If we take this back to the original point, we all can agree that there are far more RX-7 sold then 8's. So as I originally asked it seems that the RX-7 did not suffer the carbine clogging as badly as the 8, is this attributed to the side porting or is there another issue that is causing this increase problem with the 8? Possibly closer tolerances are to blame.

 

Your question was answered in the Tech Garage section.

 

Direct from mazdausa's site...

"While the third-generation (FD3S) 1992-1998 Mazda RX-7 is often credited with giving the rotary sports car supercar status, it was the second-generation FC3S RX-7 (produced from 1986-1991) that put the RX-7 nameplate on the mainstream map. Coming on the heels of the original FB Mazda RX-7 (1979-1985), the FC3S took the world class handling and performance traits of the revolutionary FB and refined them. The results were obvious as the 1986 RX-7 was nominated as Motor Trend's 1986 Import Car of the Year, made its way onto Car and Driver's Ten Best list for 1987, and recorded a best-ever sales year of more than 86,000 RX-7s in the U.S. alone for 1986."

http://www.mazdausa.com/MusaWeb/disp...e32#modsummary

While you may think you know where my information is coming from, at least I know I'm not pulling incorrect information out of my ***. The detriment to your argument is that you're dead wrong and the RX-8 hasn't sold nearly as well as the FC.

2003: 12,346
2004: 23,690
2005: 14,673
2006: 9,343
2007: 5,767
2008: 912 (through March)

66,731 total for the RX-8 and still about 20k short of just the first year FC sales. Would you still like to stand behind your original statements?

Lastly, I don't even know what you're getting at with the platform sharing nonsense. Simply because the RX-8 has contributed to other cars doesn't mean the RX-8 will stay in production. Those cars can still use that platform should the RX-8 go out of production.

 

Congratulations. You've paired one year of FC production and then mated it US RX-8 figures. US import of the RX-8 has consistently been no more than 40% of the global market. The FC was biased much more drastically to North American sales comprising a significantly higher percentage than what the RX-8 has been. And after the first few years, FC figures look like 2006 RX-8 US sales.

Anyone that is close to me, is aware how much I've thoroughly researched this subject and that my sources to confirm my assertions came straight from individuals that would know this information first hand. Read between the lines, if you're capable of that. My reasons for doing so and going to such lengths are my own.

And if you don't understand the correlation to platform sharing and how that may allow Mazda to continue the RX line than I'm going to have to suggest some sort of Short Bus level manufacturing accounting and financial analysis program.

 

Well Mr. "Misinformation Director", since you have first hand information perhaps you'd like to share the total RX-8 production thus far compared to the FC production. Your statement that Mazda has "sold as many RX-8s as, if not more than, the widely successful 2nd generation RX-7" seems to be quite wrong. You've shown nothing to back up your original statement.

If you think that a car company will keep a car going simply because it shares a platform you're dead wrong. If it's losing them enough money it simply doesn't matter. Some companies will continue to make cars that lose them money. If in fact the RX-8 has lost Mazda money perhaps they'll continue to produce it anyhow. However, that doesn't change the fact that simply because the MX-5 shares a chassis has little to no bearing on if the RX-8 stays in production.

 

RX's are like McRibs.

They come back every so often and people go, "Ooh they're back".

People geek out and buy em up. Soon people get tired of them. Sales wane. McDonalds pulls the plug.

Expect the same from Mazda.

(BTW, I STILL love this car but hate McRibs.)

 

both of you are wrong.

1. mazda has sold way more rx8s than 60k. link

2. the rx8 in no way out old the rx7.

 

mmmmmm..... McRibs. When are they coming back? I'm starving...

 

How can the rx-8 outsell three generations of RX-7s? It's like saying the Ford 500 outsold Taurus?
The RX-8 or any RX-car does not need to be a sales leader, in fact it can be a loss leader too like many upper-end cars. As long as it helps with the branding, and therefore pull potential buyers in then that's alright as well. The 8 is sale is healthy enough over the years otherwise Mazda would've pulled the plug long time ago like the FD. Same with the Supra for Toyota.

 

1.) I/we were speaking of North American/US sales. Hence the words "in the US" and "North American sales"...

2.) It outsold the FD, the FB and FC were much better sellers than the RX-8 with the FC production being close to 2X (or at the least close to 100k more) the amount of the RX-8 and the FB being close to 3x.

 

Your numbers are quite incomplete... as of Jan 08 Mazda has sold this many RX-8 models world wide:

2003 = 60,100
2004 = 50,813
2005 = 27,837
2006 = 23,463
2007 = 9,343


Or (again as of Jan 30th 08): 171,557 total. Or course if you add the 08 and 09 models world wide already sold, you will see that the FE has easily outsold the FC. These numbers are confirmed by Mazda Japan.

