Mazda RX-01

The Mazda RX-01 is a concept vehicle that Mazda presented at the Tokyo Motor Show in 1995 . The car was z. This was partly created as a response to the shrinking market for super sports cars caused by the economic situation and was intended to show a back-to-simplicity movement that was reminiscent of the small, simple and cheap cars, such as the first RX-7 , which nonetheless reminded a lot Driving fun. (At that time the RX-7 had already developed into an uncompromising super sports car with maximum performance, little comfort and a very high price).

The RX-01 showed a radically designed vehicle front with a movable front bumper, which was made possible by its space-saving Wankel engine and was designed as a real 2 + 2 sports car. The first public presentation of the new generation of Mazda rotary engines, the Type 13B-MSP, was even more important. This is a naturally aspirated engine whose exhaust manifold is now in the side housing instead of in the vicinity of the rotor housing, which prevents the inlet and outlet times from overlapping. This has various advantages: higher performance, better thermal efficiency, better utilization of fuel and lower emissions. Enthusiasts hoped the RX-01 would go into mass production and represent the next generation of Mazda sports cars (the RX-7 was no longer available in the US in late 1995), but customers turned away from sports cars and turned to SUVs Mazda's financial situation at the time allowed the RX-01 to be realized as a concept vehicle. The 13B-MSP motor, however, was further developed into the RENESIS machine that drives the RX-8 today .

literature

• B. Long: RX-7: Mazda's Rotary Engine Sportscar. Veloce Publishing, 2001.
• JK Yamaguchi: The Mazda RX-8: World's First 4-door, 4-seat Sports Car Plus Complete Histories of Mazda Rotary Engine Development and Rotary Racing Around the World. RING Ltd./Mazda Motor Corporation, 2003.
• Road & Track: Road & Track Guide to the Mazda RX-8. Hachette Filipacchi Media US, 2003.