Had a much longer test drive in a hi-power titanium today (almost 45 minutes) and have to admit that there seems to be very little difference between the two performance wise. I'd go as far to say that if I had done so before ordering I would probably save the 2k and go for the lo-power.

The main difference between the test drives was that todays was in the wet and the traction control indicator (I think that's what it is, a yellow symbol in the rev counter showing a skidding car) came on several times while putting the power down , especially exiting bends. I enjoyed the drive just as much and managed to redline it in both 3rd and 4th gear.:D

For the record the electric widows were both auto up and down.

Anyone else test driven both and if so what did you think of the performance differences?

 

Redline it in 4th:O what speed is that (ovbiously on a track I assume)?

Hi-power gets some nice goodies , and a higher rev line, I dont expect 40ps to be that different inreal world tems on the roads but 6 gears, HIDS and ali pedals are enough for me, considering Mazdas accesory prices!

 

(flame suit on)
340ps - no wonder you dont care about the delivery date Rob! :D
(/flame suit off)

hehe can't do angled brackets - it tries to interpret it as html.

hahahah

hmm, well I dunno, I'd love to drive the two and therefore compare the difference in speed....if you think they are close Andy, then maybe I would also think about having the lo power myself.

hmmm although I have always wanted a 6 speed car (not including reverse!)

 

Ooops , edited. If it was 340ps more , it'd be such a no-brainer choice...

 

Not a track - a nice quiet section of the M4! Not sure what speed it was but I was really shifting!:D

I don't think the extras are really worth the extra spend, I don't care about the pedals, and the Xenon's are probably a lot better but I don't think the normal headlights will be any different to my current car. As for the extra gear and higher redline, well they didn't make a noticeable difference to the performance , noise, torque etc so again not sure they are worth the spend. The 6th gear doesn't seem to make it more economical for cruising either, so I don't really see the point tbh.

I suppose what I'm saying is that on paper the spec is a lot better for the hi-power but in reality the two cars seem very evenly matched and I'm now no longer sure whether the hi-power justifies the 2k extra.

 

For me, the difference between 6.4 secs and 7.2 secs to 60 is what counts .... that plus the 9000 rpm red line. These may sound small numbers, but they really are the reason I'm choosing the high power.

I used to have a Citroen BX19 16V GTi which did 0 to 60 in 7.4 secs, so some 10 years later I want something that's somewhat faster.

 

Plus the small fact that the Hi-power engine will be more accepting of enhanced chips and/or mechanical modifications at a later date. The extra ports and gear won't always be gimmicks.

 

Well that's some good news for me, as one of the few 5 speed (we prefer not to say 'low power') future owners!

I must say that i test drove the 6 speed, and wasn't blown away by the acceleration, so was a little concerened that i had made a bad choice, but no longer.

I think that 2k is a small price to pay for the extra power, bells and whistles, i just couldn't stretch as i didn't want cloth.

But i may disagree with you about future upgrades Lensman. I have done a little research and it seems the 4 port motor is a good candidate (perhaps better than the 6) for forced induction. I'm also hoping to up my 192ps to at least the japanese 210 or so, by a reflash in good time. Does the 8 have an OBD2 port?

 

I'd be very surprised if there is almost a second difference to 60, although these things are often hard to judge accurately. My T5 has a 0-62 of 6.8 but I'd say the hi-power was no quicker than the T5 and the lo-power was almost exactly the same as the hi-power. Maybe the wet conditions made the difference and at the end of the day its all about perception rather than published figures. My feeling was that there was only a fractional difference , not nearly a second, and that the hi-power wasn't up to the 6.4 that is claimed.

Don't get me wrong - the car is plenty quick enough, it's just that its plenty quick enough in both versions.

 

I'm not really surprised that the high and low power models have similar performance. There was a test recently with the Japanese cars that showed the performance of the Japanese high and low power to be almost identical.

All the threads in the main forum casting doubt on the US high power's horsepower seem to finger the high rev region as the culprit. The low power car does not rev that high, so if there is a problem here it would not affect the low power car.

I think the high power is worth the extra, because it does at least have the potential for 228 hp and probably more. It just seems that at the moment all the fancy intake stuff they added to get the extra power is not being allowed to work properly by the ECU.

 

Just a thought for you guys. Forget the power dif - the higher revline of the hi-pwr version IMHO would ALWAYS be worth it for one simple driving experience:

3rd gear rush - truly this is one of the most fun driving gears. Being able to have an ear-to-ear grin :D (<-like this) on demand with great acceleration from 40 to 80+MPH due to the 9000+ rpm redline is one of the most endearing attributes of the car!

Think about it... not only are on-ramps a one-gear wooosh! but ALSO picture doing maybe 60-65 on the motorway and you have the rpms available to shift DOWN from 6th to 3rd for extra push!!!! OMG that is fun...what flexibility that gives you! The rotary is so quiet and smooth that as crazy as that sounds to piston heads, it is a perfectly OK thing for rotaryheads to do, and it's a genuine rush. Trust me.

Although I haven't driven the low power, the low revs would make those top end speeds above more-or-less unavailable in 3rd, I would imagine.

Just :D

 

As an FTO owner, I ended up in the GPX v. GR argument. The two models are almost identical in speed in the real world (0.2 diff to 60 or so), but the GPX has 197hp versus 170 or so for the GR.

In this case both rev to 8000, but the GPX has variable valve timing. Interestingly, the GR has slightly more torque during parts of the power curve, so some comparisons with the rx8.

The GPX has more standard stuff for the cash, but the main difference for me was gearing. Having driven both quite a bit, I felt that I had a bit less leeway with the GR when down shifting to acccelarate past anything.

Basically, I prefer the extra (albeit slight) speed and gearing ratios, so I probably would on the rx8 (only driven the hi-power).

Anyway, 0.8 secs difference in 0-62 is difficult to tell when just accellarating in a straight line. Maybe this is a better way to look at it......In my car, if I go all out with air-con off I can do 0-62 in 7.1ish (have one of those accel/quarter mile measuring devices), but if I switch it on then the time always goes up to about 7.8. I can't really tell the difference in speed when doing this (just like the lo/hi rx8's), but wouldn't it make a BIG difference if overtaking other cars? I'd rather have the extra tenths to spare! :D

Stu C