Classic Car And Driver - The Mazda RX-7

[dreadly101]

Australia still had new rx7's in 2001 not 95 

[rotarycorvette1]

my first car was a 1985 gsl teal blue i loved it so much never broke on me

till i crashed it street racing with my dad so dont street race in a mazda becouse there will be one less we need to preserve them iam sad now!!!

[aortiz826]

135hp!!!... Man, i got a 618hp 3 rotor 1st gen.... I bet they didn't knew this car would fall on our puertorican hands.. hehehe

[aido1987]

haha i bet felix wankel would shit himself if he knew that lol

[pallymeat]

Its crazy that back in the day all major manufacturers had bought patent rights to build the wankel / NSU rotary. Nissan, chrysler, GM, Ford, Toyota you name it. They all scrapped their designs during the oil scare in the late 70's early 80's.

Imagine if they didn't?

[aaroncake]

That's the excuse they made, but I'm betting they simply gave up because they weren't willing or capable of making the engine work. Even Mazda struggled at first. Then Mazda had no trouble selling RX vehicles throughout the 70s and 80s.

[DJM442]

my dad's cosuin has the very 1st RX-7 on the west coast of the US, he still owns it if i remember correctly, though it hasn't run since the mid 80's =(

[Deetroiter]

I'd like to think that if the 3rd gen Rx7 was released today, it would have no problem fetching the $40-$45k pricetag.

[fc3sghost]

yup yup. there would be so manny out on the streets. and the car dosnt look old it looks so nice and new.

[aaroncake]

Only if it was reliable. If Mazda junked the twin turbo system and used a small modern ball bearing turbo (ie. GT30 size) the car would make a lot more power, weigh less and be infinitely more reliable. I always wonder why Mazda spent so much R&D on making the twins when they could have just spent that money on a better single turbo...

[fc3sghost]

ye true true but i mean think about it.. most ppl who buy the cars dont know much... all they know its twin turbo and a random engine and its japanise so they want it. but yea a singal turbine would be great.

still N/A is awsome!!!

[Auruura]

@aaroncake With Twinturbo-setup you get better low-end torque, which makes it more enjoyable and economical to drive. This way Mazda was able to attract more customers and better sales.

[aaroncake]

@Auruura That's why Mazda developed the system, but the implementation was flawed. Going with a more modern turbocharger instead of one designed in the 60s would have been a better choice than developing a sequential turbo system around two ancient turbos. Unfortunately hindsight is 20-20 and engineers sometimes don't see the whole picture past their specific goals.

[dildog]

Thanks for sharing!  I love my 1985 GSL-SE, it's really bring joy to driving.

[paulfenderply57]

armoworrior 95 in the usa, 02 in japan

[SlotShop]

Thanks for sharing this.

[armoworrior]

i wish they would get the date right that they discontinued the line it was 1999 in the states and 2002 in japan. cant believe even car and driver gets it wrong.

[aaroncake]

It was '95 in North America.

[dildog]

The irony of you saying C/D is incorrect when you don't even have your facts straight. Oh the Internets, where everyone is an expert.

[aaroncake]

I'm correct. The last year of the FD was '95 in North America. Mazda stopped selling it in North America in '95 due to lack of sales, high price and the fact that a redesign would be required for the '96 model year to comply with OBDII standards. Look it up. There are many books available on the subject and I'm sure you'll find a few websites with this info. I don't do 3rd gen stuff on my website though.

[speed4mike]

1995 although some 95's were sold in 1996 that's how slow they were going. Too bad, but all of the Japanese sports cars at that time priced themselves out of THEIR market. They tried to move into Porsche's, BMW's, And Benz's market and they failed. But now Nissan is trying with the GTR. This should be interesting. I'm sure that Mazda, Toyota and Honda are all watching to see how the GTR does. Nissan might be opening a door for the rest of the Japanese manufacturers into the Porsche's territory

[rotarydrifterx7]

the prices were in "porsche territory" but the japanese cars were still much cheaper than the cars that they competed with. 320 hp supra for 40,000 dollars. it was a lot more back then than it is today but it's still that's not bad. japanese sports cars have competed with german even before the 90's.

the reason for the slow japanese sports cars sales is because many people started to buy larger vehicles like SUV's.

