Mazda Has Assembled Its Rotary Avengers Ahead Of A New Sports Car

We’re a step closer to the new Mazda RX promised land, folks. In a move straight from Marvel, the manufacturer has assembled a team of engineers specifically to develop the next generation of rotary engines.

Dubbed the ‘RE Development Group’ (perhaps not as catchy as Guardians of The Galaxy), 36 handpicked engineers will from today behind working on the Wankel which is taking on a new life as a range extender paired up with electric motors. We’ve already seen the first of these with the MX-30 REV, but that looks like it could be just a footnote in a storied future of rotaries.

As part of its development, Mazda has said the team will work on adapting the rotary to work on carbon-neutral fuels.

Mazda is yet to confirm which cars will get a rotary, but there’s a strong implication a rotary-equipped sports car is in development, stemming from the Iconic SP concept shown late last year.

Shortly after speaking on the Iconic SP in a presentation during this year’s Tokyo Auto Salon, Katsuhiro Moro, Mazda President and chief executive officer, said: “I am very happy and deeply moved by all the support and encouragement I have received for the compact sports car concept. I would like to take this opportunity to thank you all”

He added: "With your encouragement, we are launching a rotary engine development group on 1 February to move closer to this dream"

That wasn't direct confirmation a production version of the Iconic SP is happening, but it’s very close to it. At least we can tell there’s enthusiasm high up within Mazda to make it a reality.

The Iconic SP concept itself thought to be previewing the looks of a future MX-5 if not necessarily the powertrain, uses a two-rotor engine to provide power to a set of electric motors. We’d expect a similar setup in a production version, rather than a true rotary-only RX-7 or RX-8 successor. 

Total power from the concept’s system tallies at 370bhp of peak power, which feels about par for the course for something that would surely be set to rival the Toyota Supra and Nissan Z.

Alongside the near-enough confirmation of a new sports car, the Japanese firm recently launched Spirit Racing - a spiritual successor to Mazdaspeed which will spawn more track-focused versions of its existing cars. It sounds like things are getting exciting over at Mazda.