Whatever your doing, stay at it. I've been saying this for years but Mazda can't do all the R&D themselves. They need our help. My own 20b project has some things going on with it that may help the cause.

 

I don't see much difference between a widebody hard-top Miata with a rotary than what you're describing as a "base model" RX7.

The one fantastic thing (and not so fantastic) Mazda did with the FD is they gave you the goods in the platform, and then cheaped out on the ancilaries. The chassis itself, the suspension... the stuff that's really tough to change—all world class. The little brakes, cheap plastic intercooler, cheap accessories, shitty paint and interior materials not so much. But, you can fix that stuff. That's why, with mods, it'll still run with the heavy hardware 20 years later, too. If you went the route of many Japanese manufacturers at that time, what you got for your "poor man's porsche" was zoomy looks, mcpherson struts, and a heavy chassis that was like a banana.

My fear is, you start with a cheap base model—basic construction techniques and materials (ala Miata, BRZ), you never get to world class with the upper model. You get a Nardi Steering wheel and a body kit. I'm not sure the car I want can really be a hopped up $30k car. I'd rather see them build the $50k car I want, and then trickle that technology down (where possible) into the RX5 and Miata.

 

Design opinions aside,

Whats the latest word on Mazda's intention of producing a Rx-7? Last I read the new Mazda boss shut down the project.

I wish Toyota's new CEO/President came to Mazda instead. Its apparent that Toyota and Mazda seem to have switched roles. Toyota/lexus is going all sporty with the F sport badge appearing on every new lexus which btw look/drive amazing. Heck toyota is even teaming up with BMW for a new sports car... have you guys seen the new Supra concept? Mazda on the other hand....

 

Sure, not many companies I can think of (McLaren excepted) build a world-beater for their road car debut.

The thing that Porsche did though was not only race in the little leagues (like Mazda), but showcased their abilities through Can-Am (sheer domination of it), many LeMans wins, and the pinnacle of racing: F1. Mazda has none of that, with the sole exception of that June race in 1991. Of course, by "winning on Sunday" the german sports car maker (now, ironically, majority SUV maker) was able to more easily sell their road cars to the public.

 

Mazda races and wins in the grand am series , as well as ALMS American lemans . Just not with the rotary in the lemans . But it runs a 3 rotor on its RX8 grand am cars .

and the AWD 6 is doing well in what ever class it runs .

 

The little leagues? ... Mazda dominated IMSA and today dominates at the grassroots level with cars closest to what we buy raced by people like us or our neighbors. No they didn’t race in CamAm that was before their times, they still remain the ONLY Japanese company top have won LeMan and are now going back with diesels. SCCA Club Racing and SOLO championships are not nothing. Mazda is also the only car company promoting a ladder system in the US to farm Indy drivers.

 

Why so we can have "F" kits to strap on heavy dogs?? F stands for we f****d the customer.

 

As a manufacturer would you rather a) win the Indy 500 , or b) have Miatas finish in the top 3 positions in their class in an auto-x across town the day before the 500?

Also, would you rather a) have a factory team win LeMans , or b) have Speedsource (non-factory effort) win their class at Daytona?

The same logic applies to producing a 7:

a) 3 or 4 rotor to challenge cars well into the six figures

or


b) 2 rotor/mediocre performance #s challenging Toyobarus

There's a big difference in dominating GTO & GTU, and dominating GTP. Do people remember which person dominated the feeder series to F3000 (now called GP2)? Hell, most don't remember who won the F3000 title; they're much more likely to remember who won the F1 title. The ultimate bragging rights are bestowed upon winners of an ultimate series.

Don't get me wrong, the little series are fine; the problem is when not supplementing those with victories in the higher/highest levels.

 

No one is suggesting a new RX7 with BRZ/FR-S performance.
A 2600 lb. base RX-7 with a 250hp NA 2-rotor would outperform a Porsche Cayman.

 

Huh? Mazda has a pretty glittering record in production based professional sports cars (IMSA GTO/GTU, and current classes), an OVERALL Le Mans victory, and wins in lesser prototype classes. It actually has a pretty solid record in professional racing, minus F1 and Indycars, and they own grassroots racing.

It's not quite Porsche's record, but it kicks the **** out of Toyota and Nissan's overall (Honda not so much w/ all those F1 championships).

Despite all that, everything they sell is slow.

 

I agree this is a very good idea and as we've said over and over again one that Mazda should of implemented long before now and it's a shame that Mazda isn't leading this new revolution of building a light weight fun sports car that even the Ford Mustang (independent rear susp and 3400 pounds at 400 plus HP that cost 32k is a pretty damn appealing package) is taking part in.

Nissan will improve and lighten the next 370
2015 Nissan Z Concept Car News | Future Cars 2014

I expect the next Cayman to be lighter with more power

The alfa 4c will likely be a cool car but possibly a little late to the party with only 240 HP in a pretty expensive package.

Hopefully the next Miata will have 200 HP and weigh no more than 2400lbs because that's about what it will take to bump sales # into the 6 digits again.

I expect the STI BRZ to have 250 plus HP and weigh no more than 2750 and cost around 32k. Basically a modern day FD that's not as attractive with less handling potential Cough, Cough where is MAZDA!!!!!!!

I wouldn't be at all surprised if both Kia and Hyundai have light weight 250 plus HP sports car on the market before Mazda.

