MX5Ireland

Well this is my first rear wheel drive car and it is way down on power. Jacked up rear wheels to see if brakes were binding & pulled out discs temporarily & the wheels were still almost impossible to turn.(binding brakes ruled out) as far as I know car doesn't have an lsd. Is this normal for mx5's to be this stiff to rotate wheels? Any thoughts on the matter. When I say stiff..i mean like trying to turn the wheels like car is in gear...even though it wasn't by the way!

When you turn the rear wheel take a look at the one on the other side of the car as it's probably turning as well, therefore your turning wheel, drive shaft, diff, other drive shaft and the other wheel at the same time.
Shouldn't be 'very' heavy though.
What makes you think your car is down on power ? What year is it because some models are only around 91bhp if I remember correctly ?

Howdy Fergus. Much obliged for your reply. When I say down on power, you could put your foot to the floor and the car nearly wants to stall. very slow to accelerate through the lower gears especially on start up and not great acceleration or pull in the other gears either. The car is a 1.6 eunos 1990 with 197km on the clock. I took the cat out to improve the flow through the exhaust but it is still like a slug. On idle it is running a bit lumpy also!

Sounds like either air or fuel starvation, or if it's missfiring at all it could be rotten spark leads. When was the air filter last changed ? And the fuel filter ? The spark plugs ? Was the air intake manifold ever cleaned ?
Was the car always like this ?

Try letting the handbrake off while driving.I find that seems to help greatly for some reason.............Joke.!!

any noises from the diff? The prop shaft will come off on the diff end v.easily (just a few bolts) if you want to rule out the gearbox.

I'd do as Fergus suggested above too + have your timing checked. I'd then move on to checking the cambelt is fitted properly (cams line up with the marks).

When you say "especially on start up", do you mean it gets better than it was later? If so, you are probably running really rich + bogging too.

Sticky front calipers? even though you say rear wheels are stiff.Just check the front for elimination purposes

Thank you all for your suggestions even yours Robert. he he. That's plenty of food for thought & the weekend is long.

Much obliged. I think a compression check moght also be in order.