BTW, if you look at the Jan 13th Press release from Mazda, you will see:
which if they wrote before year end totals were in, it was only around 4000 short of the total reported on Jan 30th 08.

The numbers you posted are just for US sales. <edit> Whoops looking at your numbers a 2nd time, you have some number so mixed up... not sure where you got them from... for example you have the total 2007 sales listed as 2006 on your numbers and stuff like that. They don't match to anything. Where again did you get them? <End edit>

The FC only sold 174,142 (world wide) total.
86 72,760
87 38,345
88 27,814
89 16,249
90 9,743
91 6,986
92 2,245 (includes special edition 501 convertibles made in Jan 1992 and renumbered 91 Turbos sold in Europe as 92 models).

But all this is dumb anyway. Mazda has already started development on the 2nd gen RX-8 (not to be confused with the 09 RX-8- but rather the SF3P/FF)... the 8 is not going anywhere it is too successful (despite naysayers like Ike).


Gas is already $4 a gallon in California... so what? The Z, the S2K, the 3 series all get within 1 or 2 MPG city of the RX-8... If you drive a performance car, you are going to pay...

I actually welcome gas prices getting to $6 a gallon... maybe then there will be less idiots on the road because they can't afford the gas.

 

If you would read the actual posts and the context in which they're posted as well as the clearly stated post above yours you'd realize that the numbers you quoted are North American RX-8 sales. They are the numbers that Mazda is reporting to news sources http://www.reuters.com/article/press...08+PRN20080103 Unless I made a typo they should be accurate.

If your numbers are accurate for the FC then I certainly owe Red Devil an apology. The US sales vs. worldwide sales scewed my assuming they are correct numers. I'm curious as to your source for those numbers considering you seem to be the only source I can find for them. It also seems odd that Mazda would list '86 sales being 86,000 on their site if it's no an accurate number. Though if your numbers are calendar year and Mazda's are MY then that could explain it. It's interesting to see the sales nosedive for the FC similar to that of the RX-8. Other cars typically tail off, but not nearly that drastic.

Since Red Devil brought up Wikipedia they have a claim of 811,634 RX-7's produced and a claim of 474,565 FB's produced. Beyond that I believe there were around 70k FD's produced. That leaves us with around 267k for the 2nd gen if those numbers are accurate. I realize that Wikipedia is hardly a reliable source but I'm curious where those numbers might be coming from.

Lastly, maybe Mazda does consider the RX-8 a success... However, they did fall well short of their stated goals and sales have decreased dramatically each MY. Call me a naysayer if you like, but I really hope Mazda continues on the with RX-8. I'd love to see how they improve on it.

 

I seriously doubt that mazda will stop making rotary engines, when parent company Ford tried to axe the project to make the renesis, the engineers simply designed something on their own time and presented what is the current engine to the execs, it was so good that they had no choice but to say "let's make it".

Mazda has kept faith in the rotary non stop since the late 60s and the fact that they are mounting it into the Furai says something. The Furai isn't just a concept car, it's a functional race car, and the designer has stated in more than one interview that it would be a mistake to discount it ever going into production. Call it stubbornness on their behalf or whatever you like, but I doubt mazda would go to the extent of developing the 16x engine if they didn't plan to keep the technology alive for another 5 year production run starting at the moment that the engine is actually perfected.

A Furai with a 24x engine that can run on ethanol, hydrogen or regular gas sitting in my garage... I'd cream my pants right on the spot.

 

rx line is about to die, period

 

<soapbox>
If you mean "big boys" as "big government" then you are correct. I can tell you exactly why crude is over 110 dollars a barrel. Our government has regulated the oil business in the US to the point where they can't drill known oil sources in our country because some enviromentalist is worried about a stupid titmouse. They would rather let the Chinese drill off the coast of Cuba and steal our oil that's near Florida. And since the fed gov loves to also destroy our dollar it only makes sense that a foreign traded commodity would get more expensive. It has nothing to do with "big business", it has all to do with the idiots in congress who know nothing about science, know nothing about free-trade and capitolism, know nothing about the rules of supply and demand, and have forgotten to read the US Constitution for themselves and remember what the reason was why we had a revolutionary war in the first place. That's why crude is over 110 dollars a barrel. And it's only going to get worse. Freedom and Liberty is in it's death throws... and it's only going to take a wake-up call to fix it.
</soapbox>



-- I think the RX8 could be more efficent but if I remember rightly the RX8 sacrifices fuel economy for higher EGTs which leads to better emissions.

 

Almost all because of oil futures traders. Unless, of course, you have a good conspiracy theory...

