rx-8

There is a special place in our hearts reserved for the Mazda RX-7. Its screaming rotary engine made the '80s and '90s a time of high-revving fun. While Mazda continued the rotary with the four-door RX-8, the two are not the same car, and eventually the latter was phased out. The Motor Report is ...

Ah, the Wankel. You magnificent, high-reving feat of unorthodox engineering. Your biggest champion, Mazda, may have left you – at least for the moment – but that doesn't mean some mad mechanics can't rally you and a few friends for a high-horsepower party. The folks over at Pulse ...

Mark it down, auto enthusiasts. Mazda built its last rotary engine on Friday, June 22. By final, we mean the line that assembled Renesis engines for Mazda's RX-8 sports car was idled, and there are currently no plans to restart its production. Mazda has a long-running history of building ...

And now for some good news from Mazda: it is doubling the run of its limited edition RX-8 Spirit R, adding 1,000 more units to production due to demand. Announced late last year, this Japan-only model celebrates the end of the RX-8's nine-year existence. The final Wankel-engined four-door is ...

As we prepare to flip our calendars from 2011 to 2012, it's time to say goodbye to a handful of vehicles that are being sent to the Great Parking Lot In The Sky before the 2012 model year completely takes hold. And while we're not exactly upset about having to bid farewell to things like the ...

In the soap opera saga of are they or aren't they still developing a rotary engine, Mazda seems to have indicated the affirmative. According to a translation of a Tweet from Mazda PR posted on a Japanese car blog, a "new model with a next-generation rotary engine" is in development. While ...

Mazda has chosen to commemorate the departure of the company's RX-8 with one last special edition in Japan. The Mazda RX-8 Spirit R is set to arrive at Japanese dealerships next month and will offer 1,000 lucky buyers a host of aesthetic upgrades over the base vehicle. The package starts with an ...

Automotive News is reporting that Mazda has stopped production of its RX-8 sports car due to lackluster sales and ever tighter global emissions standards. Mazda managed to move a mere 1,134 of the models last year, and 2011 hasn't treated the rotary any better. Sales are down 21 percent through ...

At the end of 2011, the Mazda RX-8 rotary-powered sport coupe/sedan will cease to exist in new-car showrooms. With it, the mass-produced rotary engine will take another hiatus. The original plan was to have the Renesis, the world's only mass-produced rotary, come back maybe as early as 2017 in a ...

Fear not, rotaryphiles. According to a report from The Detroit News, Mazda isn't giving up on the rotary engine anytime soon. Though the RX-8 is headed for the production guillotine, Mazda execs have apparently confirmed that engineers are working on a more efficient and more powerful version of ...

2012 Honda CR-V, Chevrolet Cruze diesel, bending Ford SVT Raptor frames

Episode #240 of the Autoblog Podcast is ready, and this week Chris, Dan and Executive Editor Chris Paukert hold down the fort. We start with the 2012 Honda ...

Autocar is reporting that the next-generation rotary engine from Mazda may turn to a laser ignition system instead of traditional spark plugs. The report supposedly comes straight from the mouth of a shadowy senior engineer within the program. Mazda has been hard at work on the 16X Renesis ...

The rotary rumormill continues to spin about as fast as a Renesis engine at redline (that's 9,000 rpm, for those keeping track). Might the next rotary-powered RX from Mazda be a hybrid? It very well may, if you believe a report from Motor Trend. Lending credence to the story is a 2010 agreement ...

According to a report from Autocar, Mazda is currently working on a successor to the old RX-7 and the current RX-8. (We've heard this before. Many times.) Believed to carry the RX-9 nameplate, the next-gen sports car is tipped to ...

Mazda builds plenty of sporty cars that incorporate a fun-to-drive feeling, but calling something a sports car does not automatically equate to a vehicle that is ready for the track. For the 2010 SEMA ...

Rumors about a true successor to the FD RX-7 have been kicking around automotive circles since... oh, just about exactly when the car left the world for good way back in 2002. While it could be argued that the Mazda RX-8 is a spiritual progeny of the Zoom-Zoom kingdom's white night, the four-door ...

It's the rumor that just refuses to die. We're not sure if that means there's a lot of truth behind it or it's just wishful thinking, but once again we're hearing that Mazda is hard at work on a new RX-7 sportscar. And while you ...

We came across this RX-8 at SEMA and it immediately rang a bell. Time Attack, four-rotor, Mazda RX-8? It's the BMI Racing car we saw on Streetfire a while back. It's said to be the only four-rotor RX-8 in the world and it ...

For SEMA 2009, Mazda introduced us to a pair of the happiest Mazda3 derivatives we've ever seen. Part Le Mans-winning 787B tribute, part rolling showcase (for their Mazda accessories catalog) and part 40th ...

Several reports have surfaced over the past day indicating that Mazda is prepping a thoroughly redesigned RX-8 for display at the Frankfurt Motor Show this September. However, according to Mazda USA's director of communications, Jeremy ...