Five milestone Mazda models

Monday, 4 November 2019

Watch: one lap of Mazda's museum in Hiroshima.

Mazda makes plenty of very mainstream cars; it's a small company by automotive standards, but one that competes hard for volume nevertheless.

But Mazda is also a brand that has a well-deserved reputation for going its own way in so many different ways, from engine technology to exterior design.

Here are five that really stand out as being daring, unique and influential for their time. But there could be lots more, really.

Mazda-Go Type-DA

Type-DA was officially a Mazda, but distributed by Mitsubishi - hence the logo on the tank.

The first 'Mazda' was a three-wheeled truck: the brand name was a reference to Ahura Mazda, God of Light, but also a phonetic nod to founder Jujiro Matsuda.

* Friday flashback: Mazda's rorty rotary

Mazda was the only company to make rotary work properly. It went into an awesome little sports car, the Cosmo Sport 110S.

* What is Mazda hiding in its basement?

* Mazda celebrates rotary engine's 50 years**

Legendary 787B is the only rotary car to win Le Mans. Until 2018 it was the only Japanese one as well.

The earliest was the 1931 Type-DA (distributed by Mitsubishi), but one of the more interesting was the 1938 Type-GA 'Green Panel', which had a four-speed gearbox that improved fuel economy by 20 per cent. The SkyActiv of its time?

Following the end of the Second World War and the atomic bomb attack on its home city of Hiroshima, Mazda made it top priority to get manufacture of the trucks going again. The compact, practical three-wheelers played a crucial role in remobilising and rebuilding the city.

Cosmo Sport 110S

Mazda MX-5 celebrates 30 years in 2019. And a lot of those 30-year-old ones are still going strong.

The 1967 Mazda Cosmo Sport 110S was a triumph for many reasons. It marked the success of Mazda where so many had failed: to get the rotary engine design of German engineer Felix Wankel working in a production car. In your face(s) Alfa Romeo, Citroen, Ford, General Motors, Mercedes-Benz, Nissan, Porsche, Rolls-Royce, Suzuki and Toyota.

So yes, the Cosmo Sport 110S was the car that showed Mazda wasn't afraid to be bold. It also happened to be a pretty cool and exclusive little sports car (only 1176 built), with a nimble rear-drive chassis and styling inspired by the iconic models of the day from Ferrari and Jaguar - but also very much its own thing and now an enduring styling exercise in its own right.

787B

We won't bang on about rotary engines for the whole time, honest. But the racing success of rotary technology deserves a mention and there's one car that really captured a moment.

The Mazda 787B, with a 2.6-litre four-rotor powerplant, won the 1991 24 Hours of Le Mans endurance race. Any Le Mans victory is special of course, but the Mazda's was and is a landmark because it's still the only non-reciprocating engine to have won the race. And arguably the one with the most memorable paint job.

For a long time it was also the only victory by a Japanese maker. But Toyota Gazoo Racing's TS050 took the trophy in 2018 and 2019, albeit with a boring piston engine.

MX-5

The MX-5 celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. Back in 1989 it wasn't an especially original idea; in fact, Mazda happily admits the MX-5 was its own version of the classic British and Italian roadsters of the 1960s.

What made it so bold was that literally nobody was making such a purist car in the 1980s. What made it so great was the way it departed from the original formula by starting every time and not leaking oil all over the driveway.

The little car's longevity is partly due to Mazda's commitment to keeping it authentic: it's never had too much power, never had too much grip and it's always been available with a manual transmission, despite embracing new two-pedal technology along the way.

MX-30

This could easily be about Mazda's forthcoming SkyActiv-X engine, a world-first combination of petrol and diesel engine technologies. But the Japanese maker's new MX-30 EV-SUV is the car of the moment, because Mazda's take on EV tech is different to most other makers.

It has calculated a relatively small 35.5kWh battery is the best balance between range and whole-of-life environmental impact. It believes sound adds to the driving experience, so the MX-30 will make a noise. And Mazda reckons 'one pedal driving' is not for the enthusiast, so you won't get a lot of slowing-regen when you lift off the throttle.

There's more to come, including range-extender models with a rotary generator. Will go nicely with those RX-8-style Freestyle back doors.