It's bad news for Mazda for sure, but on the up side, that means... what? at least a half year less worth of RX-8's on the roads in the next few months. So given the sales, that's about 15,000 less, or maybe more.

 

The blaze lasted 7 hours. That sounds like a long time to me.

 

sounds like i have a limited edition 05... =/
I wonder how much of a negative impact this will have on aftermarket development.

 

You read my mind! I still don't have mine back, btw.... over five months now.

 

that's crazy

 

Wow...that sounds like REALLY bad news

 

I bought her back on July 17th, 2003 -- the first week they were in the USA. I'd had her for exactly one year and two days when she got wrecked, and she's been at the bodyshop ever since.

They tried to tell me she was ready two weeks ago, but they had failed to notice a bad vibration in the drivetrain that I immediately felt when I started the car -- they thought it was "normal". It was, in fact, motor mounts that had sheared at the time of impact. So the car is still there; the motor mounts are fixed but now they're apparently having a problem getting my insurance co. to pay for them since they had already submitted the "final" estimate ($16,800+).

I just hope to have her back for Christmas at this point.

edit: I just posted the links to the two articles over at Miataforum.com as well -- one of those articles mentioned that the affected factories produce the "Roadstar" (sic) which I assume must mean the Miata RoadstEr.

 

Oh man this sucks!

I'm with rx8wanahave, hope this isn't going to affect bargaining power at the dealer now. Just when I was going to start shopping ><

At least no one was hurt.

On the lighter side maybe they can actually build this 'second special edition' now

https://www.rx8club.com/lounge-4/second-special-edition-2005-rx-8-a-47739/

EDIT: hmm wait, maybe that was the point of his thread, I read it before reading this news, hehe my bad :D

 

I hopethis doesnt affect the availability of parts. This remindsme of a big negative to owning a rotary engine (especially a brand newone like the Rx8). Therearent any other cars out there w/interchangeable parts.

 

So does this mean that a new color scheme of "Fire Engine Red" will be introduced?

 

This is scary. I guess we wait from news from Mazda regarding how this will affect availability of the RX8 in the future. My question to Mazda is "how many of the 2005 models were built, and how long if any will there be a window where RX8s' won't be available to the public?" This car might not be able to survive a long period of unavailability. Particularly if this slows development of a Mazdaspeed RX8. If the market dries up, tuner development may also wane as they need owners to purchase the parts once they are made. If Mazda finds itself unable to offer RX-8s to the US public they still need to try to keep demand up, perhaps by offering more tuner/performance parts themselves or by help boosting the aftermarket tuners to keep this car "top of mind" for enthusiasts. Maybe now's the time to get existing 8s higher up the performance ladder.

 

Most car company’s have some level of flexible architecture combined with a level of spare capacity in the event they have a hot seller and need to produce more of that unit. Since we know that the Miata is coming on line soon and will share some of our components, they must be building it at another location since it sounds like this one is full up and didn’t list the Miata.

What I’m more worried about, is where the engines are built, b/c that is a job done mostly by hand, with older equipment that dates back aways. I don’t know if that is housed at that facility or not. If the engine production is ok, there will be a minor disruption 2-3 months, and I bet they will be back on line. If the engine production equipment was damaged, then we have a problem.

 

it did list the miata, on the reuters site

this is particuarly damaging to the model, as it's not exactly a ford taraus and Mazda is one of the smaller Japanese manufacturers. on the other hand, they may just give up on the se3p and come out with a new model once the factory is operational, making our cars rarer.

 

I read something else interesting with the original article on the site with the fire news....

In addition to the other models, Miata's are assembled there as well. Ordinarily, Mazda shuts down production between December 24th, and January 5th, so the hope is that they don’t fall too far behind. At this point, Mazda cannot say for sure that the Ujina plant will be operational by the 6th. The plant had not been running at full capacity, so perhaps when it reopens, they can make up for the downtime.

The initial estimates are that 470 cars were damaged – about half a day’s supply. Couple that with the additional downtime and Mazda will be short about a week’s supply of cars. In the U.S., the only Mazda vehicle that is in short supply is the Mazda3. Fortunately, those are not assembled at the Ujina No. 1 plant

So my thought is that the 8's will be ok for a while. There isn't too much demand for people buying 8's now in the winter time and by the time people are wanting too I think the plant or plants will be up and running again. As for people who are still waiting on their pre order 05' editions and/or parts needed to repair their current RX-8 might be out of luck for a while. Who knows how Mazda will be able to rectify that situation. RX-8 are not in a short demand it seems like....and who know's maybe like brillo said up there that Mazda might have another building they are able to use for a short while so that they can continue to fill orders and what not. Most auto companys usually do for times like these.

