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But it also depends on the customer...the WRX is selling very well, and a large percentage are manuals. I don't even think that the EVO comes with an automatic. These sales are being driven by an enthusiast market. More and more people are realizing that their commute everyday can be a little more interesting with a stick (just as most would recoil in shock at the thought of driving a stick in rush hour.)
I will mostly agree with your above descriptions. (I forgot the supra had a back seat.) What I think you mostly left out was price.
GTX mazda...was ahead of it's time. Did not have the advantage that WRX, etc had of Rally video games, etc. Plus was a high priced cheap compact. (And a hatchback to boot, which turns a lot of consumers off.)
Supra...priced way too high. Great car, one of the best, but my friend was looking at high end convertibles a couple of years ago. I suggested the S2000, since at the time it bested the Z3 and Audi for a much better price. He laughed in my face...a Honda he scorned. I am buying for the name, I could care less about the car itself. The Supra fell into the same boat...people buy "sports cars" for image, not the car itself.
MR2...you explained why that did not sell already.
fx-16, vr-4, acura...all were "expensive add-ons" (like 4 wheel drive) to "normal" cars. Like you said, this makes it very expensive. Hard to justify when you are going to buy a cheap compact (fx-16), and nice family car (vr-4), or a slightly upscale family car (acura).
Which is why the 225 hp Sportif will never be a sales success unless it comes in under a certain price. Even I can't justify spending $5000 more on a compact car just for the performance. Now if they do what counts, put the 225 hp engine in, upgrade suspension, steering and wheels, and leave out anything else extra (like 500 watt stereo, etc), then they can sell a hipo car for 2k or less extra. Would this sell better? It would to me, since I could justify the extra money.
The nice thing about Mazda is they engineer a certain amount of "sport" into all their cars. I can go buy a Protege ES, and already I have a fun to drive car. At the local Honda or Toyota shop, I would have to upgrade the suspension and tires before I could get that Mazda feeling.
Time will tell how the 6 sells...if last month is a good indicator, it will sell very well indeed.
Per C&D in '95, the eldest-design Camry SE still took 1st place slightly ahead of the more powerful Maxima SE & the Accord. But that was no big deal, as that Nissan-shallow-suspension Maxima also had a rather vague steering & poor driving position/seating comfort. & that Accord might be just ok. I agree the Camry SE was the most hard-edge macho car of the 3.
To me, the Camry feels unsafe only when there are bumps in the fast corners, but none of my other cars gets thrown around, especially the rear, over mid-corner bumps like that! Especially when the road surface was slightly damped... The culprit could be the combination of rigid firmness setting & the nature of the poor tire-contact angle due the simple rear strut design.
I was saying that it's too bad that this handsome roomy sport sedan satisfied neither the comfy-family-car crowd nor the driving enthusiasts. At first, in '93, I thought the Camry SE's specially tuned steering, which felt firm & SEEMED to got some feel, was much better than the ones in the Lexus ES300 & GS/LS. But it's still no good.
& ride comfort wise, these short-suspension-travel cheap design of the 20th-century Camry/ES300 was very uncomfortable over deeper bumps compare to Toyota's own GS300 & even my re-tuned Protege.
Those high-tech expensive Supra, etc., couldn't sell because most people don't even corner fast. I do, especially I've been practicing on those natural roller-coaster uphill/downhill hair pins in Palos Verdes California pretty much all my life.
That's why Toyota invented the Paseo - a Tercel looking like a sport coupe at nearly as low price.
People liked the original Scirocco for its looks, 'cause the Rabbit does just as well w/ more room & lower price. That's why the uglier & still-expensive Scirocco II couldn't sell.
If most car companies merge into one, just take the Beemer platform & combine w/ a good Japanese drivetrain, electronics, etc., & you're done. The car will also be inexpensive & reliable.
So these days, the Mazda3 w/ the world-class FWD platform from Europe solves the problems of price, etc. Besides the economy Mazda2, no other Japanese car other than the Mazda3 got it! Those "Lotus-tuned" suspensions in some Isuzus & Protons(old-Mitsubishi-based car from Malaysia) are still unsophisticated Japanese designs.
Are you saying the Mazda2 has the Focus platform?
