I wrote a post about rumors of a Fiat/Mazda partnership in March and here we are several months later and the rumor of Mazda and Fiat working together has become a reality.
The official news is that Fiat is going to share Mazda’s upcoming Mx5 chassis in a new Alfa Romeo roadster of some type. Contrary to my other blog post on the topic, I am ok with this. Mazda will be able to re-coup some of the engineering and production costs from the Mx5 and I don’t see the Alfa and the MX5 really competing for the same buyer.
Reading between the lines on the announcement, I expect we will see the news of Mazdas being built in Fiat owned plants in the coming years and would expect it to be the new Skyactiv platform vehicles (aka Cx5 and new generation Mazda 3).
Assembling vehicles in the EU would benefit Mazda by allowing them to lower prices and be more competitive in the European market. Along with the Mazda plant being built in Mexico, Mazda has several bright spots in their production plans that will compliment their great sales numbers making them more competitive on the global market.
I do have some doubts about the quality of vehicles being built outside of Mazda plants in Japan. The Mazda 6s built in the auto alliance plant in Michigan seemed to be ok but the reliability stigma around Fiats and Alfas from the 70s and 80s makes me question the alliance’s long-term value.
Officially Fiat has said it does not want to purchase a stake in Mazda and wants to finish the Chrysler purchase in the near future. I’m not too sure I believe the statement offered by Fiat but at this point we will have to wait and see what happens.
There is an interesting side story in all of this. Mazda has agreed to have Sollers in Russia build the Cx5 and Mazda 6 for the Russian market. This deal was made after a deal for Fiat and Sollers fell through to have Sollers build vehicles in a joint venture.
With this move, the Mexico plant, and the agreement with Sollers in Russia, I see a great path for Mazda to move forward on and I look forward to seeing how this goes.
This month’s winner for our blog segment, The CorkSport Featured Car of the Month, goes to Christian who’s 2011 Mazdaspeed 3 plays the looks and the part for the role!
But the mods don’t stop there, in addition to his CS go fast parts, he has also added a COBB xle bpv, upgraded his fuel pump internals and motor mounts and added a short shifter kit, CorkSport Skid Plate, and COBB AP.
For improved handling Christian has added HKS Hypermax Coilovers, Auto EXE front, rear, and bottom strut bars and BBS Wheels. To help him stop his speedy ride he has also added CorkSport Stainless Brake Lines and Stop Tech Slotted Rotors.
Ever since Christian learned how to build his first engine, he was hooked, but this is the first Mazda he has ever owned. He knew immediately that it was the perfect ride for him, “It is lightweight, powerful, and has superb handling” said Christian, “All I have to say is I love my Mazda.”
As many of you know, here at CorkSport we always have products in different stages of development and recently have been splitting our time between two areas of the Mazda world, suspension and exhaust.
Because we support so many models, our time gets allocated between several different product lines to ensure we have parts coming out consistently to support our whole customer base. Today, I will be covering just a few of the items I have been working on over the last several weeks and give you an idea of what we have working in the pipeline.
This summer it will be time to step up, or drop down, to a new set of coilovers designed by CorkSport. They will of course be CorkSport quality and be optimized for most of our customer base. Adjustable height, adjustable dampening and front camber adjustment will be a few of the characteristics. We are also working on producing some camber adjusters for the rear as a separate product.
We have also been exploring many options to get internals or a fuel pump upgrade to market over the past several months and we have started preliminary testing and design of CorkSport’s own fuel pump upgrade solution for our customers. We are in the preliminary stages of testing and will be working through the development process over the next several months.
Mazdaspeed 6 owners have been lacking options on the market for a front sway bar application for a while but don’t worry, this summer you should have that bar you’ve always dreamed of. Our beta car has had this bar on for a while and with a few revisions it is getting tremendous results in terms of improved handling and feel. We are in the final stage of development, are going into production now and expecting a full release of the product as early as next month.
All of you RX-8 fans out there will be glad to know we are in the final stages of development for a single exit exhaust. It has been a long time coming but the drift style exhaust is almost ready for release. We are doing final test fitment now and have identified some beta testers that will be getting the parts on a pre-release later this month. The Beta testers will run the exhaust making sure they like the fitment and sound of the part and will help us to refine our installation instructions to make sure that they are easy to follow before we release it for sale to the public.
Keep watching the blogs because we will be sharing more information that will give and inside look on the engineering and development of many of the parts we are releasing. I will be writing an in depth blog on the coilovers and coilover development and will also be writing a blog on all the information we are learning about fuel pumps, including spill valves, relief valves, fuel injectors, fuel pump internals, and information on the cam that drives the pumps.
