Mazda in the 70's Then and now
 

I remember when mazda came on like gangbusters in the early 1970's. Remember the logo...The thrill is back...Mazda performs. I remember how totally cool it was that ALL their autos were rotary powered. Remember bright red 4 door Rx2's (I had one)
The lime green and orange rx3's. Remember knowing the 12a engine was in all the cars except the RX4 which had the "big" 13B ? Remember the "futuristic" instrumentation of the RX4 ? I loved that era. Sadly, my rx2 began to leak coolant and steam when started.,...time for new rebuild. I remember how shitty those early waterpumps were as well. musta changed 15 or so. I remember in 1977 or 78 buying
a rx3 (which was a steamer) for $100 and pouring a can of radiator sealer in it to stop the engine leak and driving it to college. I don't remember what ever happened to that car. I couldn't afford to rebuild the engine so I just continued to use engine sealent and change the chewed up water pumps. :mdrmed: I remember talking a friend of mine into buying a rebuilt rx3 and shortly thereafter he was racing it and as wound out in 4th and instead of 5th, somehow shifted it into 1st causing a lot of damage....time for new engine. I remember getting laid in my rx3 with the front seat laid all the way back parked during a thunderstorm near a graveyard :cwm27: Afterward, we went to a dive of a bar called :The recovery room". I remember RX4's costing about $4000 new. I remember how the RX3 was so cool as it hauled ass and steered like a gocart. The things that REALLY sucked on all those early mazdas was 1) the brakes...almost worthless. 2) the sync in the trannys...shifting would GRIND. The suspension sucked as well. The RX3 had a rear leaf spring and if you hit a hard bump...BAM your head could hit the roof. Those we're fun days though....Shit I wish Mazda would remake a slightly more refined RX3 now with the 12a in it. I STILL think, they were so much fun to drive if they made a slightly refined version and could sell them cheap enough they'd sell a whole bunch. Problem is the manufacturing costs now with air bags and bumper technology....all that safety shit now makes it just damn hard to produce a really cheap fast fun car.The old RX3's were BASIC. No airbags,
thin lightweight metal and a screaming 12a engine. Damn were they fun. Remember how loud the redline buzzers were? 1st gear.....soooooommmm...beeep!....2nd.....hmmmmmmmm mmmmmm....beeeeep!
third...zooooooommmmmmmm!!!!........Beeeeeppppp. haha. Why can't I turn back the friggin clock for just a couple days???
Then I remember with all the engine problems the oil embargo and everybody freaking out about the shitty MPG of the whole Mazda lineup. Back then....Gas at 57 cents a gallon....Crap! Mazda was killed in the 70's by that magnificent yet flawed engine and the arabs. Crap. I didn't care....I would have bought a rotary engine car all through the 80's and 90's no problem. (I has 2 rx7's) I do miss mazda making a "regular" rotary powered car and from the looks of things, I don't think that will ever happen. Look at today 2006....over 30 years later...engine overheating and the MPG issue threatens once again the very best driving experience to be found in the world. Who else here remembers the magnificent 70's Mazda phenomenon ???

Yeah..........That was AWESOME!!!!

Rx-3.....
 

I remember it all quite well, if a little less enthusiastically than you :hahano:

Had an RX-3, with the four-barrel, and modded it a little to open the secondaries at WOT instead of by vacuum. That little car would FLY!

The ride was awful, the worst I've ever had by FAR. Swore I'd never buy a car with close to a 96" wheelbase again, but the fault probably lay in the suspension.

I was one of the first to use synthetic oil, Mobil1, at great expense - it was $6 US per can in 1975. It ate the side seal rings out of the 12a in about a month, but Mazda came thru and put me in a new engine, at 108000 miles, second owner! That's when I knew I would someday buy another Mazda.

S

Ps
 

One more thing...I remember driving my RX2 from Houston to Dallas and back to see a girl I had the hots for who was in the hospital for knee surgery. The car was a steamer and I was just driving itwith engine sealent. The water pump was leaking all the way there and back I was stopping adding water. The temp was all the was on red....Once started the engine just kept going and going. I finally got back and ordered all the parts, and using the book rebuilt it myself :ylsuper: cause a rebuild back the was 1500. I got all the parts I needed for 700. The hardest part was welding an engine stand to hold the "sandwich" uses lots and lots of vaseline to hold all those seals.

Go to my site www.mark-gan.com

click on sam houston button

look at the picture of me setting a girl's picture on fire. That's the girl I visited in the hospital...then scroll down to the picture of a tv set. look on the shelf, there's my roasted rotor and housing on display.
:)

It wasn't untill about 80 or 81 that I began to like Mazda's. IMSA came to Road America and I was a corner worker. RS class had the RX3's and GTU had the RX7's with open exhaust. I loved the RX3 SP. I never had one until I got my first RX7 in 85.

who is having oveheating problems?

I was just a kid, but I remember my dad rebuilding his RX-3 motor on the coffee table.

