Gord96BRG

You heard it here first - and this is just MY theory, I haven't seen it suggested anywhere else yet - there have been spy shots published of the next Miata (the NC, with the NA being the 90-97 model and the NB the current 99-2005 model), like in this 4Car article in the UK. They say the car in those photos are of the future MX-5 undergoing testing... however, I've heard elsewhere that the engineering test mules for the NC Miata are wearing NA and NB bodywork, NOT the RX-8 nose.

Now, it's entirely possible that this test mule (note: engineering test mules are often built for testing drivetrain, chassis, and suspension components - the bodywork on these test cars is often cobbled together just to cover it, and is NO indication of what the final car will look like) is an NC MX-5, with the RX-8 nose and NB Miata body panels patched on from the windshield back - but the NC Miata is supposed to be narrower than the RX-8, and that test car looks to have the full-width RX-8 nose. So, it's also possible that the test car is actually a future RX-7 convertible, and the NB Miata body panels (doors, rear fenders, bumper, trunk) are just disguising the RX-7 convertible chassis underneath.

That's my thoughts - that the test mule captured in the spy photos has been mis-identified as an NC Miata, but is actually a future RX-7 convertible!

Regards,
Gordon

From the link above:

Feras

iTrader: (1)

i dunno the rest of the car looks to have the same or similar dimensions and shape to the current miata, could just be a new nosejob for it. Gotta say a miata that looks like an 8 looks nice.

i gotta think the possible next RX-7 would be a little bit larger than that, a miata is tiny, the FD RX-7 is not (even though its light)

PaulieWalnuts

Gordon - great find!!!!!!

The important part here is that the RX-8 platform will be used for the next Miata AND the RX-7 if it's built. The Miata platform has been strengthened as a convertible which would be a drop-in for the RX-7 convertible. And to agree with Gordon, don't forget that the original running test mule for the RX-8/Renesis was a stretched and butchered Miata. It is entirely possible that this is an RX-7 test mule.

Ajax

Honestly, if you look closely at those pictures they look to be very poor photoshops. Look at the doors right behind the front RX-8 fender and you'll see a white blurry section that doesnt seem to fit.

It's especially obvious in picture 2.
Look at the facing fender at the apex, and you'll see a discoloration.

Again, picture 3, behind the front wheel is that discoloration where it looks like someone tried to meld the front and rear bodies.
It just doesnt look real to me and it really doesnt look good either.
This could be someone's attempt at a bolt on front end of an rx-8 onto a miata in order to get a rotary into the miata engine compartment, but i've heard you can do that anyway.

Gord96BRG

There's a discussion about these pics over at the miata.net forums in this thread - they point out that the white test car is actually stretched from the current Miata - it's longer in the nose, and wider as well. Since it's been published by Mazda that the next Miata will be shorter overall than the current Miata (and no wider), that's what leads to the speculation that the test car is NOT the next Miata, but an RX-7 mechanical prototype in disguise. Hmmm...

Regards,
Gordon

Gord96BRG

That's the thing about engineering test mules - the bodywork is cobbled together - it doesn't seem to fit because it doesn't fit, and they didn't care if it fits! The bodywork is absolutely unimportant - neither an NC Miata or RX-7 Convertible would look anything like that car - the bodywork is solely there to cover up the mechanical bits. Yes, the paint is different shades of white on the front and the back of the car - likely because it really IS different shades! Note how the doors and rear fenders don't fit properly over the chassis side rails showing below.

Regards,
Gordon

PaulieWalnuts

And when manufacturers make a test mule, usually isn't it different from what the production car will be? Meaning a test mule that appears to be a Miata is a disguise for the actual car.

project

Those are definately photoshopped. And poorly I might add. I've seen better work by people on this forum. Check out the body panels and the ground. The reflection of light off the body panels is poorly done and the detail in the ground just disappears into grey smudge...

Gord96BRG

Yeah, and look at the fuel filler on the rear fender! Oh, wait - that's hacked because a stock Miata fuel filler is further forward, so the engineers had to patch in a different location to fit the different hardware underneath. Sorry, aside from the graffiti on the track surface (the test track is the Nurburgring, and the surface gets a lot of graffiti painted on it), the areas you've circled in that photo just confirm that it's only hacked up bodywork on a test mule. Nobody is pretending that the bodywork is representative of any future car in the slightest - again, the bodywork itself is of ZERO importance, since it's just a disguise.

Tell me, are the wheels photoshopped? Note that they're 5 lug wheels, and the Miatas are all 4 lugs to date.

Regards,
Gordon

IKnowNot'ing

They might be (poorly) photoshopped, but perhaps with the only objective of cleaning the picture before publishing on internet and in car magazines!

The last mule I saw in flesh, was an early Ford Escape / Mazda Tribute based on a shortened (tranversaly split and awfully re-welded) Mazda MPV platform with prototype powertrain and underpinnings. This mule highlighted by Gordon looks real to me.

IKN

Lufa

Hmmm.... I don't know looks like a hack-level photoshop to me as well.

Perhaps they were trying to touch up their own spy shot prior to submitting it, and they just are not very good at touching up, or had a low res original pic and messed up resizing it and tried to clean up the artifacts or some such.

Definitely digitally altered none the less.

Smoker

The poor bodywork and patch job looks real enough to me to be a real Test Mule. Again, the question is whether the picture is a photoshop product or a real picture. The body work of a real test mule SHOULD look terrible. Those blury section looks real enough to me as puddy used to slap the body panels together.

