An eyebrow-like hood rises from the dash near the driver's door to loop over the instrument cluster and drop down the right-hand side of the center stack, offering the passenger a Hail Mary hand-grip before wrapping around the shift boot. A pair of large, round dials report engine and road speed, with a smaller dial resting in the saddle between those two doing the same for fuel level. Too bad all three circles make goo-goo eyes at the unlined top rather than gaze meaningfully into the eyes of the driver. Three round, eye shade-like dash vents service the driver, with a fourth isolated at the far end of the passenger's side of the dash. Three well-proportioned climate control knobs fill the space in the center stack between the vents and the stereo panel, the last a jarring rectangle unlike every other shape in the Solstice's interior. We would have placed the solo power point on the other side of the binnacle, near the passenger, though, to keep the radar detector cord out of the way of the climate control knobs and stereo.
Door latch handles are comfortably located high up and forward on the doors. The power mirror control, too, is convenient, at the top of the inside door pull just below the door handle, where an index finger can easily manipulate it. The hand brake is on the passenger side of the drive tunnel, opposite of where it should be, however. The power window buttons would be easier to use if they were farther forward in the armrests. And the knob for adjusting the seatback angle is difficult to reach with the doors closed.
Seats fit us well, although the bottom cushions came up a bit short on thigh support. And a seat height adjustment would ease the strain on the hamstrings over long drives. Space-wise, the Solstice compares well with the Miata, with an inch more head room, identical hip room and barely half an inch less leg room.
Elevated seats would improve outward visibility all the way around, too, although the high beltline arguably adds a degree of safety in side impacts. On the subject of occupant safety, the Solstice provides what's mandatory and nothing more. Thus, while every 2006 Mazda Miata MX-5 has frontal airbags, seat-mounted side airbags and passenger-seat child safety seat anchors, the Solstice comes only with frontal airbags.
Storage consists of a decent-size glove box, plus a couple of nets sewn to the front of the seat bottoms, a cubby tucked into the bulkhead between the seatbacks, and pouches on the seat backs. Doubling as storage for the convertible top, the trunk offers 3.8 cubic feet with the top up, but just 1.4 cu. ft. with the top down. Those data don't truly tell the tale, however. The elephant in the trunk is the gas tank. Finding no other place to put it (and stay within the development timeline and budget set for the car), the Solstice's designers plopped it down front and center in the trunk. The result is a huge box sitting on the trunk floor that leaves barely enough room around the edges for soft-sided, duffel bag-type luggage. Which is just as well, as anything put inside has to be hefted up and over the sides of the car, so light is good. There's no room for a spare tire, either, so like the Miata and for the same reason, the Solstice comes with an emergency inflater strapped to the back wall of the trunk. But although the Maita's trunk is only 1.5 cu. ft. larger, it's immensely more functional, shaped as it is more traditionally, i.e., a reasonably deep, open space.
We had trouble with the trunk lid on our test car. The first time we tried to put the top down, the trunk lid latch mechanism refused to line up properly, blocking the lid from closing. If we'd owned the car we would have taken it to the dealership for a warranty repair.
