2001 Mazda Mx-5 Miata - Turbo on 2040-cars

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Meet our new long-term 2016 Mazda MX-5 Miata Club!

We have a new Miata! For a year! And yeah, we're excited about it. This adorable roadster was added to our fleet over a month ago, but we've just now stopped driving it long enough to tell you about it. You can watch our unboxing video for this new long-termer above. (Spoiler alert: The car in the box is a Miata.) Then read a little more about which options and features we chose and why. What we got We chose the mid-line Club model because it's the only way to get the suspension with Bilstein shocks, the limited-slip differential, and a shock-tower brace. Club also includes an appearance package with a front air dam, side sill extensions, a rear bumper skirt, and a ip spoiler for the trunk. We chose Ceramic Metallic paint because it's white and silver and awesome all at once. The only option we chose is the Brembo/BBS Package. In addition to the upgraded brake system and 17-inch wheels alluded to by the title, this package adds Mazda's advanced keyless entry – you can unlock the doors and start the car without taking the key-thing out of your pocket. The MSRP for the car is $32,835. What we skipped The Grand Touring trim (too fancy), the automatic transmission (too few pedals), and extra-cost red paint (not ceramic enough). Grand Touring adds lots of convenience stuff like rain-sensing wipers and auto climate, some active safety systems, and leather. We wanted the upgraded chassis instead, and we' were trying to save some (hypothetical) money. Why we got it Because it's a Miata, and we like fun. The plan is to drive the bleep out of it for a year and report on the experience along the way. We'll take it to a track or two, keep the top down as far into winter as possible, and then slap some snow tires on it to continue . Maybe at a slight angle relative to straight-ahead at times. We'll see. If you have questions about this car, leave them in the comments below and we'll address as many as we can during the coming months. Miata! Related Video:

Mazda G-Vectoring Control makes driving better without you knowing

Mazda has just spent eight years developing a new technology that will make its new cars a lot more fun to drive, even if you have absolutely no idea that it's working. And subtlety's the point, Mazda engineers told us at a press event at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca. In fact, the effects of what they've dubbed G-Vectoring Control are so fine that the marketing and PR teams are at a loss for how to do their jobs with it. "The engineers have done their work," said Mazda Director of Communications Jeremy Barnes, "But how do we get the message across?" The basic premise is this: G-Vectoring activates only when the car's on-board computer reads simultaneous steering and throttle input. The data — including throttle position, steering angle, and, crucially, how quickly you're adjusting the steering angle — are then funneled through an algorithm to reduce engine torque, which transfers vehicle weight, adding more grip to the wheels that need it. The system will appear first on 2017 Mazda6 sedans arriving in showrooms later this year, followed by the 2017 Mazda3. Actually, "subtle" does not even begin to describe the effect. G-Vectoring Control can detect as much as one tenth of one degree of steering angle, and changes the cornering forces only 0.1 to 0.5 g as a result. "That's less than the human body can feel," explained Vehicle Development Engineer Dave Coleman. In practice, G-Vectoring reduces the steering angle at turn-in, as well as the rate at which one turns the wheel. To demonstrate, Director of R&D Kelvin Hiraishi rode shotgun with us in a specially equipped Mazda6 that allowed him to turn G-Vectoring on or off at the push of a button (production cars will always have it on). Hiraishi had us drive a number of courses, including Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca itself, while an engineer measured our steering inputs with a laptop Matrix'd into the car's electronic brain. I drove the same course several times with the same car in the same conditions, with cruise control locked and the system turned on or off. Lo and behold, with G-Vectoring activated, the engineer's output graph showed that my steering inputs were indeed reduced ever so slightly. There were two times that G-Vectoring was markedly noticeable. The first on a turn with a minor banking toward the outside, and the second was during cornering over an artificially wet section of the course — in other words, when the car was at the limits of adhesion.

Mazda reports strong Skyactiv sales, plans to boost output 25%

Mazda is set to expand production of its Skyactiv engines after critical and commercial acclaim for the fuel-sipping powerplants. The Japanese manufacturer has a number of plans in the works to bump up production, with the first being a 25-percent increase in output from its Hiroshima, Japan engine facility.
Besides adding a new line, Mazda will modify the line that built MZR engines, a family of mills that includes the 2.3-liter, turbocharged four-cylinder found in the Mazdaspeed3 and the 2.0-liter found in the MX-5 Miata. The bump in production is just part of Mazda's goal of selling 1.7 million vehicles globally by 2016, with 80 percent of those vehicles expected to wear a Skyactiv badge.
Mazda also builds Skyactiv engines at a joint-venture facility with Ford, in Changan, China, while a Mexican facility will go online by March of 2014. Skyactiv engines currently power the Mazda3, Mazda6 and CX-5.