Is my mx5 dieing?!

[Tombowern123]

Hi All
I have had my 2003 1.8 mx5 for about 6 months now and as of recent has started doing the below things

When under 3k revs it makes a horrendous noise somewhere between a rattle and a grinding sound, it will do it worst when in 3rd/4th at about 2.7k revs

When coming to an idle after driving it will droop and occasionally stall

Anyone have an idea?

[Joeigglypuff]

Not sure about the rattle, but my 1.8 '99 NB has the idle droop problem. I've tried changing MAF sensor, crank and cam sensors, and made sure all vacuum hoses are sealed but nothing has fixed it. I've been running it for about 6 months now though and there's no sign of it being a serious problem more than an annoyance. That said it won't stall like you say yours will - even still I wouldn't say that's a sign of death!

When I took it in to a specialist they found emissions were all over the place and so I need to replace my CAT for the MOT. Garage reckons that might fix the idle too, booked in next week so will have to wait and see.

[Beati Dogu]

Tombowern123 said:

Anyone have an idea?

I take it there's no engine warning light on the dash?

What sort of mileage has it done now?

[Tombowern123]

It is more the rattle that is worrying me as its very very loud, it has done 118,000 miles

Warning light is intermittently on but orange not red

[Beati Dogu]

Can you get someone to press the accelerator for you while you try to locate the noise?

[Rickyy]

Sounds like it could be an exhaust heatshield rattling, I've had several cars that do this and strangely all did it around 3k RPM! Not a major issue if it is.

Idle droop is a strange one, my MK1 1.8 does it after long periods of being parked up, it fixes itself after a while though, so can't really help there!