We were a rotary family...he had two RX-3's, a slight break for a Datsun 280Z, and then owned an FC cabriolet, which he traded in 94 for a blue FD....which he still has the bastard.

And I had an RX-8 for nearly three years...

But yeah...pretty crazy seeing a guy putting his engine together on a coffee table.

have you read about all those Las vegas Rx8's ?


Also a couple more 70's Mazda memories....Who remembers the woodgrain steering wheel (plastic) and shifter knob. Who remembers the white interiors on the rx2's ?
How 'bout being broke and in college and money either for beer or gas so you chose beer and drove your Rx3 around with the fuel pump clicking...(it was in the trunk).
Also, does anyone have any good links to pictures of these great old cars both interior and exterior?

Well I live in Vegas, and never had a problem with my 8 overheating...my coworker had an automatic though and hers overheated several times. She had an engine replaced, brought it back in again for stalling issues, and eventually Mazda just bought the car back from her.

She drives a G35C now.

I had an Rx-3 station wagon. It was a great ride and mechanically very sound - when everyone else was replacing rotor tips, mine just kept on going. Sold it to a friend who moved to Ohio and heard he racked up something like 160k miles on it. It shifted well but boy would it backfire!

A friend of mines mom bought a brand new rx3 wagon. Had many rides to school in it. She used to sing the silly commercial jingle that was out for the car: "And the engine goes hmmmmmmmm". Too funny.

I bought my first RX-2 in '71 then again in '73. Then two RX-4's, boy were they fun! Then the first RX-7 in may of '78 was a '79 model, I sure missed the 13B engine. A '87 turbo II was a ticket geter. I was driving alot back then. Now after a couple of back-ops and retireing I got a auto RX-8 in 03'. It was hard to order the automatic but my left leg is not that good, thanks to Mazda for giving us the choice otherwise it would have been the end of the rotary road for me. I have put a over 520k on rotary engines not counting piston Mazdas. I fell in love with the rotary engine early and am so glad Mazda has kept it going. Power has doubled and torque and mpg are way up as well. This is the most exotic car car you can get for the money, cant wait til the next one, I wil prob preorder again. Six different dealers have taken care of me well.

That's a cool story...I DO remember the backfiring.....Rev the crap out of it and be doing about 60 then let off the gas.....POW!...I have a '74 rotary suzuki that backfires as well. Remenber the shitty rubber grommets that held the exhaust pipe on at the rear of the car??? A friend of mine back in those days turboed his rotary truck....man was that thing fast! after we would haul ass around for awhile we'd stop and open the hood. The exhaust pipe was glowing red hot.

My first car was a RX-4 in 1989 i was 16. Man i loved that car but who doesn't love their first car, unless its really crap lol

My orange RX-2 was a stealth stoplight racer when I was a kid. What a blast 2nd gear was!! That lil 4-dr econobox could blow the doors of or at least keep up with some awesome cars of the day. ...not that surprise didn't have something to do with that lol as well.

Too bad the engine had to get rebuilt (under warranty) twice is about 25K miles w/blown seals.... then the fuel crisis, so called, killed the whole deal w/Mazda's rotary only getting 17mpg at the time on the highway.

Meanwhile, my buddies and I owned RX-4s and RX-2s and had a blast. Screw the cost! And BTW that's the principle reason I wanted an RX-8. Reclaiming the thrills of my youth!

I wasn't around back then, I was born in '85. I have a 5 year loan on my used 04 RX-8, gonna be broke until I get out of school. I am obsessed with this car. This is just the beginning of my rotary era

Very cool post Wankel lover. Maybe I'm not the motorhead I think I am, but I didn't know Mazda's whole line-up were rotaries back then.

One thing I remember, driving my first car at 16 - my dads hand me down '76 Grand Prix with a 455..all 200 horses of it, and loosing a drag against some old tiny car in disbelief. Later caught up to it, thought it was an Alfa, learned it was a RX3!

Finally got my own rotary 21 years later.

Yeah, THE rotary motorcycle right? A guy who restores older jap bikes always brings one out to a local hangout, rode with him once and really had to push my modern 1150cc BMW to keep up.

I thought I was old because I bought my first Rx-7 in 1980. :mdrmed: The RX-3 and 4 came out before I was old enough to drive. I do remember the ads though showing how simple the engine was. I remember I was fascinated with the design. That's probably why I'm a long time rotorhead.

I remember one ad showing two tire tracks leaving only flames behind. It was probably for the RX-3 maybe '72 or '73? It was a pretty hot car for the day.

Anyways, good thread. Thanks for making me feel not so old. :)

Yes back then very few people knew of Mazda or the rotary engine. The 70's were exciting times. Some of you probably havent seen anything like this Mazda hand out, look trough the pages, see the colors and the bold statements.

http://keith.miata.net/110S/index.html

Psychedelic, was that illustrated by Peter Max? :)

lol that was awesome!

I got curious about that jingle you were talking about, and I found it and thought I would share.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHzeG...y%20commercial

Wankel lover: never before have I seen someone so excited to use a plunger successfully!