Name: Ernie & Mary Voss Year/color/options of your Miata? 1995 Merlot Mica M-Edition A Miata Relationship In the fall of 2000 we attended the British car show at Patriot's Point for the express purpose of meeting some of the British Car Club members and to express our interest in buying either an MGB, or a Triumph TR-6, or even an Austin-Healy. We were looking to make our intentions known to the club members so that we could find a car that day or to make some contacts which would lead to a purchase. We remember that day as a particularly nice fall day that was just made for top down driving in a little British sports car. Oh yes, we knew all about British reliability. We had a number of friends over the years who owned these cars and we not only heard their stories about their loving their cars, but also about their hating their cars because of their being stranded here and there, or their inability to drive their cars out of their driveway due to engine, electrical, ignition problems and in some cases even severe rust problems. However, even knowing of these problems, we were not dissuaded. We figured that, after all, the cars we were considering were no less that 30 years old and in some cases 40 years old. We were going to be adventurous and enjoy the good times with one of these cars. After all, these cars would have a lot of years on them and surely the current and previous owner would have spent a lot of time, energy replacing parts and pieces. By now the cars we were interested in should have had their engines rebuilt, that the Lucas electrical problems be resolved with new Bosch parts, that ignition assemblies would have been replaced, and that the rusty rocker panels, fenders and so forth would have been replaced. Well off we went to the car show. Oh the cars were beautiful. So bright and glossy. Gleeming engines with new replacement hoses and wires. Oh, we were ready to buy. As we worked our way through the MG and Triumph displays we didn't really find any one ready to sell or even consider selling. Hmm, we quickly realized that buying a British car was going to be more costly and harder than we thought. We learned that most of the guys, and some gals, did a lot of their own work and did not drive their cars as daily drivers. Well no worry, we hadn't been to the Austin-Healy display. After all, the AH's had pretty good reputations as solid well built cars which were plenty of fun. Except, of course when crossing railroad track and when traversing over curbs of any size due to the cars' low ground clearance. So off we went. As we headed to the AH display our eyes feasted on these gorgeous exhibits of sheet metal. Wow were they ever nice and were we impressed. As luck would have it the first black AH had a number of viewers and several of us started talking about this beautiful black car. One of the older men said he recently sold his AH after seventeen years of ownership. I asked him to tell me his story as to how he came to buy the AH and why he sold the car. The why he sold was what I was really interested in. He said he bought another AH because he owned one while in college. He had to sell that car to stay in school. Later after getting married and raising a family, he decided to buy another Healy to help him through his mid-life crisis. After several years he decided to restore it. After its restoration he realized that it still was not as reliable as he wanted. Additionally, he was still spending too many weekends working on his car and he was still spending untold amounts of money. Well, we quickly had our eyes opened and knew right then and there that we were not going to buy any British sports car. We thanked him for his time and started to walk away and then turned around and asked the man what kind of a car did he end up buying to replace his AH. We expected him to say a four door Dodge, or maybe some kind of a foreign sedan, but instead he said, "Oh, I bought a used Miata. I'm having a blast!" Well, we went back to talk some more. He went on to say that he hadn't had any mechanical or electrical problems since he owned the Miata and that he was spending his time driving rather than working on his car. He then laughed and said that he was also going around to see his British Car Club friends on the weekends because he knew that they would be in their driveways or garages working on their cars. He said many of them harassed him because he bought the Miata because it did not have a long pedigree and a 50 year racing heritage. He told us that his comments back to them were rather caustic by his remarking that "Yes that is true, but my car runs seven days a week and doesn't need constant maintenance". Well this gentlemen' conversation was enough to tell us that we seriously needed to consider buying a used Miata. Not too long thereafter we saw a classified ad for a 1995 Merlot Mica M edition. We had already looked at several other Miatas, but none of them struck our fancy. Too many miles, dirty engines and interiors reflective of poor maintenance, wrong colors and etc. When saw the Merlot we knew that this was the car for us. Not too many miles, loaded, leather, good body and tires. We took the car for a ride and did the usual overview and went back to the owner. He told us that he had to sell the car because he was diagnosed with skin cancer. Although his doctor told him that by wearing a hat and by keeping the convertible up that there wasn't any need to sell the car the owner felt that he just couldn't follow the doctor's orders. The temptation of no hat and the top down was too great. After some quick negotiations, Mary bought the car (she was the one with the cash) and Ernie has been driving it ever since. We were glad we went to the British car show. It lead us to our "Little One"....... our beloved Merlot Mica Miata.

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