My Luce Rotary Coupe RX87
07-09-08, 03:44 AM
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07-09-08, 03:54 AM
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07-10-08, 04:24 AM
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07-10-08, 04:27 AM
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07-10-08, 04:28 AM
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07-13-08, 04:09 PM
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Thanks for sharing your pictures and that info toyo kogyo, growing up in Puerto Rico I thought I knew pretty much everything about rotaries, I'm realizing now there is so much to learn, I'm going to school with you mates.
Enjoy your ride mate.
Enjoy your ride mate.
07-15-08, 06:54 AM
#38
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Hi David, your a wealth of info, and you have some nice cosmo's too, I have read some of your posts on other forums.
Giorgetto Giugiaro gets the credit for the design whilst working at Bertone that year. He eventually started italdesign.
Mazda made only 976 Luce rotary coupes, production ceased in 1971 not 72 as a lot of other sites on the net say.
NONE at all were exported however they did have full intentions to export at the time.
Which 13a luce did you drive? the one in Melbourne or the one in Sydney?
Being mazda's largest 2 rotor production engine it is very tractable.
The 13a really is a delight to drive in the low to mid range, you can let the clutch out at idle on a slight hill and it moves away without any throttle and its oh so quiet and smooth too. Its the only rotary that I have ever had to blip the accellerator pedal every now and again to check to see if the engine is still running.
Giorgetto Giugiaro gets the credit for the design whilst working at Bertone that year. He eventually started italdesign.
Mazda made only 976 Luce rotary coupes, production ceased in 1971 not 72 as a lot of other sites on the net say.
NONE at all were exported however they did have full intentions to export at the time.
Which 13a luce did you drive? the one in Melbourne or the one in Sydney?
Being mazda's largest 2 rotor production engine it is very tractable.
The 13a really is a delight to drive in the low to mid range, you can let the clutch out at idle on a slight hill and it moves away without any throttle and its oh so quiet and smooth too. Its the only rotary that I have ever had to blip the accellerator pedal every now and again to check to see if the engine is still running.
Didn't know the designer started Italdesign. Thanks for that......
Unsure on your 1971 reference. Perhaps they ceased production in 71 then continued selling the remaining cars into 72 (as is often the case)
I have a few news reports of the day stating some went to Europe & Canada of all places (sold as rhd in a lhd world....??)
To my knowledge, the "Kalceiv" Luce in Sydney is not 100% complete years after its resto work. So the one I drove was the "Day" Luce in Melbourne. That was a pristine collectors item if ever you saw one, & yes the 13A was soooo smooth it was amazing.
REgards
07-16-08, 01:20 AM
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G'day again.
Didn't know the designer started Italdesign. Thanks for that......
Unsure on your 1971 reference. Perhaps they ceased production in 71 then continued selling the remaining cars into 72 (as is often the case)
I have a few news reports of the day stating some went to Europe & Canada of all places (sold as rhd in a lhd world....??)
To my knowledge, the "Kalceiv" Luce in Sydney is not 100% complete years after its resto work. So the one I drove was the "Day" Luce in Melbourne. That was a pristine collectors item if ever you saw one, & yes the 13A was soooo smooth it was amazing.
REgards
Didn't know the designer started Italdesign. Thanks for that......
Unsure on your 1971 reference. Perhaps they ceased production in 71 then continued selling the remaining cars into 72 (as is often the case)
I have a few news reports of the day stating some went to Europe & Canada of all places (sold as rhd in a lhd world....??)
To my knowledge, the "Kalceiv" Luce in Sydney is not 100% complete years after its resto work. So the one I drove was the "Day" Luce in Melbourne. That was a pristine collectors item if ever you saw one, & yes the 13A was soooo smooth it was amazing.
REgards
Sean
07-16-08, 03:18 AM
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G'day again.
Didn't know the designer started Italdesign. Thanks for that......
Unsure on your 1971 reference. Perhaps they ceased production in 71 then continued selling the remaining cars into 72 (as is often the case)
I have a few news reports of the day stating some went to Europe & Canada of all places (sold as rhd in a lhd world....??)
