I was reading somewhere that some year Miatas don't have armrests built into the doors... so I removed mine. The extra couple inches I can lay my knee over now makes a huge difference.

I'm not really into looks, but I've gotta do something about the imprint. What I thought about was getting a large piece of textured black plastic and trim it to fit, or maybe just have a fabric shop cover a piece of sheetmetal with material similar to the door. Any suggestion?

 

Aluminum or some black PVC. Any should work and can be covered with vinyl if you want.

 

It's not too hard to just recover the whole panel.

 

the armrest panels are pretty popular. most people are doing the opposite: pulling their later model panels and replacing them with the earlier panels with the arm rests. You could probably work out a trade with someone and get their newer arm restless panels. They have a very nice storage pocket.

 

I agree with ben...I'm a small guy and like my armrest though

 

How do you close the door?

 

Window is probably rolled down all the time, just grab the door.

 

What about when its raining. Then you get water in your car.

 

I personally would use the window crank or grab the door handle and hold my thumb against door panel. I do it in my roommates miata, he doesn't have the arm rest either. He removed his for the small amount of weight reduction, along with tons of other crap. It's not that big a deal at all.

 

But what if you pull too hard on the window crank and break it?

 

I personally don't use the window crank, i use the doorhandle thumb method or i just put my hand against the top of the vinyl sill against the window and the friction between my hand and the door panel is more than enough to shut the door.

 

No you just lost me.

 

I was hoping this about removing those long black door ding guards that run down the side of your Miata.

 

Damn Sideways, when the window is down, I just grab the top of the door. When the window is up, I grab the top of the triangle window brace. My top is never up, ever. It's no biggie.

 

http://www.metromotorsports.com/prod...sp?PprodID=524

http://www.metromotorsports.com/prod...sp?PprodID=531


you can pick up those, the sad part is, the aluminum panel pictured is no longer in production....although, it wouldn't be hard to recreate a flat sheet of metal.

 

The first ones are kidna cool, but I'd have them powedercoated black... but I'd rather just cover up the ugly indentions and call it a day. I'm gonna hit a local fabric shop and see what they've got... plus some spray adhesive and a thin piece of plexi should do it.