2003 MX5 gearlever wobbling when pulling away

[Busa_Rush]

The initial message was deleted from this topic on 16 March 2012 at 00:13

[MX-5 Lazza]

There is a known clutch-judder problem with cars from 2001 to about 2004 but that doesn't come through as the gear lever wobbling around so much as the whole car juddering up the road on take-off.

I don't want to make any assumptions about her driving style but is she driving it properly? i.e. is she driving it like a diesel using low revs to pull away? Does it do the same thing pulling away using more revs? I don't think I'd ever use less than, say, 2000rpm...

[Combover]

Mine has the clutch judder as the previous owner didn't think it bad enough to have it changed at Mazda's expense.

The first thing to note is that Mazda themselves didn't know what caused it. There were various 'fixes' tried but to no avail.

As it was not considered something that compromised saftey, they didn't issue a recall. Clutches were only replaced under warranty if the owner asked, or commented that it was bad on their car. Mazda WILL NOT replace a clutch on a car affetced now. I asked and they politely asked me to do one, which is fair enough, I suppose.

Bear in mind that the gearlever moves around a lot anyway. Watch it when the Mrs is driving and you'll see. Mine is accentuated when the clutch does judder so it could be this.

[MX-5 Lazza]

I was very lucky with mine. They replaced the complete clutch (pressure plate, friction plate, flywheel) with something non-standard which seems to be uprated so even after over 3 years supercharged with over 175 (now nearly 200lb/ft) it's still working just fine

[MX-5 Lazza]

I don't think Mazda ever worked out the exact cause and it took them a few tries before they found a reliable fix but they do have a fix for it now and jujst about any aftermarket clutch you might get fitted also seems to fix it so if it's bad enough just get the clutch replaced.

[Herman Toothrot]

Could try uprated engine mounts. On stock mounts I couldn't do a fast gear change as everything was moving about too much, mazdaspeed mounts and its much better.