I was thinking about the unveiling all day yesterday and into last night. I got up at 6:30am Pacific to begin reading all of the new info and peoples' reactions to the news. But the reactions never came.

The EVO and WRX STi were launched to a frenzy of customer reactions and media coverage. People on other message boards (for those 2 cars) are literally swarming with new posters and tons of cool questions/answers. Why not for the RX-8?

I posted the unveiling info to the Car&Driver Sports/GT cars forum, but only a handful of people have even responded--mostly comments about how little torque there is and how the passenger compartment appears too long for the car. Blah.

This is a revolutionary car. Brand new rotary, 4-door, 4-seater GT car that sports a very cool interior and magnificent overall design. Magazines appear to love it, but why so little positive reaction from the car buying masses? Is it just too unconventional?

I'm puzzled and disappointed.

The 350Z has great performance and a very fresh look. People gawk at it everywhere. The STi and EVO have AMAZING performance yet look like crap. Prices are in the same neighborhood. Then there's the RX-8. It looks very nice but not incredible (don't debate, just my opinion) and the performance is good but not fantastic. It's "in-between" and that might explain why there's no "buzz" surrounding the car. Agree?

 

I think that the RX-8 has taken too long to come to market for most people. As much as we see the value in the car, other people already have gotten over the concept car that was released 4 years ago.

It won't be until the movie comes out and people see it on the street that the excitement will grow again.

 

Well as of today (Jan 7), only the press/media has seen the car. The doors to the public arent open yet. It's an all new car. Give it time. Put a few on the road and watch the heads turn.

 

For me in Europe will sell in larger numbers than previous rotaries (rx-7 II & III),
the problem (almost here in Italy) is post-deal assistance...there is no such roto-specialist around and i don't know if a Ford garage (Ford network in Italy sells Mazda too) is in condition to offer a good repair service....

 

Why am I not surprised?

162 lbs ft of torque. That is the number that will make or break the RX8. It's all about numbers. The RX8 offers 162lbft of torque while everyone else is offering over 200lbft. Most of the RX8’s competition offers over 225. That statistic alone puts the RX8 at a disadvantage. 165lbft of torque tells me that the car will not have that gusty low-end power that Americans love. On paper the RX8 is not special at all.

The Toyota Camry and Honda Accord have more torque than the RX8. Not a good thing, especially considering the RX-8’s sporting focus and competition. I understand that the Rx8 will handily beat the cars just mentioned, but rolling starts (5-60mph) will not be one of the RX8’s strong points, not with 162lbft of torque. The S2000 shares this same characteristic.

I’m hoping for the best. But I can understand the lack of excitement.

 

dont forget that many of us in the public didn't get to se the launch because the server was slammed. i think that is good initial public reaction!

 

When you frequent internet forums it's easy to forget that the general public doesn't even know they exist. Most people don't even read the magazines. They won't know the car even exists until they see it on a TV commercial

 

I'm agreeing with Spoonie. I have to admit that I have lost some excitment for this car in the last month after much thought. Some of the reasons are:
- that for ~30k the car is lacking in torque compared to competitors. For those specs, I'd like the car to weigh ~2500lbs.
- it handles awesome, but a lot of it's competitors handle well enough for most people. In everyday driving, torque is more important than 'ulitmate' handling for probably 90% if the people.
- it is still pretty much a 2+2, even with the suicide doors. The rear passengers cannot get out without the front doors opening. And if I have someone in the front and rear, once the front person gets out, I will have to get out of the car to let the other passenger out too.
- would I be compromising a true sports car and a true passenger car to get one car (losing the best of both worlds)? Why don't I just get a true 4-dr car if I want to carry passengers or get a true sports car if I really want a sports car?

I've really been eyeing the G35 lately and the specs of the Sti has also caught my attention now. I've always thought that I was a fair judge of the average person, and it seems that Mazda does have a lot of competition now. Remember , these are all my pre-testddrive thoughts so I am still reserving final judgement till the car is actually out.