 

Well, reading these posts I believe the RX8 is currently in the category of the S2000 in terms of it's purpose. However, the massive supply b rought into the market in 2004 verifies Mazda wanted to try and create a greater volume of a car more then just enthusiasts would buy. Unfortunately, the hype wore off fast, and in reality the rear seats, lots of available trims, and suicide doors would be eliminated if this truly was like the S2000 in terms of purpose. It's hard to compare it to a 350z because the 350z marketwise is a far greater success. It really isn't and was meant to be the best of both worlds, as a practical sports car.

With the soaring gas prices, a car and an engine that requires more care and attention, people who buy Hondas and don't maintain them can't get this kind of car.

It reminds me of my father. he buys a new car, just drives it, and changes the oil at 7500 miles, doesn't worry about anything else, and trades it in before it reaches 100k. If he bought an RX8, he'd ruin that car before 50k with his neglegence. Many people are like this, so the car has now taken on a new identity.

In the future, I recommend Mazda make a 2 door pure sports car as it's flagship. The RX8 as is can be greatly improved as pure sports car. The practicality of it makes it uch more of a daily driver then an S2000 perhaps, but unless it can get the gas mileage or reliability, it seems like it's stuck, but Mazda doesn't want to take the rotary off the market, because too much has been invested, and it does get people in the door to perhaps buy a different car like someone mentioned.

 

Actually Miata numbers have always followed a simular curve, as well as many other sports cars. The Z followed the same curve in the 90's.

With the FC the biggest reason for the drop off was the dollar to Yen. When the FC came out you could get a base model for around $12k... by '90 the cheapest base FC was nearing $20k.

Of course that is what killed the FD in America as well... Mazda completely mis-judged the market and sales had tanked so bad that the FD replacement was already being developed by late 92 (both the P797 (RX-01) and P007 (which as most of us know, that with later tweaks became the RX Evolve show car and lead the way for the RX-8).

No way in hell that they made 464,565 SA/FB models. The absolute best year's sales for the FB was only around 50K. Even if every single year of the SA/FB sold 50K (which they didn't) that would be only 400,000. I'd be rather surprised if there were actually as many as 70K FD's made, but I will look to confirm.

Obviously the wiki is (as usual) is rather wrong when it comes to RX-7 Production.

And my numbers come from Mazda Japan.

 

most sports cars follow a similar curve. it becomes the "hot car of the year" and many people buy it. next year it is forgotten for the new big thing.

i believe the miata and the bmw z roadsters are the only 2 to continue to sell well after their first year.

 

Ok, I'm slow...not sure what you are saying. Maybe that due to the design of the rx8 it cannot compare to the 350z because of the back seat and rear doors? Or are you saying due to these two things one cannot compare the 8 to other sport cars? Does not matter at all to me one way or the other really...just trying to understand this part of your post. Again...me be slow

To me, as I thought about it while driving the other day...deep thoughts you know...not...I felt that I was driving a sports car even though it had back seats. I guess I feel that partly due to the fact that it feels small...well at least small in regards to me feeling one with the car yet I have the back seats to toss packages/book bag into plus the rear truck so that gives it the large functional thing. Don't know, I would miss the large things the rx8 offers if it went to a 2 door only model.

I wonder how true this is for Mazda. I realize having the vet is for sure a GM halo car but does the world (well at least USA) think, when they want to go look for a car, to say 'man...I need to go check out a Mazda...because I remember they have that cool rx8 model...won't buy it most likely but it makes me want to walk in the door'. Hum, not so sure about that but maybe I'm off the mark on this thought.

If making the rx8 a true 2 door (well with hatch back) would allow it to up the mpg mileage then guess it could get my vote. Why not just do the retro thing like many of the other car companies and bring out a rx7 1st gen model with all the current engine improvements and such? Sounds like a good post...which I will now go do.

 

Looking at the Miata production numbers the FC and RX-8 drops are far more dramatic. Yes, the Z32 followed a similar curve, but it had a price similar to that of the RX-8 today 20 years ago. All the other cars in its class suffered a similar fate of poor sales due to price and willingness to pay big money for a Japanese car. I would also point to other factors moreso than the yen. I would imagine many people that might have dropped the money on a FC in 89-91 bought a DSM or MKII MR2 instead (I did).

Anyhow, I also came across the 1,094,416 number for RX-7 production. Just considering how many rotary powered vehicles Mazda has claimed to sell your numbers feel low. However, I have no freaking clue how successful Mazda's other rotary cars were.

Lastly, I'm almost sure that there were between 69-70k FD's produced. I'll look it up later since I've gotta run.

 

Here's one source I found for FD production http://www.rx7.net.nz/fd-jp-models.html

 

With gas at $4/gal, there won't be any more McRibs.

 

you probably will see aspike w/ the 2009 model.