Hi I am the owner of a miata or Mx-5 in Australia. My model is made in 1992. I dont drive it all the time and has left the car undriven for about a month. I noticed a little bit of clear oil under the engine area. it is clear in color and not leaking at all.The lastengine oil change wasdone last october and has travelled 1500kms since then.Is it normal for miata's engine to leak a little when not driven for a while? I read from some surveys it is but would like further comments and experience you miata owners out there. Will be much appreciated. thanks

 

Frankly, I don't see why the Miata would be any different than any other car, and it being a '92means that it's a veteran and probably has a fair number of miles (kms) on the clock. When they get older, they leak, unless a rebuild has been done.
My wife's Saturn has ~120,000 miles (+/-193,121kms) on the clock and it uses oil, much more than it used to.

You might try using a "high-mileage" oil next time, which has seal conditioners built into it to help old rubber from getting hard and brittle. Or old brittle rubber to soften up a bit.
We've had fairly good luck using it in her car.

 

Don't know if this will help or not, but Keith Tanner, of Flying Miata, wrote a book called MAZDA MIATA MX-5 PERFORMANCE PROJECTS. In the book, on page 29 he says the following..."Miatas were inspired by old British sports cars, but the Mazda engineers decided to leave out the leaks. Well, most of the leaks anyway. There is one common one, the O-ring on the cam angle sensor used on the NA cars. This will drool down the back of the engine and is often mistaken for a rear main seal or something equally difficult to fix. The valve cover gasket will also harden with age and start to seep a little or get the plugs oily. Both items are cheap and easy to replace."

Hope this helps.[/align]Ron

 

'Sounds like good, sound advice to me, Ron!!

 

I Have a 91 Miata with over 175000 miles, and about a year ago I spent over $1600.00 for repairs to leaks that were coming from every seal and gasket and oring that existed. It is fine now and I itend on keeping him for a while...
That bady sure leak a lot....

Dex....

 

it is not normal for any car to leak oil...but it is common...just because it is common doesnt mean it is normal....if you keep an accurate check on the oil level, more than likely you will have no problems....if you dont check it, you could be running your motor on less oil than it requires for optimal running and friction viscocity....oil is important for every vehicle(obviously), but in a high revving miata when you are going 80 mph and the rpms are at 4000, oil is extremely important....i would get this checked out, expecially if you plan on keeping the car for a while ormodding your car in the future....