Miata ND MX-5 mk4 Drain Filter Cleaning

Removing and cleaning the convertible drain filters on my Miata MX-5 ND. I remove and reinstall the filters (on both sides) first the hard way, and then using an easier method starting around minute 6:44

Clearing Miata ND Convertible Drains

*TIP: One of my viewers used a dental pick to pull out the tab...Thank Julio!

**Third TIP from another viewer: Thanks naibafabdulkobor
Have the top fully up and shut (!) but the door open.
Stand right beneath the car, looking forward, pass your right arm between seat and top. Move your hand forward (towards the seat) and to the left as much as possible.
You will be able to easily feel the foam gasket/seal around the actual filter box/basket. You can also feel the foam attached to the little handle that can be seen in the video.
Next, gently push on top of the basket while pulling the handle towards the inside of the car. It is not even necessary to apply the pressure to the little plastic hook that's behind the handle. Just push anywhere. This will be enough to release the hook and pull out the filter.
In the very same way you can easily reach the foam filter, remove it and put it back in.

[jzhd]

Thanks for both videos! I needed the help.
My dealer charges 160$ for this and doesn’t even do a good job.

[NielsBohr]

I’m not even in math this semester but I always love to watch the best math teacher I’ve never had! 😅
That’s one great car, must be a blast to cruise around in!

[lakaiyak]

Of course the best math teacher ever drives the best sports car ever :')

[FlydreamMedia]

I came here to learn to clear my drain and found all these wonderful comments from your students. Thank you for teaching these kids and making such an impression

[carsonfoy]

A mathematician and car enthusiast?? We have a winner ladies and gents!

[THE______TRUTH]

Its been years since ive taken calculus. I still recommend your channel to new undergrads. I have mad respect for good teachers like you because I struggled terribly in school. Stay awesome Mr. Tarrou😁

[chrisvernon-parry]

This is really clear and helpful. Many thanks for publishing this, it helped me no end in clearing the drains from debris from a nearby silver birch tree.

[larryh]

Brilliant! On a couple of occasions, I've found a swimming pool in the driver's side footwell and for the life of me couldn't figure out where the water was coming from. While I'm not sure the debris was the cause of the issue (as I didn't find all that much), your video was excellent. In less than 20 minutes I was able to disassemble and clean both sides. It's my suspicion that the drainage system in the ND can't handle a high volume of water and when a cloud dumps an inch of rain in less than an hour what doesn't drain ends up inside the car. As opposed to chasing this, I'll just get a car cover for the nights we're expecting heaving rain. Many thank for taking the time to make and post the video.

[andrewbarton-willson]

Thank you for your videos. As a result of viewing them and reading the comments I was able to complete these tasks and learn a lot in the process.
1. The hole behind the seat belt may be covered by a centre pull stud (same as those that hold the plastic panels on)
2. The one- ended trombone can be fished or fiddled down the hole but there are a couple of obstructions that make it hard to get it all through
3. Prising off the large circular stud (one of two low down in the panel behind the seat) allows access to an oval cover labelled out with an arrow pointing to the side of the car. On the other side is a catch which can be released with a short flat bladed screwdriver slid in horizontally along the axis of the ‘out arrow’ from the inboard side of the cover.
4. Reach in behind the cover and prise the white plastic tube off the vertical surface (there is one small lug held in a notch which holds the tube in place). Once the tube was held vertically I found I could fiddle the trombone cleaner right down and out through the sidewall.

UPDATE: The passenger side is slightly different. The white flexible tube - that runs right down to the outfall on the vertical surface tucked in just in front of the rear wheel - terminates in an orange section (on the driver’s side it is white all through) which I found to be clipped in very firmly and I didn’t want to break it. Fortunately with a lot of fiddling I got the trombone cleaner to go all the way through and then I could pull it through easily from below).
Having done this once on both sides of the car - and found no obstructions or detritus- I plan to check the filter cage and sponge regularly but use the trombone cleaner less frequently so long as the water flows through to the ground.

[aaronrogerson]

Thanks for the reminder. These should be checked annually. I find it easy to get the baskets out by just reaching around, but yiu have a great alternative.

[arturomonedero]

Thank you very much, the video was handy.
The first side was a bit difficult for me because I didn't know how to get the basket out, but the second side was much easier.

[adamski-lw]

Oh what the heck. I’m thinking of getting an ND. As I’m researching the algorithm sent me here. Subscribed for the maths. I hope you don’t mind students in their 50s.

[camdcam]

Super helpful video. Especially from the 2nd half where you pull the plastic panels off. Worked exactly as explained and very quick and easy to do. I’ll be adding this to a quarterly maintenance routine. Cheers.

[horizonbrave]

Bam! Wow, I don't know why but I LOVE that you posted this! After having been watching and rewatching your math videos over the last few months, you've become like my friendly neighbor! And I love the Miata in white! You need to do more like these, sort of random "house keeping" videos so you can impart not only your math wisdom, but your life skills wisdom as well! Also as an aside, I drie a Jeep Wrangler, and have a custom top, and I had a very similar problem. AFter it would rain, the passenger side and rear trunk would be soaked! I'd have to pull up the carpet and pull the drain plug to let the rain water out, and them sop up the water with towels every single time...I had to replace and re install the top, but finally I nailed it and now it's dry as bone after every rain!

[chrisgrant]

Don’t have to move the seat, don’t have to move the top, don’t have to touch a panel.

If you are doing it on the driver side (left side), face towards the car and snake your right arm into the opening and feel your way down the inside wall of the car. You’ll feel the little clip on the cup and right below it the foam padded pull tab. Push the clip, pull the tab and out it comes. Can have both sides of the car done start to finish in 5 minutes, 10 if you have to walk inside to use a sink. This is the easiest maintenance for a drain filter ever. Thank you for the video though. Without this, I was struggling to find the basket. I thought it was in the flat horizontal section inboard of where it actually is.

[davidhalsall]

Brilliant video and explanation. I did it on my car - taking off the trim - and it worked beautifully. Many thanks

[jmanninja]

We had an 08 and currently have a 16 and always check the filters every 6 months nowadays to make sure a new filter is added in! The same problem happened to our 08... we actually had to buy a trombone cleaner online to clean the filters and if you look in the comment section of the amazon trombone cleaners you might see a lot of miata owners on there talking about how it cleaned their car filters for them LOL.

[paulfernandez]

Thank you very much for the very informative video as always :)

[vincentl]

Thanks, I would never have known about this without this video.

[ariabakhtiar]

Hello sir, you helped me so much through my senior year and I really wanted to thank you for your efforts. I hope you can create more videos. You make math much more fun.