Found these gems while I am hibernating at home. I think Jalopnik featured this guy before. He has a pretty sick collection of cars in Hong Kong. He did a pretty interesting review on the Spirit R. The video is in Canotonese but his videos have pretty good (and hilarious) English subtitles. Basically to summarize, he loves the FD chasis but was disappointed with the Spirit R. He thinks its a parts-bin special and Mazda did not go far enough trying to make the car as special as it could have been. What do you guys think?

 

Its not wrong I mean, i love the Spirit-R, but it is what it is. A regular RX-7 with some red parts.

 

The Spirit R wasn't a huge difference from a regular RZ, but that seems to match Mazda's usual modus operandi. The RX-8 Spirit R was about the same.

He seems to have a huge amount of disposable income and a large collection, so maybe the stock RX-7 wasn't special enough for him. I guess the series 8 (model 6) RX-7 are more easily available in Hong Kong, so they don't have that unattainable status.

I didn't know that the stock Bilstein suspension was considered soft – it would have been easy to change out (and keep if he wanted to go back to stock) to something firmer, like Öhlins DFV coilovers, but it sounded like he didn't want to keep the car. His comment about another owner in the same parking garage having an identical model reveals how little he was attached to the car. He is correct that it would have been better for him to buy a regular FD and modify to taste – a clean Spirit R should be kept near to stock, in my opinion (and the market probably agrees).

Looking at the Spirit R's wheels reminds me that I have to save up for SakeBomb's forged RZ+ wheels, if they do another production run.

He mentioned that he is a Honda and Subaru guy, and he ended up replacing the Spirit R with a 2006 Subaru WRX STI Spec C RA-R, which is rarer (especially in that shade of yellow), with only 50 made in that color.

 

At the end of the day the stock Spirit R is a mildly upgraded 10 year old design. In 1993, 255hp was a LOT. In 2002, even 280hp wasn't that impressive. Kind of like the NSX, it was a car they kept making and the rest of the industry was leaving it behind.

The FD is a fantastic car but by modern standards it's low on power. The good thing is you can make up for it with some choice mods.

Dale

 

If you want a special highly collectable FD you get the RX-7 SP homologation special.

Get a consumer one if moneys tight or one with racing history if you are a baller.

https://www.carsguide.com.au/overste...-porsche-62213

 

Very nice. Hard to say how many SP are still in Australia: Mazda RX-7 SP (1995) - AusRotary

Looks like the Australian owner of the sole SP-II prototype last posted in 2014: https://www.rx7club.com/3rd-generati.../#post11749951

The SP brethren are still racing hard:

 

Wish I could get an SP2 wing

 

Pretty cool review, he said the Spirit R came with a bigger IC and oil cooler? Don’t think that’s correct.

 

Yep, I find it weird as well. Never heard of this before. Maybe he was referring to the fact that +99 models have a better air flow with the new front bumper design ?