Miata NA Shifter rebuild

 91 miata - 241K miles.  1st time doing the procedure

- very straightforward and not difficult.  everything is easily accessible. 45 minutes including taking pictures.  i did spend an hour looking at various you tube videos ahead of time.

- lots of good you tube videos I found this one to be the most helpful

Short version

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=53Vz15GdKd0

- also this writeup from the miata.net https://forum.miata.net/vb/showthread.php?p=8041867

- get a kit.  In addition to both upper and lower dust boots having failed, the two 'wavy' washers were toast, the plastic guide was chipped and and nylon cup was missing.

Details

As the above video & write up are comprehensive will just provide some highlights

- i went with moss miata kit ($90).  ordered monday and showed up thursday. .  Only minor complaint is the upper boot dust cover did not have metal reinforcement for the 4 10mm bolts.  it was just rubber while their picture showed the miata OEM part with the metal reinforcement.  

- my shift knob was on tight and could not budge by hand. had to wrap with towel and use a pipe wrench to loosen

- I used a small amount of liquid dishwashing soap (vice grease or vaseline) on the shifter shaft to remove/install the boot covers.

- The shifter came out of the turret easily although the nylon cup at the end was missing.  Could not see it in the turret after removing the oil so who knows what happened to it? 

- Oil was at the fill line but definitely needed to be replaced.  went with 80W-90 gear oil. $7 for a quart at local O'reilly's. 

- i used a pump from a $1 liquid soap dispenser to pump out the oil.

- The turkey baster I had was not able to get in deep enough into the turret.

- Both 'wavy' washers were toast.  The upper one was in three pieces that thankfully came apart after removal of the shifter assembly.

-The lower one (attached to the bushing in the turret) was cracked. This was not evident until after removing the bushing.

- the plastic guide was chipped at the top.

- i left it in neutral and it seated on 2nd try. i installed the lower dust cover afterwards.

- i used a small amount of liquid soap on the gear shift as lubrication when putting on the boot covers (vice vaseline or grease)