Click on picture to enlarge

Mark's car at the Laguna Seca racetrack 
Beach weekend in Monterey

Look for the following build article 
in the Southern California Miata Club magazine!


Italia 038 for Mark Anthenien
by Jim Simpson

     Several months ago, I received a series of email queries about the Italia and what is involved in building one or having one built. I get a few of these every week so I don't get too excited about them. Until this year, they have rarely come from existing Miata owners. Perhaps it's because the cars are getting older and the owners looking for a fresh way to enjoy them, particularly if they have had owned them for some years. 

     This email is typical with the notable exception that the sender has apparently been aware of the Italia conversion almost from its original release. I email him the information he asks for and we speak a couple of times on the phone but I don't think much more of it. Then, quite unexpectedly, a check and order form arrive in the mail and a few days later so does the car. Evidently this nice gentleman from San Jose is a serious car guy!

     The transporter is late and phones to say he will be arriving fairly late in the evening so I board the ferry from Whidbey Island to meet him at the Mukilteo dock. There I stand out in the cold with not nearly enough clothing for a typically rainy, windy Puget Sound winter evening, waiting to pick up what I expect will be a fairly ragged 1990 Miata with all the miles and not much else to recommend it.

     The trucker finally appears. He is quick to let me know this is no ordinary Miata. I grin as I watch him back it off the top of the transporter. He's right. It's been lowered and has special and rather expensive road wheels, not the usual cheap aftermarket wheels that tend to adorn older cars. It has a rather distinctive growl as well.

     After a quick walk around, I rush my freezing tail into the car to get in position to reboard the ferry. By this point, the car has been running long enough to warm up considerably. As I climb into the leather-clad interior, I note the very heavy clutch pedal. I ease off the clutch and give out a bit of gas, realizing the car also has a light flywheel. Suddenly the turbo springs to life and the rear end comes around as I launch out of the parking lot somewhat sideways. Indeed, things are not always what they seem. Aboard the ferry, I put the hood up to find another surprise - this car is blown with one of Corky Bell and Bill Cardell’s wonderful early turbo set ups. As I sit in the car onboard the ferry I’m reminded of the many years I’ve owned and worked on Ferraris, something this little displacement sports car seems more akin to. One thing is for certain - this is much faster than any of the Miatas in my stable. I wait eagerly to get to shore and head up the hill to see what this thing is all about.

     I worm my way up through the pack of cars coming off the ferry to get a clear lane before rolling into the throttle. The car rewards me, running through rpms and gears quickly. No problem here - the car doubles the speed limit without trying hard. Oh, yeah, did I forget the 6-speed gearbox just for good measure? - hmmm, not your average car or client here.

     Time to back down to sub-light speed, and cool the warp nacelles. Still trying to straighten the kinks out of my neck from the g force, I call Mark the next morning and compliment him on a wonderful car.

The transformation begins…

     Several hours later I have the front fenders, bumper cover, reinforcement, headlight assemblies and hood removed from the car. Then I move on to the rear body to strip off the rear bumper cover lights, rear panel and trunk lid, leaving a pretty grim looking car. Having been through the process many times, I know that we will remove the interior and top as well as all the rubber around the doors and all the small chrome bits, door handles and top mounting brackets and posts.

     Now for some new bodywork. I get fellow designer and enthusiast Dale to help me set the front and rear body in place and start drilling holes and fitting gaps and edges. It's all going easily until we realize that the front body will not clear the air cleaner assembly. Oops. Well, time to have a cup of coffee and think about this one for a while.

     Guess we'll fit up the rear body and see what that holds in store. Hmmm, what a nice exhaust, all polished stainless steel with twin outlet tips. Think we'll pull that off and get it out of the way until the rear body is mounted, then put it back on and cut the openings for the exhaust tips. Already I can tell this is going to be a special car. Not that other Italias are not but very few people go the extra mile, let alone the extra ten miles this man has gone.

     With the rear body fitted, it's time to do the metal prep and the structural bond. Sure getting cold here. I'm not happy about the prospect of the severe cold and the effect it will have on the epoxy curing. Think we'll wait until it warms up a bit and, in the meantime, concentrate on the front end.

     Still scratching my head over what to do with the air cleaner, I start measuring and trying to figure if it is possible to move it to another location. This turns out not to be a feasible idea. Further inspection and a little calculation yields an answer. As it turns out the early air box assemblies on the Bell Cardell setup was a pretty thick aluminum casting. The solution is to cut out a diagonal path through the top of the air box, not a bad solution as it would also guarantee more air getting in the air box with less resistance. So about an hour later, the air box has been set up in my vertical mill and a nice path milled through the casting ending the clearance problem. Smooth sailing from here.

