Wheels Australia — August 2016

@wheelsaustralia 23

DAVE Coleman is a man on a

mission. The Mazda North America

vehicle development engineer is

a self-confessed car nerd who fell

in love with the Mazda RX-7 when

he was 10 years old after his dad

brought one home; he later owned

the car. Now he’s out to save the

Mazda rotary.

While the development of the

car expected to resuscitate the

RX-7 nameplate is being led by

Japan, Coleman and his small

California-based team is playing

a key role. “We’re all on the same

page with what we want to build,”

he tells Wheels. “Everything you

expect in a rotary is enhanced.”

Controversially, though, Coleman

says the new rotary will be more

about driveability than revs.

“We’ve kind of hinted at

where that [new rotary] engine

is going,” he says, referring to the

Taiki concept car from the 2007

Tokyo motor show, something

he describes as a “big departure”

for the rotary engine. Its 16X

engine had a longer stroke with a

narrower rotor housing

Truth-

torquer

Dave Coleman is not your

typical engineer, because

he started life as a car

journalist. He even wrote

an article for Wheels in the

1990s, so we know he’s a

man with taste!

He also speaks his mind

and isn’t afraid to call things

out when they aren’t right.

“The last MazdaSpeed 3

[MPS in Australia] would

have been better with the

2.0-litre engine rather than

the 2.3; higher-revving

er than a whole bunch of

ue,” Coleman explains.

hat engine was an SUV

minivan engine. It was

car, but in a perfect

d it would have been a

rent car.”

Coleman says the new

rotary will be more about

driveability than revs

tet

rrathe

ttorqu

“Th

aandm

afaun

wworld

diffd er

Coleman says fuel economy,

typically a weakness of high-

revving rotaries, is a major focus

for the new RX-7, previewed as the

RX-Vision concept (below middle)

at the 2015 Tokyo show.

“At higher rpm the exhaust

temperature runs a lot hotter. The

RX-8, for example, you get into

that fuel enrichment, where you’re

throwing extra fuel into it to keep

the exhaust temperatures down. If

we can constantly have the engine

where the exhaust temperatures

are lower, that will give us a huge

boost in fuel economy.”

Torque is something Coleman

loves talking about. He was

instrumental in the program to

produce the lower-power/higher-

torque CX 9 that has just gone on

sale. It was a gamble – especially

with marketing departments

fixated on numbers rather than

real-world feel – but one that

appears to have paid off.

He says technology will play a

bigger role in future Mazdas.

“We’ve got stuff you can’t even

imagine that’s coming. You’ll be

very surprised ... new technolog

that nobody else has been able t

pull off but everyone [is] trying t

do,” he says cryptically.

“When we run Miller cycle at

light load, that’s essentially getting

rid of some of the compression

ratio but keeping the expansion

ratio ... so you still get really high

efficiency. And we’re doing it with a

much cheaper mechanism.”

TOBY HAGON

y

n

ies

to

o

Mazda MX-5 impressed us so much we

ded it the coveted Wheels COTY last year.

o car is perfect, and it has been noted the

ppy convertible has a fair bit of body roll.

Dave Coleman is quick to defend the roadster’s

suspension.

“It’s a convertible and it’s not a very stiff

chassis, so you don’t want to put sharp inputs

and start shaking the body,” he says. “We tuned

that car to work well on roads, not tracks.”

Coleman says the lack of rigidity was part of

keeping the weight down, and that the softer

tune helps keep the tyre contact patch in touch

with the road, increasing grip.

oll on, MX-5 critics

narrower rotor housing.

“[That]pushed it to be more

torqueythan the 13B. Bigger b

• that’s a really big hint of wh

we’re workingtowards with th

rotary engine. We’ve tried to b

the revs down somewhat.”

e

arrel

ere

he

ring

torque CX-

TheM

award

But no

zippy

Ro

JCW Countryman spied!

Chunkier styling, more space, and

extra pace! The team at John Cooper

Works have been fiddling with the Mini

Countryman, and a test mule has been

spotted in Germany being thrashed

around the Nordschleife. The JCW

Countryman is expected in Australia

in the first half of 2017. Engine choices

are likely to be split between Mini’s

100kW turbocharged 1.5-litre

three-cylinder, or varieties of the

2.0-litre four-cylinder turbo.