 

i'm also suprised at how dead things have been around here. The Subaru board I'm on was in a frenzy.

Of course, we all knew it was coming (the RX8). This car hasn't been news to us for about a year. The EVO and STi, although we pretty much knew they were coming, were announced for the first time, EVER. The RX8 has been around at US auto shows...it's old hat.

And yeah, with the STi putting out 300lb./ft. of torque, with an adjustable center diff. Well, that's the car to beat this year. I would be suprised if it's not considered best sports car of the year (2004).

 

So many people are looking down upon the RX-8 because of it's "lack of torque." This is unfortunate because the fact that it has 162 lb-ft and another car has 200 lb-ft is absolutely meaningless. The RX-8 does not lack torque. The only "lack of torque" is in the heads of the people who read the "162" number but don't really understand what it does and does not mean.

Let's say I took two RX-8's and prepared a little "Pepsi challenge": For the first car, I pull out the Renesis and put in a V-6 with 210 lb-ft of torque, 90% of which is available from 2300 RPM to it's 7,000 RPM redline. This V-6 has 250 HP. To match this car's new power plant, I'll install appropriately matched gearing. On the second RX-8, I leave everything stock except I replace the tachometer with one that reads incorrectly. This new tachometer reads 7/9 of the actual engine speed. (eg. 7,000 RPM when the engine is really turning 9,000). Now people get to take a drive in each car and decide which one has the faulty tach, and which one has the engine with "more torque". They get ear plugs so the sound of the engine doesn't give it away. Guess what? They will not be able to tell the difference between the two cars. This is because though the V-6 has 210 lb-ft peak torque, the area under it's torque curve is exactly the same as that in the RX-8.

What matters for driveability and that shove that pushes you back in your seat are the area under the torque curve and the gearing of the car. Though the RX-8's peak torque is lower than other car's peaks, the breadth of the RX-8's torque curve is wider. The area under the curve is similar to other cars - there is no lack of torque. I wish more people understood that.

 

good tecnhical example, redrotaryrocket.....
Not forget to talk about how faster rotaries increase rpm's than an alternative

 

Nice comparison Mr Red - I completely agree.

It's like comparing AMD cpus to Intel P4 cpus - just the pure clockspeed (or torque number) tells you very little about relative performance. So AMD invented a multiplier factor so that a 1.6GHz cpu is equivalent to a 2.0Ghz+ P4 (or whatever).

Perhaps we need a 'multiplier' that will give the effective peak torque if the car was limited to a 6000 rpm range like a normal car. What if the torque curve was horizontally squeezed (to fit into 6000 rpm instead of 9000 rpm) and then we moved the curve higher up the vertical axis to keep the total area under the curve the same as before. What would the peak torque be then (hence giving multiplier) - who is up to the challenge? Alternatively let me know if I am just talking gibberish...


JUST EDITED this to say the answer is obvious to me now (duh!).
As the rev range is 2/3 of the original the max torque will be 3/2 times original.

159 * 3/2 = 240 lb ft torque (approx)

A nice large number that most people can relate to. All Mazda has to do is recalibrate the tachometer now...

 

Pelucidor,

Yeah, it would be great if we had a way to equally compare torque values. The problem is that a simple multiplication factor does not take into account the shape of the curve. Taking your idea a step further, I was thinking that all manufacturers should specify the area under the torque curve....integrating the torque across the RPMs. So the new specification would be in units of lb-ft-rpm. You would still have no idea about the car's gearing, but this would be much better as far as comparing car A to car B.

The only problem I see is that manufacturers could fudge their torque by extending the redline to unuseable levels. To combat this, the spec could be area under the torque curve with bounds at some percentage of the peak (90% perhaps).

 

Yes, I also think part of the proplem is that the Rx8/Evolve has been on the autoshow circuit since (was it 1999 when the RX-evolve first showed up in Detroit?) ...