     Several hours later, the rough body fit-up is complete in the front. The hood is bolted in place and it's time to again address the rear body. The weather has given us a break and it is a bit warmer so I proceed to bond the rear body in place and fit the trunk lid.

     With the body fitted, it's time for bodywork using very dense premium body filler. Days of blocking follow and then it's time to prime. Car is looking good. The doors have to lose the Mazda character line down the middle - a little filler and more hours of block sanding by hand with a straight board. Time for another couple of coats of Urethane primer. At this stage in the bodywork, it is time for guide coating and wet blocking, then off to the paint store.

     Mark and I converse many times at this point about color and he determines that a medium metallic blue is in order for his new look - he's tired of red. We both like the metallic blue that Dodge had used on the Neon a couple of years earlier. So that's decided, or so we think. I head over to the mainland to look up the paint code at our local paint and body supplier, who also mixes PPG paints.

     Looking at paint samples is kind of like going to the grocery store when you’re starving - you find lots of distractions. This time, however, is a bit different - the only distraction in the paint book is 3 color chips over from the Neon blue. Yep, you guessed it - Viper GTS blue. Close to the Neon color but much more spectacular. I don't hesitate. I figure I'll tell Mark about the color change when I get back to the shop and if he doesn't approve, what the heck, I'll use it on my next Italia.

     I order up the paint and while waiting for it to be mixed, I pick out a PPG high solids clear to go over the Viper blue base coat and lots of tape and masking paper to go along with it. For those of you who have never painted a car and do not know paint prices, it can definitely cause your mind to reel. Quality materials are worth the extra expense and now is certainly not the time to be cheap.

     Returning to the shop, I ring Mark up and relay to him my executive decision and he immediately gives his blessing. Several days later the car is sporting its new color and clear - WOW! Viper blue is a bit more intense than the blue on my wife’s 10 AE Miata, particularly in direct sunlight.

     Time now to install a new windshield and replace the one with rock chips. We order a new windshield with a shaded band across the top, and have it skillfully installed by the technicians at South Whidbey Auto Glass.

     Back in the shop a few hours later, we begin making and installing the new egg-crate grill, a feature more familiar on Ferraris than Miatas. We'd had a customer's Ferrari 330 GTC in the shop a month earlier and had measured the grill bar spacing. I figure if it looked great on a Ferrari, it will look great on our Italia.

     Interestingly enough, when you make a perfectly flat part and install it on a car it gives the optical illusion of being concave. I've seen this on many aftermarket grilles on stock Miatas and I didn't want this effect so I designed the grille with a radius across the face. It took hours of setup and machine time to produce the aluminum bars and stagger the vertical bars to keep them at 90 degrees to the centerline of the car. I now know why all those after market grill makers make flat grilles - it is much less labor intensive.

     At this point I have more hours involved than I've spent on any Italia to date. I'm on a quest, sure that such a grille could be standardized and put into production, a notion that leads to many more hours of development. Who am I kidding? My self, as usual, but the grill does come together and, when finished, looks impressive.

     A few more details on the interior and an installation of one of our newly developed 6 speed short shifters, a little bonus for a patient customer, and the car is complete. Time to do a final clean and go home. Mark is to fly in at noon the next day.

     We're famous for two forecasts in the Pacific Northwest - summer sun and winter rain. The weather does clear in the winter at intervals but it's viewed as unpredictable so it's not usually in the forecast. Being a weatherman here is an easy gig with few expectations.

     As I head to bed, it's raining to beat all rainstorms. I can only think how unrewarding it's going to be driving to the south side of Seattle in this little rocket ship in the rain. Next morning, the weatherman is wrong again - the sun is shining and the world is good. Mark calls and informs me that he will be on an earlier flight.

     A last quick wipe down and I'm off to the airport. On my way into Seattle, a guy in his top down Candy Apple Red Corvette C-5 is feeling his oats. Never have I driven a 1600 cc Miata that goes like this thing does. As Flip Wilson used to say, "The devil made me do it." I lit the wick and fairly ruined the proud Corvette owner's day. If he'd known that that unidentifiable little car was a Miata, I am sure that he would have gone back to the dealership to tell them something was seriously wrong with his Corvette.

     Being the thoughtful guy he is, Mark had suggested meeting me at passenger pickup so I wouldn't have to go into the terminal to get him. It certainly makes it much easier to pick out this man I had never seen. Ah, yes, he'd be the one standing there at the curb with the large grin. And that is any stylist's biggest reward. I was rewarded with an extra big smile when I related the story of the Red Corvette to Mark, his comment was simple and to the point, "good".

     The next Italia we produce will be #40. One of the nicest things about building these cars is the interesting and amazing people I get to meet. They have each decided they have to own one and they are even more amazing than the creation that they help to shape. I love my job.