News | CorkSport Mazda Performance Blog

July 26, 2013April 24, 2023

CorkSport Wants To Make Your 2014 Mazda 6 Even Better

If you have a 2014 + Mazda 6 then today is your lucky day! CorkSport is officially releasing the 2014+ Mazda 6 Rear Sway Bar, LED Light Kit, and License Plate Relocation Kit.

Relocate Your Plate

In order to improve airflow, and look better we created the 2014+ Mazda 6 License Plate Relocation Kit. The stock location of the license plate blocks the airflow through the grill of your Mazda 6 which is why we relocated the License Plate to the Tow Hook adapter location. This kit is simple to install and really creates a stunning front view of your Mazda 6.

The CorkSport 2014+ License Plate Bracket Relocation Kit is available at our online catalog. For more information please visit our product listing at: https://corksport.com/corksport-license-plate-bracket-relocation-kit-for-2014-mazda-6.html

Lights, Camera, Action

Allow your new Mazda 6 to shine, literally. Replacing the yellowish lighting inside the cabin of your Mazda 6 is one of the simplest upgrades to your car and makes the cabin more visible, cleaner looking, and feel higher-end. Don’t let the yellow light of the Mazda 6 ruin the atmosphere or limit the clean look of the interior, instead swap out the bulbs for fresh white LED lights.

The CorkSport 2014+ LED Light Kit is available at our online catalog for only $59.99 and is ready to ship now. For more information please visit our product listing at: https://corksport.com/corksport-led-light-kit-for-2014-mazda-6.html

Own the Corners

If you want to handle better, then this is the upgrade for you. Adding the 2014+ Mazda 6 Rear Sway Bar will limit the body roll when cornering by helping transfer some of the inside compression to the outside suspension. The rear sway bar effectively increases the compressed springs rate by helping distribute the load more evenly across the rear suspension. This helps control body roll and ultimately helps you corner flatter, faster and with more predictability.

The CorkSport 2014+ Mazda 6 Rear Sway Bar is available at our online catalog for only $229.99 and is ready to ship now. For more information please visit our product listing at: https://corksport.com/corksport-2014-mazda-6-rear-sway-bar.html

We also have the CorkSport 2013+ CX5 Rear Sway Bar available here: https://corksport.com/corksport-2013-mazda-cx5-rear-sway-bar.html

Upcoming Products:

CorkSport has been hard at work at more than just the parts listed above, soon we will be releasing the CorkSport 2014 Mazda 6 Power Series Short Ram Intake. Just like all our intakes this has been tested in varying conditions for proven power gains and improved sound.

If you can’t wait to improve the sound of your 2014 Mazda 6, we also have an exhaust for the Mazda 6 that will be released soon. It sounds great and looks even better. CorkSport has a great opportunity for one lucky person. If you simply HAVE to HAVE the Mazda 6 Axle Back Exhaust before anyone else then send Spencer an email (Update: we have already filled the beta testing spot.). We are looking for one lucky 2014 Mazda 6 owner to Beta test our CorkSport Axle Back exhaust and give us their thoughts. If chosen you will get to be inside the testing process and work with our engineers to provide feedback about our newest part!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Edu2KOE3tOA

Stay tuned for official release dates and more exciting news in the near future!

Also, if you haven’t signed up for our Email Newsletter, now would be a great time. This is where we release coupons, news, release dates, events, and more.

July 19, 2013December 18, 2017

Derricks Mazda Rumor Round-up

I have made some speculations in the past about things to come and have been fairly accurate thus far so I thought I would take another look into the future with the inside knowledge I have. Here are my most recent thoughts.

We know that the plant in Mexico that Mazda is building was slated for Mazda 3’s and Mazda 2’s for sale in North America. The whole plant will be online and running in 2014 with some production being slated for a small car from Toyota which Mazda will be building for them (which just says something about the quality of Mazda if Toyota is willing to have them Mazda build them). Mazda has said most of the production is slated for Central and South America which I am not sure about. I am betting that this new plant will be building additional units for the anticipated surge of the new Mazda 3 coming out and here is the reason why.