I mentioned to a couple of friends (who love to talk about cars) that "Today is the day" - They didn't care and told me not to hold my breath!

They truly feel sorry for me that I've been waiting so long ... over 3 years to buy my RX-8.

They already know what the car looks like and since their not interested in getting one, themselves, soon (One of them loves his 4 yr old Jeep and the other bought a new G35 coupe last Dec).

One of them mentioned that Mazda is as bad as VW in bring out their new cars (it took about 5 years for the new beetle to come out) and said he'll beliver it when he sees it at the dealership!



Me - I'm still waiting ... :D

 

Good discussion guys,

I previously posted the below on the torque subject:

[RANT]It is unfortunate that much of the public just looks at peak hp and peak torque figures before judging a car. There are a lot of people that compare the peak-torques of the Mazda6 (192) and the rx-8 (159). How many of these people are aware that the rx-8 has several hundred more ft-lbs of [snip ] wheel torque than the Mazda6 while also being about 300 pounds lighter?[/RANT]

We don't need a multiplyer to compare different cars though. The many variables of gearing, weight, torque curve, redline etc can all be taken into account.

See http://www.rx8forum.com/showthread.p...9603#post19603 for an in depth discussion on how these variables affect performance. I will post another graph tomorrow morning that will bring everything together.

Brian

 

:D

Buger and Red, where were you guys about 10 months ago?

 

I'm not sure I am getting this right, but if I understand the effect of torque correctly (based on what I have read here) then I can't agree that torque doesn't matter on the RX-8. I understand that gearing affects torque at the wheel and that any amount can be generated through gearing. What I don't get is the effect this has on acceleration. I can't imagine engineers designing engines to maximize torque if it didn't make a difference. I think the flaw in the argument might be in the rpm range needed due to gearing. If you re-label the tach on the RX-8 to read 7 at 9k rpm, it doesn't change the fact that you still need to make it to 9k in the same time that the other engine (the V6) reaches 7k. The rpms of the Renesis will have to increase faster than the V6.

I can't see why anyone would ever use a 6 or 8 cylinder engine if you could just use a 4 with different gearing. At the very least you will be shifting more often due to the lower gearing unless the higher redline is enough to offset it. Actually now that I think about it, the ratios of the torque values for two cars could be compared to the ratios of their redlines. So if car 1 had twice the torque of car 2 then car 2 would have to have twice the redline if it was geared to have the same wheel torque or you would need to shift more in car 2. I will have to check this out and see if it actually turns out to be useful.

 

Hi Rich,

Are you in the Denver area? I'm in SE Aurora. I was posting about weight, torque, and gearing back then too. Below is a flashback to 10 months ago.

http://www.rx8forum.com/showthread.p...=1213#post1213

Brian

 

Hi Feakhelek,

I see where you are coming from but gearing will not turn any 4 cylinder car into a driveable car that can accelerate fast. Although large amounts of torque can be generated by gearing, a normal 4 cylinder car will be almost undriveable if it is geared too much.

A few reasons the rx-8 gets away with it because:

1. Weight is much lower than comparable cars with heavier engines.
2. Renesis revs much higher than normal engines.
3. Renesis has an unheard of powerband for a high revving engine. (or any engine really)

Cars like the s2000 get complaints because only about 3000 rpms are in the 90% or greater powerband. High ratio gearing makes the short time that is spent in the powerband go by even quicker.

The renesis will not be appreciated by the much of the general public because they are not used to seeing a car that revs like an "import" but has the powerband of a "musclecar".

I need to get back to work now but I will post more on this subject when I get home (probably in the morning).

Brian

 

Thanks for the reply. I hadn't considered the flatness of the torque curve. My mind is eased. I really do hope that your 6 sec 0-60 estimate is on target. I love good handling but I also really love the feeling of a powerful launch.

 

Colorado Springs, Buger. Do you autocross? I may have run into you if you do...