I would guess that it would since it will be made in Japan and the Focus won't.
The Focus, Mazda3 and Volvo S40 will share 60% of parts. I don't know which ones, but that's the official word.
Are you saying the Mazda2 has the Focus platform?"
The Fiesta platform. A tiny little car maybe the Canadians will get.
The Mazda4 is like the Focus C-max - another low-center-of-gravity sporty car w/ huge back seat & even got an optional 3rd-row seat.
Its great to see others remember the GTX. If mazda is really putting AWD on the 6 wagon, maybe a 3 GTX is possible after all.
Any word on traction/stability control in the 3, or opinions on it in the 6?
I'll bet they don't detune it because it will be a Mazdaspeed version of the Mazda3, not to mention that there are cars out there like the Neon SRT and WRX. The Mazdaspeed 6 will surely have more than 225 hp.
About 5 speed manuals I here the Honda Civic and BMW 3 Series have alot of people that purchase those cars with manual transnissions. About the Maxima its terrible styling has to contribute for lousy sales since the 2000 model year. The 95-99 Maxima was discounted because of its goofy styling for the 95 model year but eventually people started buying the Maxima and demand for the 95-99 Maxima incereased as time went on thus giving it pretty good resale value and was on the Top 10 list of cars sold in the mid to late 90's period.
For example, the Mazda6. Is the ones the rest of the world gets that are built in Japan really that much better than the ones built in the United States? What are the advantages of having it built in Japan?
I'm still not sure what they're talking about. Are they saying that Mazda3 will have closer to 50/50 weight distribution or what? Why is the less RWD-handling-like Focus II more agile? Less understeer?
Once, CAR mentioned that the Lexus IS200 "feels fantastic" because it's not like those cars that lean over the front when pushed to the corners. My '90 Protege LX feels not unlike the IS200's description. Maybe this is a typical Mazda setting. Any opinion?
Other info in that article - For the Euro market, arriving late this year in hatchback only(I forgot if that also includes a 3-dr hatch) Other than that, they said a new 150hp 2.0, but no 158hp 2.3.
The last generation of Protege/P5, the longitudinal "pivot axis" is designed to point slightly downward, i.e., lower in front and higher in the back. This allows a greater stability at high speed.
Bruno
The whole thing comes down to attitude. Japanese engineers strive for perfection in everything they do. They also follow the law of continuous improvement, always finding ways to reduce waste, whether it be wasted material, time or money. Without opening a big can of worms, I believe the plants in Japan are union free, not to knock unions, there are some positives to them. It's just that I've worked in both environments and the attitudes of the workers change once the union comes in. Just my opinion though.
I do strongly believe that it is the mentality of the Japanese that is responsible for the high quality coming out of the Japanese plants.
If you think about it, December is not that far from now. That's only five more months before we see the M3 out in the streets
Dinu
I think both engines are available in both the sedan and the 5-door, but not entirely sure at this point.
At the February Canadian International Autoshow in Toronto, Mazda had Canadian-spec Mazda6 sedans (Flat Rock), as well as a Mazda6 hatch and wagon (Hofu, Japan). The exterior fit and finish of the Japanese built ones were significantly better (we weren't allowed to sit inside, but the cloth of the Japanese ones were better too). Funny thing is that I later found out from another forum that a bunch of people felt exactly the same way as me.
So while there's a Flat Rock assembled Mazda in my garage, I really do believe that the Japanese ones are better - hence I'm getting a Mazda3 over a Mazda6.
And to keep this post on topic, thanks groovy for the info. Please share with us all the specs/options/release dates as you get them - they are particularly useful to me because I get zero info from Mazda Canada.
In 1973-74 we had the Oil Embargo when the Arab producers cut back on exports almost forcing gas rationing in the U.S. I had a new '72 Riviera, which I sold at half what I paid for it for a quick sale. And bought a '73 Audi Fox (which eventually became the VW Fox when Audi introduced the A4). Hondas sales took off fast when GMC, Ford, and Chrysler didn't have small cars, and wouldn't have for two to three years. The first Honda Accord was a car smaller than the current Protegé and buyers paid premium prices for them with up to 6-months waiting lists.