The new Skyactiv chassis Mazda is building cars from was announced to be shared in the next Mazda 2 recently. This means the Cx5, upcoming Mazda 3, and upcoming Mazda 2 will all be produced on the same platform. That means the tooling, production, power trains, and everything else will be available to build ½ of the Mazda product line in one place. This one place (Mexico) is a free trade zone for North, Central, and South America giving Mazda the ability to supply vehicles to any western hemisphere market quickly and tax free.

The capacity of the new plant will be 230,000 units by 2016 which is almost enough to supply the US sales with one plant if you look at the 277,046 Mazdas sold in 2012. I wouldn’t expect all of the supplied models to come from the new plant as Mazda Japan has a majority of their worldwide production capacity still based in Hiroshima, but the potential is there.

My second rumor will be that the new Mx5 will be released next spring or summer. It was back in 2011 when the patent pictures were dug up by someone and posted by all of the magazines. With the Rx8 gone and the current Mx5 having gone through a 2^nd facelift on the same chassis it is well overdue. 2 years have already gone by and the new Mx5 should be ready to pop. With the current focus being on the new Mazda 3 I am betting we will get a surprise next spring from Mazda.

-Derrick

July 16, 2013

Help Build the Mazdaspeed of Your Dreams

You may remember that we had to get a new shop testing vehicle after our last Mazdaspeed 3’s untimely demise See here; but what you may not know is how much time and effort was put into that car. Building a rolling showcase isn’t easy, cheap or quick. We were sad to see it go but now have a brand new canvas to start over on.

With our new speed we decided to go white, with that pearly white paint job we wanted to go towards a “panda” style going forward, mixing white and black parts in our build. We have started with a few small black and white things (intake, BOV, etc.). We’re really looking for input from you to really make this car unforgettable.

We’re looking at every detail to try to make an overall car that hasn’t been seen before that goes deeper than just bolting things on. We want to try new things, make combinations that have never been seen before and really try to make something that you would want if you never had to make a compromise.

Check us out on Facebook and let us know what you think we should add to this car to make it really unique.

July 10, 2013February 28, 2018

Fuel Pump Comparison Part 3

Welcome back to the Fuel Pump Comparison, Part 3. If you haven’t been following along with us feel free to read Part 1 and Part 2.

Now that we have a good understanding of the basics for these high pressure fuel pumps we can start to really dig deeper into the specifications. One of the items we were really curious about were the materials used in the construction of these pumps. We decided to have the hardness tested and ascertain the materials used. The factory pump internals do not use any coating, the hardness test showed us that the internals went through a hardening process as the core was significantly softer than the surface. Because of these hardness requirements, many other aftermarket internals use a coating of some sort to decrease friction between the piston and the sleeve. As for what the stock internals are made from, we answered that. Except for the hardening procedure, according to their chemical breakdown, they match a common die steel, so nothing too fancy.

We now understand why it is so common to hear that the factory pumps are machined to such tight tolerances. At high rates of speed and pressure with a hardened material, you could easily have failures if tolerances were not correct.

When testing the fuel pumps on the dyno, we chose a Mazdaspeed 3 (2^nd gen) with bolt-ons and a stock turbo. The factory boost levels we maintained 1700psi all the way to redline with no issues. As soon as we raised the boost slightly, the fuel pump began to drop pressure. With a Cobb AccessPort and a stage 2 reflash, the pressure of the pump would drop under 1000psi by 5000rpms. If you’re going to turn up the boost or run a reflash, an upgraded fuel pump is a must.