So much in this thread reminds me of the talk about the Miata. Not enought torque, not enough power, unimpressive numbers, on paper everything on the road has it beat, etc. Yet every reviewer goes gaga about it. There's a reason it's the only car ever to win 12 Automobile all-star awards. The P5 has won a bunch of comparison tests despite its lack of power. The 6 is one of Car and Driver's 10 best despite having less power than Accord or Camry.

Mazda makes damn fun cars, despite their unimpressive stats. People who buy cars based on stats won't look at Mazdas, but people who buy cars to drive will. I never really expected the RX-8 to make a huge splash until the reviewers get a hold of it. If Mazda gives it the same fun to drive factor that they put in all their other cars, it'll be the 4-seater to beat in the $30k range for people who care about performance on the road, not on paper.

 

In my opinion, the main reason for the "disappointing" launch was because Mazda hasn't veiled the RX-8 in complete secrecy. We already knew most of the relevant information about the RX-8 and we've been seeing pictures of it for months.

The Evo VIII and WRX STi launch were big hits because both Mitsubishi and Subaru managed to keep them under wraps until release day. The STi's launch caused a bunch of excitement because most people were caught off guard by it. If you read the Impreza boards, nearly everyone was expecting a watered-down version of the 2.0L engine. Instead, Subaru announces a 2.5L (the largest ever in an Impreza) with 300 HP to boot. Not to mention that the rest of the world is getting a less powerful version of the car, which is unheard of, considering that we're almost always treated like the red-headed stepchild by the foreign manufacturers.

I'm still fairly confident that the RX-8 will sell well. It may have come at a bad time, though, since we seem to be at the beginning of a horsepower arms race.

 

Those are some great explanations for what happened today. I really do agree that the public has underestimated the RX-8. But what else is there to see but the specs?? This may turn around when reviewers actually get their hands on the car. I am really looking forward to reading about the production model and how it stacks up against the competition.

 

I think we are over-analyzing the torque bit. Many G35 or BMW buyers don't check torque numbers. First they like the way the car looks, then they test drive it. These are the multitudes who buy the cars in big numbers, not the car nuts like us.

I hate to be the one to bring this up, but...

It is possible the reason for the lack of "excitement" is because the four door sports car concept as executed in the RX-8 misses the mark. A sad possibility, but a possibility nonetheless. Maybe the RX-8 tries to be too many things for too many people.

Does anyone remember the line from the old movie, The Karate Kid? Pat Morita says something like, "Do karate, or don't do karate. Not in the middle, or SQUASH! like bug!"

The RX-8 definitely lies in the middle. Not a pure very high performance sports car (which I wanted) and not a performance sedan (which I have). My Mazda dealer (whom I have a relatively close relationship with) said they have had no inquiries about the RX-8 other than mine.

We will see what happens when it hits the market. At least if the SQUASH! like bug scenario plays out we can look forward to $3,000 dealer incentives.

 

I was at the L.A. autoshow tonight. It was very easy to spot the RX-8 in the Mazda display. IT WAS THE CAR YOU COULDN'T SEE BECAUSE THERE WERE OVER 50 PEOPLE CROWDED AROUND IT!!!!

L.A. show has two cars, the X-men car and red mica #10. The public was very interested in it. Everybody had to get in the back seat. I watched guys over 6' get in the back with no problem. I consistently heard "Its a little tight getting in but there is plenty of room once you are back there." I myself am 6' tall and fit fine. I actually fit better in this car than I did in the rear of the Jaguar S-type.

I heard a number of girls exclaim "Its so cute." So you young single guys should have no problem having girls wanting you to "take them for a ride." The RX-8 is a pure babe magnet.

As expected the public, and the people working the Mazda display are completely clueless about the car. I was so embarrassed to listen to the barker say that the RX-8 is "true to the Zoom Zoom spirit" and that you can be a superhero too. All you need to do is buy this car.

The only negative I was hearing is that the car is too small. I thought it was perfect and far better looking in person than in the pictures. It will truly be a classic.