 

Houston, we have a problem:

January 29, 2003
For your information

Mazda Begins Production of 'RENESIS,' the New-Generation Rotary Engine
- 'Mazda RX-8' sports car to be launched in April -


Mazda Motor Corporation today commenced production of its newly developed RENESIS* rotary engine at its Ujina plant. The RENESIS is a new-generation rotary engine employing twin rotors, each with a displacement of 654cc. The engine was designed especially to power the all-new four-door, four-seater Mazda RX-8 sports car, due to hit showrooms this April.

A ceremony was held at the plant in Hiroshima from 8:00am this morning to mark the start of RENESIS production. Six company directors, including Executive Vice president Hisakazu Imaki and Executive Officer Masaharu Yamaki, along with MWU's representatives and approximately 150 employees attended the event.

 

There are 2 Ujina plants - No. 1 is where the fire was, and it originated in the paint-drying phase. Considering that the Renesis engine itself is not painted.... I doubt it's production line was directly affected. That article didn't state whether the engine was built at the 1 or 2 plant.

However, none of the articles I've read have made it clear if the fire were contained to the paint facility, or whether it spread to/damaged the rest of the plant, and to what degree.

 

Just got off the phone with Mazda USA in Irvine, CA. I was told “There will be no slow down in parts”, “There will be no problem with new cars shipping.” and “There will be no increase in the price of the RX-8.”

I’m sure they were programmed answers. Big business always has a fast response recovery team to deal with disasters. The guy I talked with hadn’t had anyone call about the issue before me. (?) Don’t know how standard all the answers are but he did his job of making me feel confident I would not have a problem getting my RX-8 rebuilt.

(EDIT)
Actually I wish someone would call from a dealership instead of me calling as a consumer. Can someone here pull that off? 1-949-727-1990

 

This better not hurt production of my favorite car, right before I buy one!

 

I agree that we all should not jump to conclusion just yet or be alarmed about the price raises in the 05's or parts. I am sure they have means of still trying to fill their orders and continue production by utilizing their other plants. This is one of the main ones but this shouldn't stop production it will just slow it down a bit, in my opinion

 

I would assume (correct me if I'm wrong) that like with most car companies, most of the individual parts are made in factories all over the place and they are just assembled at this main plant. So maybe only things like the major chassis and body parts and the engine block are actually created in that plant. In which case, I'll just be sure not to crash the car or blow the engine. Still it's a shame, Mazda certainly doesn't need anything like this. Whatever the Demio and the Verisa are, I'd bet the damage to the company financially will come from loss of production of them.

As a side note, why don't we get the goofy names they get elsewhere? Why couldn't the RX-8 be called the Lemantra or something?

 

LOL... They give us the MPV, 3, 6, RX-8, B3000...

I guess we will just have to wait a week or so and see what happens in the news.

 

For what it's worth... another article with more details on damage.

"17 Dec 2004
Source: just-auto.com editorial team

Mazda Motor on Friday said it will be difficult to restart operations by the year-end at a factory in Hiroshima where a fire broke out on Wednesday.

Kyodo News said the fire destroyed about 8,000 square metres of the 180,000-square-metre Ujina No. 1 factory in Minami Ward from Wednesday night to Thursday morning, forcing 1,000 workers to evacuate.

Mazda has since found that air-conditioning ducts on the third floor of the factory's paint-coating section have been burnt out – such damage to air-conditioning machines at an automobile-coating facility has serious implications because it is crucial to keep automobiles free of specks of dirt, officials told the news agency.

The fire left lots of soot in the factory, so it will be very difficult to resume operations soon, they reportedly said.

The Ujina No. 1 factory has accounted for 30% of the automaker's domestic output. The firm plans to suspend operations at the factory from December 26 until Jan. 5, corresponding with the nation's traditional year-end and New Year's holidays.

Officials told Kyodo News that Mazda wants to return the factory's operations to normal as soon as possible in 2005, but does not yet know when this will be. It is considering assembling the car models produced at the Ujina No. 1 factory at other factories.

The No. 1 plant, capable of assembling 268,000 cars annually, was opened in November 1966 and produces Demio [2] subcompacts, the RX-8 sports car and some other models, Kyodo News added."

 

The body shop working on my car said it is ordering all parts from domestic warehouses and that none will be coming directly from Japan.

 

another article

http://www.just-auto.com/news_detail.asp?art=46652

 

i don't think it will affect parts, usually parts are manufactured off site and brought in for assembly. i don't know it that is the case here but i would be pretty confident of it.