What's underneath the shell here could very well be the next RX-7 or a Convertible version of the RX-8.

PaulieWalnuts

A couple of points supporting the possibility of it being real.

I blew it up in Photoshop (like to 2000 @ 300dpi) and noticed there is a huge gap between the windshield and hood where the engine compartment and some internals are showing. If this is a chop, replacing the hood and filling in internals would have been a pain.

Also, where the door and front fender meet, there appears to be contact between the two where the scraping matches.

The fact that there are 6 different shots would make this a PITA even for a more advanced PS person to do. Why not just fake one?

Gord96BRG

Now look at all 6 photos - amazing how someone was able to apply the same hack-level photoshop changes to all 6 photos in the identical spots, even though the photos are from all different angles? No, I think the different shades of paint on the back of the front fender and the door are really just actual different shades of paintslapped on those parts to cover hacked bodywork. If you look at the photo of the rear of the car, you can see that the nose of the car is wider than the rest of the car from the doors back, just as if you'd joined an RX-8 nose to a Miata rear section! Obviously, patching together a mechanical mule like that is going to leave patchy paintwork where the bodywork is roughly matched.

Regards,
Gordon

project

Its not that I don't think it couldn't be hacked up body work, I just don't think it is. The reason I didn't point out the fuel door is because it looked like it could possibly be hacked body work where the things I circled looked like poor photoshoping.

And maybe I'm wrong and it is real but like Lufa and others have said, its definately been altered.

Ajax

Well, gordon, you could be very right. I've never seen a production mule so I wouldn't know. It is very logical to just throw a car body together to test something underneath the hood and if this really is the RX-7 project, I'd be happy to see it.

You're also correct that photo to photo, the same poor photoshops is very unlikely.

I wouldn't doubt it's real if it didnt look so bad, but I guess looks are unimportant.

Father LeadFoot

Man Gord, you got your work cut out here trying to convince these guys, all of us in the miata forum just went right along with it. Pidge1114 this car isn't meant to be a concept or anything like that, this car is strictly a suspension/drivetrain test mule, body doesn't matter for sh*t. I've seen Ford F250s testing Mustang drivetrain before, what better a plateform to do heavy load testing on a motor than a heavy pickup?? The point is manufactures do all sorts of wierd stuff to cover up test mules....oh that reminds me the mother of all test mules. In Forza magazine and in Autoweek they had the Enzo test mule, the front of the car was clearly a 348 and the back half looked like a streched testarossa or something grafted together, it looked funky.

The reason it looks like a crappy photoshop job is because the car's body was put together crappy, look at the front end, it doesn't directly resemble the RX8 you can tell its been cut and sectioned to fit that body, the 5 lug in the chassis and if you look at the length of the front end and the placement of the wheels the overall wheel base is much longer than the miata will see, its probably just a straight RX8 chassis. Another reason this car has crappy body on it instead of the body panel covers they normally put on is because its doing high speed testing and so they needed some sort of "realistic" body on their to hold up in high speed track conditions. Whatever it is its not the next miata, its just NB body worked nailed down to a newer chassis, remember RX7 will be 2 seater so throwing a miata rear on it like that would also make sense as its going to be shorter than the RX8.

You know Gord you beat me to it, I was just coming over to post that info. Good analysis on it though. Take it or leave it folks, but your looking at a new chassis, forget the photoshop crap, when a car looks that bad its too hard to tell.

Titanium190

Having seen test mules up close and personal (not allowed to say where or what due to a NDA, so don't ask) and that looks 100% genuine.

The whole front end is tacked onto the rest of the car - the bad wheel arch alignment is a result of the bodywork not fitting the chassis, nothing more.
The straight line running down just infront of the door is the join where the front section is most likey overlapping the body panel beneath.
The door could be any number of things - most likely a dodgy paintjob and that's taken a beating in testing.
The strange bit behind is most likely another poor merge of different body panels that just don't fit on the car properly. If it is indeed a different size from the old MX5/Miata, then the panels they're using won't fit anywhere near correctly.
The fuel filler is just patched up, no doubt as the chassis underneath has it in a different place.

You think the outside is bad?! You should see the interiors of these things... wire bundles, sensors and computers left right and centre. And very hot most of the time to boot!

greese

The RX8 book my dealer gave me has some pictures of he RX8 test mules and that is about what they looked like. Some of them were Miata's they hacked up. Come to think of it these pictures look famliar. I am going to take a better look at my book when i get home.

greese

PaulieWalnuts

Greese. Can you scan the Miata one and post it? Anybody who thinks this Miata looks bad, wait until you see the RX-8 one.

zoom44

HMMM. I DONT REMEMBER A MIATA BASED TEST MULE FOR THE RX-8 BUT I BELIEVE THERE WAS A 626 MULE FOR THE RX-8. THESE PICS LOOK STIKINGLY SIMILAR TO OTHER MAZDA TEST MULE PICS I HAVE SEEN AND LOOK GENUINE TO ME.

greese

According to the book they gave me, almost all of the develoment of the 8 was done on old Miata mules.

I don't have any way to scan the pictures out of the book. They may be online somwhere though.

sectachrome

its not the new 7. first of all, i highly doubt they would make a convertible version, and second, its just an mx5 body with an 8 nose slapped on, look at the taillights.

Rotarian_SC

I agree, does look like a real test mule. The look of the ground under the car didn't look right in one pic, but I looked through all of the pics and the others ones seem accurate.