at 8am - needed to goto Crossfit Victoria for a quick workout before I hit the road. By around 10am, I couldn't wait to get out of crossfit class and hit the road. First things first, fired up navigation on my trusty google nexus one and headed to the closest BP fuel station to fill up on some RON 98 petrol.

After filling her up, I got the mood going with a frank sinatra station on Pandora radio and pointed google navigation to Lorne. 150kms is not a lot but already cloudy and with heavy rains predicted, I knew I was headed for some tough bits.

And the tough bits came, heavy blinding rain for quite a few kms while I was on the westgate-princess freeway. Couldn't see a thing, with the downpour as well as the spray coming from all the bigger SUVs passing me by. Strange thoughts passed my mind as this was my first time in a rear wheel drive in crazy wet conditions. Checked to make sure stability control was on! Stuck to 90kmph and kept going in my lane and then it finally cleared up. The road even started to dry up by the time I got to the Geelong Ring road and then I hit the twisties on Angelsea and Great Ocean Road. The MX-5 lapped up everything the roads threw at her without having to slow down anywhere. Its amazing how a front engined rear wheel drive handles on these roads - you won't know it till you drive one. The 50:50 weight ratio, the smooth acceleration and braking and precise handling makes MX5s a joy to drive on the twisties - these are things I had only heard, but here I was cushioned inside of one, experiencing the same while listening to some soothing music from her bose audio system. There is a distinct hum inside the cabin from the engine and tire sounds which cannot be drowned unless the music is very loud. Roll down the windows and the chaos of the wind trying to get in makes you realize how fast you really are going.

Ofcourse,  I knew this was a running-in drive, so at the freeway even at 100kmph was playing with 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th gears to have patches of driving at various rpms between 2k to 5k. But there was some good fun to be had once I hit great ocean road, was always changing gears up and down to keep the revs going all over the place.  Every few minutes, I went down to 3rd or 2nd and spent a few secs all the way up at 5000rpm (way below max revs zone) and saw some real potential in her basic 2L 158BHP 188Nm engine. Felt some g-forces on the spiraling B roads and enjoyed some great views of the waves hitting the beaches. Only had one stop at this beautiful nursery/cafe in anglesea for a hot chocolate and finally reached Lorne at around 1pm. Parked and walked around and took some pics.

Post workout hunger was creeping in, so looked up ratings of the local restaurants on google places and found a highly rated place called Bottle of Milk . The awesome weather and thought of food, ended up having the BOM burger

It was 2pm by the time I relished the awesome burger (skipped my no bread paleo rules this once!). A shot of my baby before we hit the road again

Quick stop-over at Shell in Lorne to get some more RON 98 fuel for the MX-5 and she was doing great at 9L/100km (11kmpL) even with all my antics! The drive back was more fun, maybe I knew the roads now, maybe I knew my MX-5 better now. I hugged as many corners as I could, and when the B roads ended, I felt like turning and going back to Lorne! Aah well I will come back again soon. Was back home before 430pm, in time for some Saturday evening fun with my good friends!
With the 300km drive running in was now done (1006kms on odo)  and I had a great drive in almost perfect weather on the awesome great ocean roads. All in all a great day and I believe now I know why Jeremy Clarkson said this about the MX-5
"The fact is that if you want a sports car, the MX-5 is perfect. Nothing on the road will give you better value. Nothing will give you so much fun. The only reason I’m giving it five stars is because I can’t give it 14."

journey to my sports car

As a kid, I was always fascinated by cars, especially the sporty kinds. I had all the hot wheels and matchbox cars in my collection. Infact my grandma once said, I will grow up and become a driver! Well in those days computers weren't a big thing :-) but thats where I ended, like most people of our generation

The addiction for cars, got me hooked to all things cars - formula 1, top gear, fifth gear, etc :-)

I had some experience driving dad's maruti suzuki 800 and fiat premier padmini in my engineering days and ended up owning a hyundai santro while working in Bangalore. A rather unlikely car to modify, but I managed to get a a nice CAI (cold air intake) and FFE (free flow exhaust) on the santro and even a few track days. I did seriously think of a ford fiesta sport or mitsubishi lancer in those days, but knew very well anything more exotic (hell even a mitsubishi evo X) would just be a dream given the crazy import duties in India. Held on to that dream as I knew one day my time will come.

The time came in sep 2010 when I moved to the land down under and although in aussie-land good sporty cars are 2-3 times as much as they cost in US/UK, I knew I was close to getting one. Infact the day I got my residency visa, I was already checking out websites to understand what can be had in aussie-land. I even had a thread http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/luxury-imports-niche/89307-sporty-car-40k-80k-aussie-dollars.html hinting there was a friend moving to australia, when it was actually me. Got some good suggestions then.

Things didn't come easy though. Frequent work travel kept me from getting my driving license in australia. There was no direct conversion for an indian license (understandable), so had to go through 2 computerized tests (learners and hazard perception) and some driving lessons, before even being eligible for a drive test. After an agonisingly long wait, finally got to giving my drive test and passing it first attempt in sep 2011. The night before the drive test I was back to searching for cars, and infact even during the driving test I was thinking – I can't believe this is it, I am passing today and getting a car soon!

The test was passed on a friday (23^rd sep 2011) and I was already doing test drives on saturday and sunday with just a drive test result in my hand (license hadn't even shipped from vic roads). There were so many options – lotus elise, mazda mx5, rx8, holden/ford performance cars, mitsubisi evo X, subaru wrx sti, golf r, nissan 370z, audi tt, etc.

Given that I follow road rules and there are strong road rules here, I knew anything very high on power would just be pointless. But I did wan't something fun to drive, which would mean a rear wheel drive. That narrowed it down to lotus elise, mazda mx5 and rx8. I figured the elise was barely in stock, impractical as a daily driver (it rains a lot here) and slightly over my budget. RX8 was out due to its awesome yet impractical engine and only marginally useful claustrophobic rear seats with almost no leg room.

That was it the decision was simple, it had to be the MX5 – no tons of power to sort you out, just a modest 2 litre 167bhp, rear wheel drive, 50:50 weight distribution for lots of fun on the twisties while still staying legal on speeds. A great track car, but also add to that creature comforts like stability/traction control for wet days, power retractable hard top for occasional top down fun and 7 speaker bose sound system. I don't need more than 2 seats at the moment and the boot is big enough for weekend shopping from the farmers market!

In under a week of passing my drive test, I had my finances sorted out, jumped some hoops to get a loan (due to no previous borrowing history), negotiated a cool 10% off the recommended retail price to end up in a brand new aluminium silver coloured Mazda MX5 Special Edition ( MX5 Special Edition ). There are only 200 speciial editions made with some nice bilstein shocks, cool alloys and grey leather insides. I chose one of the only ones available at a dealer next door and it was driven only 26kms, out of which 6kms were driven by me during the test drive.

The car is loads of fun, still running in, but I am enjoying every bit of it. Here are some pics I took on the morning after delivery