To my knowledge, the "Kalceiv" Luce in Sydney is not 100% complete years after its resto work. So the one I drove was the "Day" Luce in Melbourne. That was a pristine collectors item if ever you saw one, & yes the 13A was soooo smooth it was amazing.
REgards
Didn't know the designer started Italdesign. Thanks for that......
Unsure on your 1971 reference. Perhaps they ceased production in 71 then continued selling the remaining cars into 72 (as is often the case)
I have a few news reports of the day stating some went to Europe & Canada of all places (sold as rhd in a lhd world....??)
To my knowledge, the "Kalceiv" Luce in Sydney is not 100% complete years after its resto work. So the one I drove was the "Day" Luce in Melbourne. That was a pristine collectors item if ever you saw one, & yes the 13A was soooo smooth it was amazing.
REgards
there are some interesting peculiarities with the luce rotarycoupe, officially production ceased in 70 however 3 more were produced in 71 that were NOT available to the public these (mystery 3, as i call them) were gifted, however no one that i have been in contact with knows were these 3 were gifted too, there specs differed to both super dx m13r and dx m13p, (mainly by wheel alignment angles strangely enough) which leaves me to believe these were offered possibly to the hiroshima prefecture council
so any vehicles sold in 72 would have been unsold vehicles built in 69 or 70
07-16-08, 01:58 PM
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there are some interesting peculiarities with the luce rotarycoupe, officially production ceased in 70 however 3 more were produced in 71 that were NOT available to the public these (mystery 3, as i call them) were gifted, however no one that i have been in contact with knows were these 3 were gifted too, there specs differed to both super dx m13r and dx m13p, (mainly by wheel alignment angles strangely enough) which leaves me to believe these were offered possibly to the hiroshima prefecture council
so any vehicles sold in 72 would have been unsold vehicles built in 69 or 70
so any vehicles sold in 72 would have been unsold vehicles built in 69 or 70
I know my RX87 was produced in 1969 however it was first registered in 1970 so there are some peculularities between build dates and sale/registration dates like for example a few 1968 R100's were imported into Oz and NZ in 1969 with the first batch of rotary cars downuder.
07-16-08, 04:53 PM
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There is a nice article in "Road Test" magazine July 1970. These cars were pretty loaded with extras pushing the price to about $US5000 which was a good amount in 1970 especially for a then unknown Japanese brand. The price tag was higher than that of the Cosmo Sports of the same era. The world wasn't ready for a high line Japanese touring sedan.....yet. There was a beautiful RX87 at Sevenstock a few years ago but sported no engine and with the nose pointed skyward!
The book "Mazda Rotary Sports" also shows a photo of a RX87 sedan prototype.
The book "Mazda Rotary Sports" also shows a photo of a RX87 sedan prototype.
07-17-08, 12:52 PM
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There is a nice article in "Road Test" magazine July 1970. These cars were pretty loaded with extras pushing the price to about $US5000 which was a good amount in 1970 especially for a then unknown Japanese brand. The price tag was higher than that of the Cosmo Sports of the same era. The world wasn't ready for a high line Japanese touring sedan.....yet. There was a beautiful RX87 at Sevenstock a few years ago but sported no engine and with the nose pointed skyward!
The book "Mazda Rotary Sports" also shows a photo of a RX87 sedan prototype.
The book "Mazda Rotary Sports" also shows a photo of a RX87 sedan prototype.
Brian Burrow's at Mazda R&D should be very familiar with the 13A when he is finished so I may get him to rebuild my 13A when the need arises.
Love that sedan proto
07-17-08, 10:05 PM
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Wow. You own a piece of mazda history. That is a truly beautiful vehicle and an amazing collector piece. Are you doing anything particularly special as to storing it? If it sat in storage for that long i bet it is actually in really great shape. Probably one of the nicest of its kind. That is an amazing find. Good job, and thanks for posting pictures!
--Hank
--Hank
07-18-08, 02:30 PM
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Thank you everyone for your positive comments, here is a video I made up as a kinda joke reply to another video a mate sent me. I decided to put it up on youtube for yall.
http://nz.youtube.com/watch?v=ngSoLlhYB9o
http://nz.youtube.com/watch?v=ngSoLlhYB9o
