What are some reasons you guys have why the MX3 never became

[Solo]

i think all of u got at least a good point...
but you should see around Montreal how much mx's are around here!
but ppl from the province of quebec in 1992-1996 were looking for fuel economy witch the 1.6l was great at it(and u'll find A LOT of those here)
and also at that time ppl from around the world wanted big sport car, mx was too tiny to compete ^^

[Gro Harlem]

Hey Gro, why don't you stop wetting your diaper for a minute and back up what you are saying. From what I know the KF was not a part of the original K series motors. The reason the K8 was 1.8L was to get under alot of insurance price increases at the over 2.0L mark.
As for the BP, I stand corrected. All I could find last night were the production stats of the Maita. Today I found on club protoge that the BP was used much earlier in the Protoge. So I guess that one doesn't amke much sense to us.
However how do you call 115 ft/lbs of torque in a motor that had only 130 Hp torqueless. Have you ever seen a dyno of a K8, they have a pretty good torque curve. I know it doesn't feel like it, but that was the great thing about the K8. It was the smoothest motor I've ever driven by a LONG shot. I understand that this part of our conversation is purely a perspective debate, but you have to say that the K8 was darn good for it's size. I'll give you that a 2L would have been a better option, but I just don't think it was a manufactured motor untill later.

Dood, you havn't read the "K-Series V6 briefing" article on that probe guys site I'm gussing. IT was the official press briefing regarding the K-Series engine family. It was written by someone within MAZDA and dated in 1991. That is how I know the KF was concieved at teh same tim.

It was used in the Lantis & Eunos 500 saloon car. There are many ways to confirm this using google as well, so search if you don't believe me. It appeared in the 500 first then the lantis later.

and I have no doubts that the K8 was smooth, but so is my ZE. IT still should've been better than it was. IMO it was pointless to make both a 1.8 and 2.0...and i can't fathom that you wouldn't agree with me there. And even still...IMO the k8, being a 24-valve V6 should'v had higher power output than 130/115. Something like 140-150 and 120-130 would've mad it much more acceptable.

[hgallegos915]

over here in the us engine size does not really impact insuranse... i have an 86 maxima 3.0 and my gs-kf and i pay 55 dllrs for both. Liability only of course. They never asked me what engine it had.i guess they think its a 1.8. The mx3 would have been a bit better with that kf engine and astraight neck. The power difference is highly noticeable. Doesnt run out of breath as fast as the k8 having experienced both.

[Rumnhammer]

Well the first batch is done and ready to ship, if you want one send me an email and be sure to say you saw it on here so i know to get the extra $3 for the board.
I take paypal and money orders in U.S. dollars only.
I'll ship it out to you the next weekday after I get payment.
be sure to leave your shipping address and name if you use paypal.
send to
Rumnhammer@aol.com

thanks again
Chris Rummel

[Rumnhammer]

LOL, man I'm so jet lagged I posted in the wrong thread!

[Yoda]

It is not just the province of Quebec but Canada in general. Sales of the MX-3 in Canada almost equalled total sales in the US. Give that the population of the whole country is slightly less that the state of California. If things were equal this means that there should have been almost 470K MX-3 sold south of the border instead of 47K if US sales had matched Canadian sale. Also Canadian sale of the GS was also higher. I believe the about 33% of all MX-3 sold in Canada were GS where in the US the figure was only like 23-24%. Other countries were sales of the MX-3 were higher that what you would expect were France and Germany but the popularity of Mazda's in these countries is also very high. I think what it really came down to is Mazda Canada did a much better job marketing the car than Mazda did in other countries. I was travelling much of the world on business from '89 to '97 the one thing I noticed that most Mazda Canada and to a lesser extent in Germany & France kept MX-3 as well as all there other products visible on Television, print and billboard ads. Were in the US at the same time you seldomly saw a Mazda ad and when there was on it was for a Miata, RX-7 or B-series pick-up.

i think all of u got at least a good point...
but you should see around Montreal how much mx's are around here!
but ppl from the province of quebec in 1992-1996 were looking for fuel economy witch the 1.6l was great at it(and u'll find A LOT of those here)
and also at that time ppl from around the world wanted big sport car, mx was too tiny to compete ^^

[Gro Harlem]

Hey Yoda, where did you get the sales figures for the USA? I know the main MX-3 site has them for the Canadian market, but i've always wondered the exact sales figures, per-year for the USA market. Also the % of RS vs GS, manual vs Auto, etc would be good info.

I dunno if the 25% USA GS model thing is right though, I see about 1/2 and 1/2 GS to RS.......from my experience it might have been something like 60/40 RS to GS or something...either that, or most RS's were wrecked before GS's or people just aren't driving them as much

[Juans_93_MX3]

Your very right Gro
As smooth and unique as the 1.8L maybe, 130/115ft torque is not acceptable.

[Yoda]

Hey Yoda, where did you get the sales figures for the USA? I know the main MX-3 site has them for the Canadian market, but i've always wondered the exact sales figures, per-year for the USA market. Also the % of RS vs GS, manual vs Auto, etc would be good info.