However with all this going on there's still a gap in the 350 plus HP light weight division. Possibly BMW, Toyota, Porsche or some company will take advantage of this niche market and give me the sports car I've wanted for 10 years. How cool would it be if the one company I love got off their lazy asses to build the exact replacement for the 350 rwhp 2700lb RX7/FD I'm currently driving, with a 3 rotor, BAMMMM heaven on earth

 

I don't understand why Mazda doesn't make a Mazda7 and have a rotary experiment as an option as the top of the line car. For that platform. Or hell get rid of the miata and make that the new rx7/miata and save on cost of manufacturing use options

 

fixed! the current miata has been around since 2006, its OLD. i don't know about you, it looks fine, but never felt right.

you can count BMW out, they have less money than Mazda, they are actually in talks with toyota to develop a new car, because BMW can't afford it on their own. its easy to understand why Mazda has had cash flow problems, but BMW is a surprise.

oh actually i guess BMW/Toyota is a go, BMW-Toyota joint sports car project is on like Donkey Kong - Autoblog or they've agreed that its a go

 

Doesn't the Genesis Coupe fit this bill? Or is it too heavy?

345HP/3400LB with the V6/Manual, 271HP/3300LB with the 2.0T/Manual.

Vince

 

it's no surprise to me, the cars are engineering nightmares and the cars drop to pennies on the dollar in value within 3 years.

it was only a matter of time when people realize buying a nameplate is just a total waste. cadillac is another i am surprised that has lasted this long, the only thing that has kept caddilac afloat was the introduction of a fancy chevy tahoe called the escalade.

in sports car terms anything over 3,000lbs is considered a pig. some companies still make it work but the cars wind up costing a LOT of money to make any real numbers fly.

luxury is one thing but if you want the best lap times.. the lighter the better. some of the fastest cars on the planet are still the simplest and oldest designs, like the caterham which is over half a century old in it's backbone. starting with a frame/suspension that weighs less than 1k lbs, when you get in the car you are one of the largest contributors to the overall weight of the car.

 

It used to be that BMW (and other "nameplates") meant the car was actually better than other cars in terms of engineering, feel, execution, etc. it wasn't just a nameplate.

 

oh i definitely know, owning a brand new BMW is probably a dream to most people. but when things start to break and the bills come in, then the cars sink like a rock.

i needed to know what it was like owning one so i bought an E36, it was one of the worst car experiences of my life. fixing even the most simple item on the car took at least 4 hours, such as the blow motor for the cabin, which is literally a 4-5 hour job to R+R. the knock sensors, 3-4 hours. fixing a cracked exhaust manifold another 4 hours, etc, etc, etc.

changing the spark plugs is the ONLY easy thing on the car, to which they probably just forgot to over engineer them.

 

Wow everyone is so down on all of these car companies! If all of these cars are crap, what would be considered a good exciting reasonable price car? What's the benchmark that your all comparing what a good sports car should be? And please don't let it be a car from the 60's or 70's with bench seats and I'm flying through the windshield safety features.

 

That's easy

Corvette
Viper
Mustang
Camaro
BRZ
Miata
Cayman
GT3 (little worried about the 991 911 though)
GTR (almost forgot godzilla)
370z
etc...

I don't think there has ever been a better time to be car guy than right now.

The cars and performance along with reliability in all these models is pretty damn good.

BUT as the HP has moved higher so has the weight but in the last year or two you can really see a lot of emphasis on taking weight out so hopefully we'll see a weight reduction war along with the HP war Can't wait to see what sports cars pop up in the next several years and hopefully one of them will have a rotary engine in it



l

 

Yup, Mazda is sorta maybe kinda thinking about building a car that would have been the **** three years go three years from now. Yeah.

 

You have to admit though; when Mazda made the FD they made a car that even 20+ years later it's still turning heads.

This is an expectation that I'm sure a lot of us have for the next car that comes out with the RX-7 badge and I'm sure that everyone at Mazda know this. If it ever does come out; they have a huge shoes to fill; not just in performance but also in looks.

Just ramblings....

 

i see where you're trying to go, but you're actually using the wrong analogy, fritz. people buy the panamera because of the 911. but the 911 isn't porsche's halo car, it's their standard model. porsche's halo cars are their super cars ala 918 and cgt. and as nobody buys a panamera because of the 918, just like no one buys a toyota because of the lfa, you're basically basically arguing against your own point.

 

fixed your list

 

sooooo you think you can teach mazda a thing or two? i think i've literally heard it all. with their oh thousands of engineers, nearly a century of being in business, and billions of man hours or research, computations, engineering, simulation, racing, development, road tests, real world feedback, etc. you think that there is actually one iota of information that you know that mazda hasn't already considered a thousand times over?

on a serious note though, i just put on a filter and exhaust on my honda and gained 5hp. can someone put me through to the ceo honda so i can teach him how to gain an extra 5hp on his cars? oh and can someone get me tim cook's phone number. i just jailbroke my iPhone and it's got a bunch of cool new features on it now. i really think tim's gonna be impressed with when i show him what i did. i'm totes serious guys, it's really important that these guys talk to me cuz i've done a bunch of cool **** that they really need to see.

 

There's obviously a lot of things that Mazda didn't consider when building the FD, hence some great ideas and innovations that have been introduced by the Grassroots/aftermarket community. Take the Vmount for example. An OEM version of that radiator/intercooler arrangement could have made the car run significantly cooler. I'm all for people testing proof of concept ideas and then letting the market/community be the judge with their wallets.