[speed4mike]

I don't know if I should respond. You obviously weren't old enough to know first hand. I happened to sell Toyotas in 1993 and 4. And the whole time only 1 Supra went out the door, and it wasn't because all the sportscar enthusists decided to buy SUV's. That's stupid. If you want a sportscar, you want a sports car, not a suburban. Porsche & BMW had no problem selling their sports cars at 50K. And that's what our Supra sticker was with all the fees 53K, if I remember correctly.

[speed4mike]

Let's take the 78 RX-7 for instance. Mazda sold about 60,000-70,000 of these (somewhere around there). Why? Cause it was under $10K. The last RX-7, my spirit R cost me almost 4.8 million yen (about $43K at the exchange rate). Mazda didn't even sell all of them in 2002. There are a few 2002's that have 2003 sales years. Why? Cause it's too expensive. Same with 1995 RX-7's. Mazda couldn't sell them fast enough so there are 1995 RX-7's that were sold in 1996. Porsche & BMW didn't have that problem.

[rotarydrifterx7]

and the GTR's aren't trying to step into "porsche territory" again. they are trying to take back the throne as king of the supercars.

20 years ago the R32's were the monsters from japan, "Godzilla." porsches back then couldn't even touch them. they were way ahead of their time. the RB26's were amazing engines.

this japanese car are much cheaper than the cars that it competes with, just like the japanese sports cars from the 90's.

[speed4mike]

Please... That's just crap.... If Nissan's 32 was so badass, why didn't they ship them worldwide like Porsche & BMW did. Fact is & has always been, the 32-34 was an ok OEM car that you COULD modify into a pretty badass car. I built my 1st '74 Skyline Kenmary GTX into a GTR in 1984.

It's also crap that R32's were faster, better, or nicer than a Porsche 911. Both cars off the showroom floor, the 911 would crush a 32 in everyway. Modified? That's different, & depends on the man with the wrench.

[speed4mike]

Its funny that you talk about 20 years ago, you were 9 years old. So you're talking about what somebody else told you, cause you surely didn't experience it at 9.

Also, if the RB26 was so badass, Nissan'd still be making them, but they're not. So that should tell you something.

It's exactly as us real engine builders have been telling all the turbo tuners since I can remember, THERE'S NO REPLACEMENT FOR DISPLACEMENT. Nissan's know's it, & that's why they enlarged the GTR's displacment by 46%

[wellshii]

wow,sad

[ayane]

I'd love to know the company that makes the exhaust system that triples my stock hp rating.lol.

Great find, favorites!

[djjjr42]

The one that includes a turbo, like he said.

[gslse]

i think it my be the elford turbo rx7.. and the Pacific Avatar Convertibles rx7

[dildog]

I know you're correct, I was talking about the guy who said '99 in the NA market. OBDII was the death of the RX-7 in the US, it's a shame, if sales would have been stronger in the final years they might have survived a few more production runs. The price was quite high for the time, and it kept getting higher. It's too bad we never saw some of the special editions from Japan.

[speed4mike]

You didn't, but I live in Japan & I bought a brand new Spirit R #822 ($45k when converted). The last of the beauties. Now 6 years old and 91K Kilometers later, I thinking of selling it...I know crazy. But the extended warranty is about to run out & I have come to find out that if you want to play in an FD, you better be prepared to pay, not to mention that we are paying 170yen ($1.65) per liter of gas. That's about $6.50 a gallon. And I get between 8-9 miles to the gallon after it's converted.

[aaroncake]

8-9 MPG?! There is something seriously wrong with that car. :-) My bridgeported 2nd gen gets better mileage then that in the city...

[speed4mike]

Not really, the series 5 & 6 ('99 & up) with the better ports & turbos pours in the gas. The nice part is with just a new ECU, like a power FC, you'll be able to boost 1.2 & make about 380-400HP.

Fucking Mazda sold the 7 saying that it gets 7.2 kilometers/liter (that's 17MPG), RIGHT! I get 4.7 if I keep my foot out of it (11 MPG). When I'm on it, which is ALL the time, I might get 4 flat (9MPG). If I'm doing the street thing, like on my page, that night, I'll be in the 2's (that's about 6MPG)

[Enj01]

You Already know its racing beat!!!11!@#13

lol

[xboxmods]

thanks, very interesting video, when was the video actually made, because they said things such as "for the time" that leads me to believe it was made quite a bit later than when the 1st gen came out.

[aaroncake]

Some time around 2000-2001, just before the RX-8 came out.