I dunno if the 25% USA GS model thing is right though, I see about 1/2 and 1/2 GS to RS.......from my experience it might have been something like 60/40 RS to GS or something...either that, or most RS's were wrecked before GS's or people just aren't driving them as much

The number were available for the asking from Mazda. I don't know if they still give out that info As many of the older MX-3'er know I was involved with the aftermarket industry to try get parts on the market and requested this info. I was sent a spreadsheet that had both US and Canadian sales figures by year and model (tranny info was not listed) Unfortunately there were several attempeds to hack into the computer where I kept my database of MX-3 and Mazda engine files a few years ago. Of almost 5megs worth of data that was lost when the HD crashed was the spread sheet with the North American sales data. One of the things I do remember is there were significately fewer GS sold in the US than Canada. Most were sold in the '92-'93 model years. '94 saw less that 1500 GS imported if memory serves me and none at all in '95.

One thing that probably helped US MX-3 imports was Hertz Rent a Car and to a lesser extent Budget. At the time I was flying in and out of at least 1 or 2 US cities a week 3 weeks out of the month. In '93 and '94 probably an good percentage of the ATX 4cyl and a few ATX GS MX-3 were rentals at Hertz. For the longest time I thought MX-3 were popular in the states because I would arrive in the Hertz lot at DFW, BWI, ATL, LAX and see 30 or 40 MX-3's plus more in the service lot. There were 5 or 6 MX-3er that were travelling on business at that time that were frequent business travellers and we would sent each other messages about how make MX-3 were in the rental car lots if it was a city were none of us had been before. Hertz at the time probably had a network wide fleet of at least 5000 MX-3 in the lower 48 and turn over on car is usually 2 or 3 times a year. Even Hertz locations in small airports like El Paso or Tulsa had a fleet of at least 10 MX-3's. At the time there were probably more MX-3 on a Hertz lot in the US than on a Mazda dealers lot at the time. When these rental cars reach a certain number of mile they were sold off at a discounted price which probably didn't do a lot to help Mazda's bottom line for the MX-3 when almost half of the cars imported end up passing through a rental car fleet. It also seemed like when Hertz took the MX-3 out of there fleet Mazda's imports of the MX-3 dropped off radically in the US.

In Canada I've never seen a MX-3 in a major rental car fleet also though I did see them as pizza delivery, driving school and parts delivery cars. What were are starting to see now in Canada is a lot of US cars being imported either as a running car or for parts because there is still a high demand in the great White North especially for body parts.

[jschrauwen]

FWIW, very shortly after I got mine in 95 I stopped in at Mazda Dealership near downtown Toronto. While looking at the newer model MX's I happened to mention or rather asked in a passing conversation why most of the MX's on their lot were ATX's. Their response was for 2 reasons. One because it appeared that more women were interested in the cars and a majority of women preferred ATX's. The second was because a good portion of the probable driving of the MX was to be for comuting back and forth to work, it appeared to be the tranny of choice when it came to stop and go city driving. Put the 2 together and you have the makings of a predominently ATX MX base. Like I said, just a passing observation from 10 years ago, FWIW.

[Juans_93_MX3]

Sorry to be bumping this thread

Both sides make some very good arguements
the 4cyl was very weak so people wouldnt have to pay alot of insurance
The V6 was very unique for the type of car and size, even though it only makes 130hp/115ft torque.

I guess the real thing is, why didnt Mazda make a 3rd option for the tuners?
Something like a GT MX3. All wheel Drive + Plus turbo + at only 2600lbs + Small Import Compact + 1.8L V6 = Deadly Sleeper Car

I wouldnt care if it would only would make 210hp and 190ft torque on a small tiny V6.
Back in those days (early 90's) and even now, nobody was/is willing to swap the engine out of a $14,000 car. Not even work on the internals. Why? Because they shouldnt have to, just to get to 200hp.
But I am telling you, cars that are made fast stock, get alot of aftermarket support which would of been really great.

Ohwell, gotta love the MX3 for its uniqueness.

[MX3parkerGS]

If you ask me, the MX3 did become what it was meant to be...It just took a while! I mean, look around, this here is a website with a total of over 8,930('monky' being #8,391) people who have a 'thing' for MX-3's. Whether they are average jo's who are on here needing to know a question, or MX-Crazi3s who mod their MX3 in just about every single way! And not to mention all of us here are probably literally around the world.

And so what if the Aftermarket world still to this day doesnt like MX3's, we ourselfs have taken care of that, its everyday i see something new on here about people producing custom mods for all of us to enjoy from custom gauge panels all the way to a 'bolt-on' turbo kit!

I love my MX-3 and always will.


Parker

[Andrew_Pakula]

I think in many ways the MX-3 was sort of ahead of its time, it's a shame we never ended up getting a Second-Generation model.... maybe one day....

[DJ]

Their may not be lots of aftermarket parts compared to other cars available to the mx-3. But atleast when you see a CUSTOM Mx-3, it really is CUSTOM. While if you have a civic, just pick out what you want for it in a magazine and order it. With an MX-3 you are either building from scratch or building off of something else so it will always end up different.

[havoc13]

i agree with DJ about u never really see two alike everyone has different tastes when it comes to cars. Some people love big wings and huge mufflers and thats what makes everyone different. I bought mine because it was only $700 and my buddy also had a destroyed mazdaspeed bumper in his garage he fixed it and put it on my car and the car was already lowered. I couldnt go wrong with my intake it makes me feel like i'm flying i love my mx3!