Mazda MX-5 Superlight Concept: 995kg Of Fun

Now we're talkin'. Mazda's MX-5, aka the Miata, is a car near and dear to my heart and the heart of many a sportscar enthusiast out there. It's essentially what every British sportscar form the 60s was, and also wanted to be. It handles like nobody's business, brakes great, revs high and, best of all it works. You turn on the headlights and the heater fan at the same time and they function, something that could not be said to happen for, say, a 1965 MGB.

So what's not to like? Sure, you could say more power – I know guys who are asking for more top end with there Cobras, there's always more power to be had. But an idea that has been kicking around Miata circles for quite some time has been the desire for a factory stripper.

Make the car even lighter. Take out everything unnecessary. Delete stuff like the heater and the carpeting and go down Colin Chapman road as far as you can. Turns out that Mazda has decided to do just that, at least in show car form. OK, maybe it's not a total stripper, but they have made an interesting concept.

Dubbed the Mazda MX-5 Superlight Concept, the car will roll out at the Frankfurt Motor Show next week. Mazda has taken away the windscreen and has stripped the car down to achieve a curb weight of just under a metric ton. The work was carried out at Mazda's European R+D centre in Oberursel, Germany.

"I've dreamed of building a Mazda MX-5 with this kind of radical form for a long time. Now that weight reduction has become a dominant factor in automotive development, the time is ripe for it. We show how lightweight a car today can be, " says Peter Birtwhistle, Mazda Motor Europe's Chief Designer. Yeah, you and me both, Pete.

In addition to dispensing with the windscreen, Mazda's designers also did away with the MX-5's retractable top and its frame. They also added an extension of the original aluminum hood into the cabin made of lightweight carbon fiber. This is to covering for the dashboard frame and also houses a single aluminum wide-angle mirror. The car also gets a pair of special roll over bars with LED brake lights.

In the cockpit there's ultra-lightweight carbon fiber racing bucket seats upholstered in saddle colored leather, as is the armrests, the steering wheel, and the lightweight aluminum shift lever and hand brake.

The dashboard is made of lightweight plastic reinforced with fiberglass and adds a starter button to the standard instrumentation. There is no air condition or fan, and the sound insulation mats and rugs are gone as well.

In the engine bay there's the stock 126-horsepower 1.8-liter four-cylinder engine mated to a five-speed manual transmission. Mazda has added a cold-air intake made of polished and powder-coated aluminum and a Mazdaspeed exhaust system delivering a sportier exhaust note.

They reworked the brakes, adding four-piston, fixed calipers and perforated discs that bumped up the track by 50 mm. They also lowered the ride height by 30mm and installed Bilstein B16 coil-over suspension plus Eibach stabilizers. At the corners there's the stock 205/45 R17 original-equipment tires and alloy wheels from the 2.0-liter version.

All up, the Superlight comes in at 995 kg or 2,194 pounds which is about what the original, NA version weighed. It can go zero to 62 mph in 8.9 seconds and gets 37.3 mpg.

No, they're not going to build a production version, which is sad ... I might be one of the first guys in line.

Source: CarScoop