Our dyno is able to adjust load, so in our testing we chose a load value typical of 4^th gear on the street and tested all pumps with the same load on the same day, only hours apart from each other. All the pumps tested performed very similar for power but the stock pump actually ran a lower air/fuel ratio. This is because all of the pumps were tested with no tune. When we changed to the Cobb stage 2 map, the power levels increased but we could not complete the test with the stock pump as it just could not keep up with the demand. With the stage 2 tune, we found the air/fuel ratios to be very, very rich and had a very real possibility for causing high load misfires. We actually experienced that several times on colder days. With no tune, this does not happen but the car did still run very rich in boost with all the aftermarket fuel pumps. With a custom tune though, there should be no difference between the pumps and you can raise the boost without worry of running low on pressure.

Now that you have read Part 3, see Part 1 and Part 2.

Stay tuned for part 4 in our fuel pump comparison series, things are about to really heat up!!!

July 8, 2013

Inside the upcoming CorkSport Blow Off Valve

When you look at the blow off valves (BOV) and bypass valves (BPV) on the market today you see many examples of the same thing with little to no innovations. For those of you that aren’t aware, BOV’s and BPV’s are valves that vent pressurized air in the tract between the turbo and the throttle body. This prevents the turbo from suddenly stopping or slowing as those can cause unwanted bearing wear on the turbo. A BOV vents this pressurized air into the atmosphere (into the engine bay). A BPV vents that air back into the intake just after the mass air flow (MAF) sensor. Venting back into the intake allows the ECU to correctly meter that air that it has already accounted for. Many times when venting to atmosphere you can get a momentarily rich condition because the ratios are off.

We were talking about innovation though, the last great innovation in valve technology for turbos was probably years ago with pull type valves like the SSQV from HKS. Many years have passed since then and not much has changed, outside of the few valves that partially vent to atmosphere and route the rest back to the intake tract. Typically now you just see one copy after another of someone else’s idea. SURE, it can be hard to innovate in the blow off valve market but we were convinced there was something exciting we could do.

We speak often about your ideas sparking our innovative minds, this project was started by just one of those customer suggestions. We started with a customer submission of using wave springs that led us to design a new valve design to reduce the size and weight of the moving parts.

Key Features of the upcoming patent pending CorkSport Blow Off Valve:

Reduction of spring height

With the use of a wave spring we are able to reduce the spring height by 50%. The traditional spring sits at 40mm and the CS wave spring sits at a 20mm height. These springs both provide the same force and will move the same distance before experiencing coil-bind.

Reduction of piston size

Because the spring is 50% smaller we are able to reduce the piston and still maintain the same amount of movement. As you can see, just changing to the wave spring we were able to decrease the piston by 33%!!!

What does that all mean?

The reduction in mass is all well and good, but just being smaller isn’t the only benefit (even though that is pretty cool). With the force (F) being the same and the mass (m) decreasing by 33% we can see how the mass relates to acceleration (a) in the formula F=ma. Rearranged, this becomes a=F/m. This means we have accelerated the actual speed of the valve, which means the valve is able to react much faster than a larger valve with a traditional spring (33% faster!) Because the blow off valve is a safety feature to protect the turbo from premature wear, this increase in acceleration can help increase the longevity of the turbo and the system as a whole.

What does all this innovation look like?

With the reduction in the size of these key parts, we can reduce the body size. This can be especially helpful in situations with airboxes, custom turbo and intercooler kits or even in universal situations where space is at a premium. Below you can see a comparison of similar BOV’s, the spring chamber on our design is significantly smaller but the function is not lost; in fact, we improved it!

To maximize flow, we pushed the piston area out to ensure a larger venting area, this reduces the time it takes to vent the air and allows larger turbos to vent more efficiently. As a blow off valve, this certainly pushes the envelope, we think we can find even more applications for this kind of innovation. We are very proud to be able to offer things for the Mazda market we helped create and will continue to engineer parts that push the scene for you.

Relocate Your Plate

Lights, Camera, Action

Own the Corners

Upcoming Products:

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