Miata door handles

[JHunter]

Yup, got my passenger side door done. I was a bit nervous cutting into my newish door skin, but I think it turned out pretty decent. Hate that they're from a Miata, but love how they look. I cut off the Miata key hole and will fill in the little divot on the rear end later. I've sand blasted them to remove the chrome, and they'll eventually be painted body color.













It opens easier than it looks, you just can't think about it. If you try to open it like a beer can (putting your other fingers on the door) its a bear. If you just pull on the handle like its a drawer, it opens right up. It's more of an arm movement than a finger movement.

[Todd in Vancouver]

Looking good, I really like how they fit. How were they for hooking up to the door the mechanism inside the door?

[JHunter]

Thanks. Not to bad after some trial and error. I ended up remaking the stock cam lever so that one of the arms was longer and reused the Miata rods after shortening them. Cutting the Miata lock off helped as well because I was able to get the cam/arm closer (to the rear of the door) to the original latch. I'll post some inside pics when I get back to the house.

[JHunter]

Here's a not-so-great picture of the inside. To the right side you can see the linkage from the Miata that I connected to the original mechanism. The gray cam that it connects to (via 1/4 button head screw) is what I made. I'll post pictures of the driver side mechanism before I mount it. I had to cut off the 'ear' that the original handle contacts for clearance.

[DreKoushRanada]

That's a great alternative to paying close to $500-$700 for the kin-dig-it handles I was looking at. What year Miata did you get them from and was it a scrap yard find?

[JHunter]

DreKoush - Sorry, for some reason I didn't get the notification that you posted on here. Its from the first generation of Mazda Miata MK5 - from 1990 to '98.

So I decided I didn't like how the panel fit around the door handle. What I had originally done was after cutting off the Mazda key hole, I cut down the portion of the Miata door to fit the new, shorter handle. It worked ok, but left a little slop around the edges. It fit as good as the original handle fit on the Miata, but it wasn't symmetrical. By that I mean the front and trail end of the handle where it fit into the door had more of the bevel showing, and fit closer on the top and bottom edge. I won't bore you with a bunch of text, but below are some photos of how I fixed that - in short, I made a "stamp" to make a new recess for the door handle to fit into with the right amount (equal) space around the entire circumference of the door handle. Still have some finishing work to do, but thought I'd share.






22ga metal ready to be pressed. Holes drilled to locate on the die, cut between holes to allow the metal to 'move' easier - you'll see how much it stretches in later pictures.








Pressed - you can see how the metal deforms







After initial "re-flattening"


Using a dulled chisel to clean up the edges, and get a closer fit around the handle.


You can see how much the center has spread, the gap was originally cut by a body saw. If you don't cut that relief cut, the metal has a harder time stretching, and will deform the perimeter a bit more.


More smoothing to do



Backside, trimmed so the handle fits, but leaves enough room for the gasket to seal.


Still some body work to be done obviously-


Not real exciting, but you get the idea.


And the inside, even less exciting - but it shows the original door lock mechanism, and how I tied in the Miata handle to it. What I had to do was create the cam to turn the horizontal movement of the original handle into a pulling action needed to tie into the Camaro's original door latch. Don't mind the welding marks - it still needs to be cleaned up ;-)

[DreKoushRanada]

Now that is some damn good work! Great attention to detail my friend and thanks for the info.

[Todd in Vancouver]

Very impressive work. Now that you have it all worked out and perfected how soon till you start selling kits for us to install at home ! Do I hear a $49.95...

[JHunter]

Thanks guys - I think this is why my project is still dragging on after 10 years. I've never met a rabbit-hole I didn't explore lol!

[DreKoushRanada]

I'm with Todd on this one! ha-ha... Plus that will save me a load of time!

[JHunter]

Well my delay wiper switch business has stalled a bit lately, maybe I can do mail order Miata handles lol. It's not to difficult really, it just takes some trial and lots of error lol. I was a bit nervous when I cut open the door not knowing for sure if the linkage would work lol. I'm still undecided on keeping the original Camaro key hole or welding over that and trusting that the battery on my remote door lock key fob holds up. When it comes time for paint (whenever that day finally comes) I plan on painting or preferably powder-coating the door handles black (to match the paint). I had to use a bit of JB Weld to fill in the small divot left from the Miata's key hole, and I'm not sure if that will powder coat well.

Thanks for yalls comments, it gives me the motivation to keep working, and after 10 years of this project I need the motivation lol.

[snappytravis]

Miata, man that's a tough one, Looks awesome, Can't bring myself to cut up new door skins.

[Franco]

are you selling this kits?
I like your job here very impresive
the sheet metal press is very unique
at least can I buy from you four
pieces of the sheet metal pressed,
for this miata handles.....

[JHunter]

Franco - Thanks for the kind words. I'm not really selling anything, just sharing my idea. The problem with stamping out the sheet-metal is that it has to tweaked after the initial pressing to match the door handle. In other words, it doesn't come out of the press perfect. If I pressed out some blanks for you, you'd have to do a lot of work fine tuning the fit around the handle with a dull chisel or something similar. Also, the key hole has to be cut off (at least that's what I chose to do) so you'd have to reshape that end of the handle to fit the sheet-metal form. Then there's the issue of all the linkage modifications and coming up with a gasket to seal the handle to the door. If you lived next door, I'd gladly make you up a set and work through the fine tuning, but I think you'd get these pieces in the mail and be cussing me out with the amount of work you'd have to do lol.