Brydon –
CorkSport Product Development Update May 29th, 2012CorkSport
This kit expands CorkSport’s line of LED light kits specifically designed for Mazda and Mazdaspeed model vehicles by adding a lighting kit that has been customized for the CX5 and designed to replace the standard yellowish lights with cool white/blue ambient light for an enhanced look in the interior of the vehicle and license plate lighting.
“We are the only Mazda Performance Company on the market right now that supports the new Mazda CX-5 models and SkyActiv technology,” said Rich Harris, President of CorkSport Mazda Performance, “The CorkSport Skyactiv Short Ram Intake, Skyactiv Exhaust for Mazda 3, and our new lighting kit represent just the beginning of what will be a full line of performance products to support the SkyActiv brand.”
The CorkSport Mazda CX5 LED Lighting Kit includes replacements for your dome light, map light, rear hatch and license plate bulbs and retains the interior dimming feature in the Mazda CX5. The bulbs emit a very white color with just a hint of blue that resides in the 6000-7000k color range.
This practical and attractive addition to the vehicle improves the look of the interior and generates less heat, will have a longer lifespan than the standard bulbs, and resists shocks and vibrations better.
The time had come to see what the Mazda 2 could do at the track. The race weekend I signed up for was the Oregon Region SCCA April Showers Event which was a two day race. Each day there was a 20 minute qualifying session in the morning and a 25 minute race in the afternoon.
With the car being brand new to the race track, there were a few extras which were required so I showed up early. I had to get the Mazda 2 a log book and the car received a full tech inspection which included checking out the cage and safety equipment which takes some extra time. The car passed with flying colors and the cage received lots of compliments on the design and quality of the installation.
Saturday morning was looking like it would be a raining all day but the clouds cleared up and the sun came out in time for the new race slicks to be installed. This was the first time I had driven the 2 on a race compound tire which was an interesting experience. I let the tires warm up for the first lap of qualifying before I really started pushing the tires. The level of grip with the BF Goodrich R1S tires is outstanding on the 2. I was able to increase my speed through the corners as the qualifying session when on. I was able to drop the lap times from a 1:46 to a 1:40 which is a good start.
Out of the 23 cars which were in the run group I qualified 15th overall. Considering the cars in the run group this wasn’t too bad, 8 Porsches, a 350Z, a couple of STL and STU miatas, and 1976 HP Rabbit driven by Monte Shelton. Behind me were an ITJ Mazda Rx7 and a Ford Maverick and a few Porsches which finished less laps during the qualifying session. The Rx7 was the closest car in group to the Mazda 2, it was faster on the straights but the 2 was better in the corners. The maverick was really fast in the straights but horrible in the corners making it difficult to get around because it was all over the place.
We lined up Saturday afternoon and the race went as expected. There were two slower cars behind me as the faster cars slowly pulled away…ok, the Porsche GT3 disappeared really quick. He completed 18 laps to my 15 lap, due to a 20 second faster lap time. During the race I discovered several of the Porsches were slower than the Mazda 2 in corners. There were a few times when they would try to pull away in the corners and would get squirrely and have to slow down so I could get closer. Once the straights came up they would disappear down the track again and I would be back to checking my mirrors for the next fast car to come up on me again. The result of the first race in the 2 was 15th overall. The lap times were slower during the race which was a surprise to me. With letting the faster cars go past you give up some speed around the track.
On Sunday our run group was merged with another since there were only 3 cars running in the group. One of the more notables was a tube frame SPO Panoz which was running close to the same lap times as the Porsche GT3. Qualifying was improved over the day earlier, the lap times were consistently in the 1:42s to 1:40s with a best time of 140.527. The qualifying location came up 15th again in the run group with the ITJ Rx7 behind me again.
The race on Sunday was a smaller group as we lost a few cars in the morning qualifying. A bmw lost a connecting rod bearing and a few vehicle break downs which took out a few more cars. The race had 17 cars in it which gave more time for speed and less time getting out-of-the-way of the faster cars. The race itself has some interesting points. During the second lap the Panoz pulled off the track on a side road with the race being over. There was a 944 turbo which also suffered a failure and did not finish either. One of the laps one of the faster Porsches was catching up to me on the front straight. I had been working on braking into the corners later and later. With the approaching speed of the car I knew he wanted to get in front of me before the chicane. He found out that I could brake 100 feet later than he could as I watched him disappear from my vision on my right and I went through the corner first. It was an interesting feeling of satisfaction as I let him past me into corner 4 and I stuck with him through the rest of the corners until the straight came up again and he pulled away. The overall result from the race was 14th place overall.
The whole experience was a great first event and I learned a ton about the Mazda 2 and its characteristics at the limit. My goal for the next time out is to get the 2 into the 1:39s.
Derrick-
Pictures courtesy of Illiad Boyce and video courtesy of Brendan Hughes. Thank you both for the support and the footage!