None of the Japanese cars were as refined as they are today. I had a '71 Toyota Corona that would never run, had more mileage on the tires being towed to the dealer than driving it. Turned out the timing chain was set wrong, but the dealer couldn't find the problem. I had sold it when it was running a little.
It was in the following years when Japanese car buyers noticed a great increase in reliability and refinement and complained to American car manufacturers about their build-quality -- Why can't you do this? Their excuse was labor unions.
Mazda is a niche car builder, but I read in the Washington Post, yesterday, that GMC, Ford, and Chrysler are becoming niche builders -- "cars designed just for you", with 5 or more models each coming out in the next four years. They have no other choice: people want cars that make them feel "special", not cookie-cutter knock-offs of more successful brands. They want them unique and with utility and high-style.
What buyers were offered in the latter part of the 20th Century were good cars, but not from the Big Three. Now THEY are going to have to get their acts together or else. But I still wouldn't buy American! I remember all too well the cars made to fall apart in 3 years.
Wonder if Toyota and Honda will drop their 5-point grilles and let Mazda have them exclusively?
fowler3
Go start an "Endless Boring Arguments that Never End" thread and seclude yourselves there.
Groovy...I apologize for posting another non-Mazda3 post. I don't believe I am arguing, just passing on information concerning a question previously posted. Trust me, if I had any new information on the 3 I would post it. Right now, we don't have any info on the 3, except that it will most likely be built in Japan, so hence the Japan vs. American plant discussion.
Unfortunately, probably for 2-3 more months this thread will be mostly dead from lack of information.
The article went on to say that the Mazda3 wagon and hatchback will be somewhat similar, with the hatch being more sporty. But it said to expect the Mazda3 sedan to be drastically different from the wagon and hatch versions.
It also mentions how MAZDA is taking a gamble with the Mazda3 because it is replacing Mazda's hottest seller, the protégé. I think that is an interesting comment being that if you stop and think about it, Mazda couldn't go wrong with 6 because it was replacing the aging 626 and Millennia. But replacing a hot, little number like the protégé is another thing.
would love to see what the M3 sedan will look like and how different will it really be from the other two versions of the M3. I guess we won't know till Frankfurt
Will that be the first "official" unveiling of the M3?
Dinu
I have seen the picture of the Sedan, and it looks quite different.
As for the wagon, it's new to me that Mazda will introduce such version. Notice that the dimensions of the blue car (hatch) are proportionally close to the P5. The wagon probably look more like the Focus wagon. I doubt about the availability of the wagon for the US market.
Bruno
I too have seen a pic of the sedan (posted a link way back last fall - 2002 here), but don't know if it's the real car or a Photoshop impression...
Do you have a link for a pic of the REAL car?
Also, do you know of any good (something like C&D in NA, evo or Car magazine from the UK) French auto sites? - since you're there now
Dinu
Don't worry, I'm your trully spy in this side of the pond. ;-)
Bruno
bluong1, are there any new pictures (like the ones from MazdaUSA) up on mms-press.com?
dinu, the Mazda3 will be unveiled on Sep. 10, 2003 in Frankfurt.
Dinu
Bruno
Too bad Mazda cheapened out on the 'piano-black' instrument panel, it would have made the interior much more upscale.
I mean, we are two months away from September and still no pics of the 3 sedan. I also have seen those pictures of the 3 sedan (the two pics in dark blue of the side front and side back) To be honest with you, I wasn't too impress when I saw them. But who knows, maybe it will be different once in comes out. According to the article I read, the sedan will be much different than the hatch.
Bruno
I really hope they use the two-tone leather color seats like in the MX Sportif. I thought that looked pretty sweet.
I love the grille work for both cars they show on their website. I actually like the sports grille better.
Frankfurt (Sep):
- Mazda3 sedan and Mazda3 hatch
Tokyo (Oct):
- A two-door rotary-engined concept. Basically this is the first of a series of concepts that may (will?) become the next RX-7 (similar to how there were a series of concepts that eventually became the RX-8).
Detroit (Jan):
- ???
Geneva (Mar):
- Mazda4 (Mazda's version of the Ford Focus C-Max, won't come to N. America)
I guess I wasn't paying enough attention
Dinu